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NSF plans end to lone U.S. Antarctic research icebreaker

science.org

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Re: NSF plans end to lone U.S. Antarctic research icebreaker

#51

Post by Yeul »

mlinhares wrote: post #25
petesergeant wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What possible justification could you have for this The base wants to see spending cuts in exchange for the tax cuts the rich are getting, and thinks science (especially climate science!) is a blunt tool by which liberals berate and control them.

The base doesn't care about this, I doubt they even know this boat exists, this is being done for the sake of destroying science because they hate it.

The base are the rich who get the tax cuts.

Looking at the US is looking at making Cyberpunk real. If you're not rich your vote doesn't matter you are just a useful idiot.

Re: NSF plans end to lone U.S. Antarctic research icebreaker

#52

Post by Yeul »

monero-xmr wrote: post #41
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you can’t imagine such research could have happened without taxpayer funding In a vacuum, maybe. But if China is subsidising basic research, it doesn’t make sense for private enterprise to do it here. That technology base shifts to where its cost of capital is lowest. This is practically how America ascended—putting massive public resources behind emerging science and technology before the fractured powers of Europ…

Funneling massive amounts of taxpayer dollars perhaps made sense in a pre-internet age where central planning of research was potentially more efficient when capital moved slowly and wasn’t large enough to fund such endeavors. I truly think that time passed decades ago. I would entertain arguments for situations where huge amounts of taxpayer dollars might be required because the private sector doesn’t show up. But t…

Funneling massive amounts of taxpayer money is how China caught up.

Look I get it those with good incomes in America want to pay less taxes because they can take care of themselves.

Re: NSF plans end to lone U.S. Antarctic research icebreaker

#53

Post by ck2 »

It's going to take 100 years to recover from this spiteful, pointless destruction

Who would ever work again for any research in any science that relies on government cooperation in the US?

Only all of Congress should be able to do these things, we do not have Kings and we don't tolerate Tyrants

Re: NSF plans end to lone U.S. Antarctic research icebreaker

#54

Post by oefrha »

monero-xmr wrote: post #44
oefrha wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Explaining the value of fundamental research and long term societal investment to some crypto bro is an utter waste of time. Polar opposite mindset.

I understood the value of crypto well before the vast majority of people and made a significant amount of money. While that isn’t an argument in favor of my opinions on other subjects, the pejorative of “crypto bro” is certainly inaccurate considering I noticed a massive profit opportunity well before most others, and instead should signal that I have heterodox opinions that might be accurate before the small-c conse…

Exhibit A. Exactly what I’m taking about.

Re: NSF plans end to lone U.S. Antarctic research icebreaker

#55

Post by JumpCrisscross »

runsWphotons wrote: post #42
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you can’t imagine such research could have happened without taxpayer funding In a vacuum, maybe. But if China is subsidising basic research, it doesn’t make sense for private enterprise to do it here. That technology base shifts to where its cost of capital is lowest. This is practically how America ascended—putting massive public resources behind emerging science and technology before the fractured powers of Europ…

Until somewhat recently America had an advantage in commercialising the basic research. But now increasingly we fund some basic research to the tune of tens of millions of dollars only to see it commercialised overseas (often by China but by others too), often when technical know how is exfiltrated and patents ignored. This reduces the expected benefit of funding the research. Science has been a big part of the US do…

> it is better case that America ascended through industrial and commercial might

We ascended remarkably similarly to how China is. Stealing IP from the old powers, giving it room and state support to scale and then staying out of nonsense wars.

Re: NSF plans end to lone U.S. Antarctic research icebreaker

#56

Post by mindslight »

palmfacehn wrote: post #37
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you can’t imagine such research could have happened without taxpayer funding In a vacuum, maybe. But if China is subsidising basic research, it doesn’t make sense for private enterprise to do it here. That technology base shifts to where its cost of capital is lowest. This is practically how America ascended—putting massive public resources behind emerging science and technology before the fractured powers of Europ…

Equating central planning with liberty feels like a reach. Can you think of any examples where central planning resulted in misallocated resources? If so, why is state directed research a special case? If the state has cancelled research for 'impure' political motives, how would we know that it hasn't directed state research (and outcomes) for similarly impure political reasons? There's an interesting contradiction i…

> Can you think of any examples where central planning resulted in misallocated resources?

Plenty, of course.

> If so, why is state directed research a special case?

It's not a "special case", but rather there does not seem to be a better way to allocate significant resources for scientific research than governmental funding. Thus, the decision is either to accept that there will be some misallocation from centralized funding (while working to mitigate those inefficiencies), or to give up doing most fundamental research.

Also note that government funding of research is "additive" to an otherwise default-open system - independent actors can always fund research they'd like to see. Whereas most of the time we bemoan central planning we're talking about closed dynamics from which there is no opt-out. If privately funded research were generally lucrative, then we would see much more of it. But outside of some very specific contexts (straightforward patentability, prospects of immediate commercialization, subjects adjacent to highly lucrative centralized industries (which is closer to government funding than not)), we don't.

In general markets are not supercomputational - markets are merely one heuristic that works well for some things and terribly for others. If we were talking about say how many gas or electric vehicle charging stations to build and where, that's something that is decently handled decently by private investment. But an endeavor where the gains from discoveries will end up distributed and a private investor can't reap most rewards from their investment won't be.

Re: NSF plans end to lone U.S. Antarctic research icebreaker

#57

Post by brendoelfrendo »

throwworhtthrow wrote: post #36
brendoelfrendo wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.propublica.org/article/video-project-2025-presid... Consider the video "Staffing an Office" where Jeff Small, a former advisor in the Department of the Interior says “When you work for the federal government everything you put in an email, text, or note is FOIAable and releasable to the American people. At interior, we had a ton of in person meetings which allowed us to speak a little more freely about th…

You'll find worse quotes from the House interview [1] of Fauci's advisor David Morens. Ever since I watched a recording of his testimony I've been more willing to give incompetence "passes" to bad behavior in Republican admins. [1] https://www.science.org/content/article/house-panel-takes-fa...

Why? Assign malice where there's malice. Don't give someone a pass because someone else might have done something worse.

Re: NSF plans end to lone U.S. Antarctic research icebreaker

#58

Post by s1artibartfast »

mindslight wrote: post #56
palmfacehn wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Equating central planning with liberty feels like a reach. Can you think of any examples where central planning resulted in misallocated resources? If so, why is state directed research a special case? If the state has cancelled research for 'impure' political motives, how would we know that it hasn't directed state research (and outcomes) for similarly impure political reasons? There's an interesting contradiction i…

> Can you think of any examples where central planning resulted in misallocated resources? Plenty, of course. > If so, why is state directed research a special case? It's not a "special case", but rather there does not seem to be a better way to allocate significant resources for scientific research than governmental funding. Thus, the decision is either to accept that there will be some misallocation from centralize…

it seems plausible that there are diminishing returns to fundamental research, and that those returns are conditional on the funding system environment.

I think many people have concluded that the marginal ROI is negative or the system environment is prohibitively inefficient.

Re: NSF plans end to lone U.S. Antarctic research icebreaker

#59

Post by qingcharles »

brendoelfrendo wrote: post #14
nxobject wrote: post #3

> NSF has been opaque about these plans—intentionally so, Wellner believes. “They are purposely not putting anything in writing,” she says. And the planned cancellation is leaving in limbo the scientists who have cruises planned for the Palmer this Antarctic summer, which begins in December. Incompetence (we didn't think about this out loud), or malice (we didn't want to leave a paper trail)?

https://www.propublica.org/article/video-project-2025-presid... Consider the video "Staffing an Office" where Jeff Small, a former advisor in the Department of the Interior says “When you work for the federal government everything you put in an email, text, or note is FOIAable and releasable to the American people. At interior, we had a ton of in person meetings which allowed us to speak a little more freely about th…

This happens all through government now. As soon as any small public body starts getting FOIA requests they stop putting anything off-color into an email and take it to phone calls and private meetings.

Re: NSF plans end to lone U.S. Antarctic research icebreaker

#60

Post by mindslight »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #58
mindslight wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Can you think of any examples where central planning resulted in misallocated resources? Plenty, of course. > If so, why is state directed research a special case? It's not a "special case", but rather there does not seem to be a better way to allocate significant resources for scientific research than governmental funding. Thus, the decision is either to accept that there will be some misallocation from centralize…

it seems plausible that there are diminishing returns to fundamental research, and that those returns are conditional on the funding system environment. I think many people have concluded that the marginal ROI is negative or the system environment is prohibitively inefficient.

Sure? I would say that "many people" have concluded the system is a negative due to political propaganda fueled by general feelings of powerlessness, and are now trying to backfill justifications as if this is about anything more than the "culture war".

Your argument would be appropriate if we were debating the amount of spending in the context of other spending, or relative to itself. But in isolation as some heuristic it's "not even wrong". The larger context is this same movement blindly destroying our scientific research institutions also just added $5T of new debt, with a large chunk of that being spent on nothing more than a spectacle of performative cruelty (ICE).

And so I have to ask - do you really want to be making an argument in support of indulging the mob in their desire to see people hurt instead of actually advancing as a species?

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