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WH proposes rules giving political appointees final approval on research grants

scientificamerican.com

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Re: WH proposes rules giving political appointees final approval on research grants

#591

Post by phs318u »

Terr_ wrote: post #584
SubiculumCode wrote: post #566

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No biologist is an essentialist for long. Sorry, the author makes a good argument that there are only two sexes if and only if you ou define sex by the specific definition of gametes. The author is not wrong within that limited scope. But, what really matters is the phenotype of sex, which is not binary, is highly overlapping, and is a complex developmental phenomenon. When people get all up in arms being anti trans,…

> If you want to define biological sex as only being the gametes Compare to: "If it burns diesel, it's a truck, if it burns gasoline, it's a car. Thus, there are only two kinds with no overlap, easy peasy."

Are humans as simple as cars though? And why does sexuality get represented by the energy source n your analogy? Why doesn’t sexuality get represented by other characteristics? Perhaps because “there’s only two kinds - sedans and pickups” sounds a little silly?

Re: WH proposes rules giving political appointees final approval on research grants

#592

Post by phs318u »

joenot443 wrote: post #587
phs318u wrote: post #573

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You sir, are no biologist.

Which part of his comment are you disagreeing with when you say that?

The part where he’s chosen to ignore all the physical developmental factors that contribute to how sexuality is expressed in the body and focus solely on gametes in order to fit the world into a preconceived notion of “male” and “female”.

I’ll give an analogy. Male and female are to biology as orbitals are to nuclear physics. A really, really useful shorthand. But they do not describe actual physical electrons “orbiting” a nucleus. Don’t mistake the shorthand for the reality. Scientific shorthand is generally not useful for reasonably discussing edge cases.

Re: WH proposes rules giving political appointees final approval on research grants

#594

Post by rsynnott »

OtherShrezzing wrote: post #208
Jerry2 wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Emigrate where? And why do you assume that the country you're gonna emigrate to will have the funds necessay to fund the research? US grants are the biggest and most generous in the world. I think the USG spends over $900 Billion every year. Europe spends about 1/10th of that. Other option is China but as a foreigner, you will never get a grant there unless you work for someone else.

> I think the USG spends over $900 Billion every year. Europe spends about 1/10th of that Do you mean that the EU spends 1/10th that, rather than Europe ? Because France, Germany and the UK all spend €100-150bn each in grants depending on how you set your definition, and that’s atop the EU’s grant money. Just eyeballing the figures across different countries, it looks like the USG distributes approximately the same a…

People tend to be terribly confused about what the EU actually does and is for.

Re: WH proposes rules giving political appointees final approval on research grants

#595

Post by rsynnott »

pindab0ter wrote: post #153
hdgvhicv wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They voted for this. In larger numbers than in 2020 and 2016.

What is this "this" you're referring to? Was this on the ballot? Did Trump announce that he would do this? It seems very easy to just blame this on the voter like this.

I mean, Trump was all but outright saying "I am going to be comically terrible"; the people voting for him presumably knew at least the broad strokes of what they'd be getting, if not the fine detail.

Re: WH proposes rules giving political appointees final approval on research grants

#596

Post by rsynnott »

nomilk wrote: post #105

This means research projects will be optimised for political boasting. Sounds terrible, but is it? It incentivises high-impact research (otherwise politicians can't boast about it), and less research into trivialities that common sense says aren't worth the public funding.

Thing about common sense is that it isn't.

Re: WH proposes rules giving political appointees final approval on research grants

#597

Post by softwaredoug »

mold_aid wrote: post #532
softwaredoug wrote: post #471

To steel man this move You could argue peer review has become a mechanism to encourage incrementalism. That it doesn’t reward big leaps. And the public isn’t getting ROI on science funding compared to 50 years ago. Peer review is a closed system of expertise that doesn’t let you challenge the core tenants - some might say theology - of the field. It’s basically a cartel for keeping a field of study alive, regardless…

>You could argue peer review has become a mechanism to encourage incrementalism. That it doesn’t reward big leaps. And the public isn’t getting ROI on science funding compared to 50 years ago. Are you arguing that or not Also: tenets >some might say theology - of the field Some might, I'm sure! Are you saying that?

No I am steelmanning. Making the best version of the other argument.

https://www.lesswrong.com/w/steelmanning

Personally, I am sympathetic to the idea that science has stagnated. But I do not think this is the solution.

This is a case of correctly diagnosing the problem - but not actually having a real solution

Re: WH proposes rules giving political appointees final approval on research grants

#598

Post by ruszki »

IncreasePosts wrote: post #349
consp wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On a gdp basis, which heavily favours the US, the US is not even the top dog. It's just above Belgium and below South Korea.

Absolute values would favor the US, not a percent of gdp.

Concentration does definitely matter. Cities vs countryside for example. In the case, per capita definitely matters.

Re: WH proposes rules giving political appointees final approval on research grants

#599

Post by quickthrowman »

yieldcrv wrote: post #494
mschuster91 wrote: post #431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> With a few exceptions like Switzerland, American levels of compensation for highly qualified people just can't be matched anywhere in the Western world. Gross compensation yes. But if you begin deducting stuff like the absurd American housing costs, private healthcare, saving up for deductibles, the need to own, insure, fuel and maintain a car to do everything because almost nothing is accessible by public transpor…

I've done that math too and the other reality is that most of those costs are optional in the US. It is 100% possible for me to have a high salary in the US and save most of it while temporarily exposing myself to larger risks. And it is far more useful for me to be able to say and show that I have a high salary, for access to credit and resources, private investments that give me the best shot of escaping a permanen…

> I've done that math too and the other reality is that most of those costs are optional in the US.

It really depends on your situation. I am living alone in an apartment that costs 60% of the median rent in my metro area and my generous healthcare plan ($1500 deductible, $3000 max OOP) is fully paid by my employer, short and long term disability insurance paid for by my employer, and my car will be paid off in 3 months. I am able to save around half of my income, but my sister and BIL have three kids and a house and they spend almost all of their money. Their combined income is probably 2.5-3x of what I make, but by myself I have a higher net worth than them. They’ll probably surpass me in net worth once they can stop paying for daycare and get their student loans cleared, they just have a lot of expenses I don’t.

Re: WH proposes rules giving political appointees final approval on research grants

#600

Post by ndsipa_pomu »

ChrisLTD wrote: post #186

It’s sad to watch my country commit suicide. Not only will my compatriots be poorer for it, but the rest of the world will be too.

Have you considered that all the people just watching are maybe enabling it?
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