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What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

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Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#61

Post by aqueueaqueue »

unsnap_biceps wrote: post #12
dan_can_code wrote: post #3

The cynic in me thinks that the US is going to roll over and take this fascist shake down. The optimist in me thinks that the people will rise up with a resounding NO and do something about it. Right now I'm not sure which I believe.

I think the former is most likely. The people are largely unhappy with how things have been and it's unlikely to get materially worse for the majority of people in the near term, so I don't think there will be a fire lit under enough of the population to rise up. If it gets bad enough that most people are starving, rather then just struggling, we'll see action, but I doubt it'll get there anytime soon.

It just needs something small to be taken away or happen that ignite and capture the collective imagination.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#62

Post by TylerE »

thinkingtoilet wrote: post #37
csa wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The cynic in me thinks that the US is going to roll over and take this fascist shake down. The optimist in me thinks that the people will rise up with a resounding NO and do something about it. Right now I'm not sure which I believe. At this point, almost certainly the former. 1. Most Trump supporters do not think that there is a problem. 2. “Regular people” — that is, the folks who don’t track news — won’t notice…

These "regular people" that you seem to condescendingly speak about absolutely notice it at the pump and at the grocery store. They aren't mindless robots.

Boy are those folks gonna get what they voted for…

Price of eggs dropped yet?

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#63

Post by ncr100 »

iancmceachern wrote: post #2

Not good

Yep. Destruction of systems (orgs, ...) that take care of us.

Meanwhile, TikTok (et al) tells us to talk about ourselves ... the current focus of attention of the Fifth most popular social network of the citizens of the United States. [1] [2]

Q: how could we have avoided this pathetic crawl into encouraging stupidity?

(Feeling sad, thinking, 'Look at our Works, and cry.')

[1] https://later.com/blog/tiktok-trends/

[2] https://www.statista.com/statistics/272014/global-social-net...

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#64

Post by UncleOxidant »

willvarfar wrote: post #49
bawolff wrote: post #4

Seems like a good opportunity for other countries to recruit scientists. I think its underappreciated how much of America's modern success comes down to attracting scientists and intellectuals from war torn europe in the 30s-50s.

China, for example, could set up a very European-style English-speaking institute in Hong Kong or Macau with high salaries to attract scientists. Singapore and South Korea too. One day Americans might well follow the money and the research freedom?

Heck, China has a reproduction of Jackson Hole, Wy. (See the documentary Americaville)

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#65

Post by TylerE »

dmagee wrote: post #59

There seems to be a lot of negativity from the HN crowd about this. But, the reality is that your fellow Americans voted for this. If you don'y like it, you're going to have to convince people that it's a bad idea. Getting worked up about Trump or Musk or SV bros isn't getting us anywhere.

[flagged]

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#66

Post by throwawaymaths »

just two days ago:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42910829

the problems that led to these frauds are structural--no amount of patching the system will fix this.

maybe we should consider the possibility that we are due for a refactor, which is often painful, but especially painful for people (or code) with an entrenched incentive to continue existing.

i dont mean to defend what the administration is doing but I'm warning that everyone crying doom and gloom and threatening to move abroad, etc. might be eating crow. ironically, the very people most likely to move abroad (in it for the career, not for the principle) are biased to be the types bringing down our system of science. bad science is the science equivalent of a zirp.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#67

Post by aqueueaqueue »

joe_the_user wrote: post #54
dan_can_code wrote: post #3

The cynic in me thinks that the US is going to roll over and take this fascist shake down. The optimist in me thinks that the people will rise up with a resounding NO and do something about it. Right now I'm not sure which I believe.

The thing I find strange is that the other wealthy and powerful stand for the destruction of things that gave the US a huge competitive advantage. The average person isn't hit immediately by the destruction of science. But a far-sighted person with some power should by self-interest not want this. And this, I think, points to the corruption of the entire political class in America with just being upshot.

Elon can live anywhere in the world. Very rich people are global citizens. They cannot be patriotic.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#68

Post by jcgrillo »

dekhn wrote: post #23
boc wrote: post #9

Watching the tech community waltz into DC and pretend that they know how all the levers of government work is pathetic. Are there inefficiencies? Sure. Are there places to improve? Of course. But pretending that they can understand the intricacies of literally decades of institutional knowledge and deep connections across the globe in the course of a single weekend is asinine. We need to do better. The US government…

Note this isn't representative of the tech industry in general. When I worked for Google I visited NIH, sat on study groups, and helped advise program managers how to move more compute to the cloud. Like many other techies in SV I have a PhD in a quantitative science and understand how NIH works. My efforts were entirely designed to help update the establishment, not tear it down, and that's true for the wide swath o…

> Note this isn't representative of the tech industry in general.

I'm not convinced. In the past half decade or so this industry has veered hard toward outright fraud and grift. I see this trend all over--adtech, cryptocoins, "AI", security... These days I assume technologists are frauds until they prove otherwise. It's a blunt instrument, but it often works well.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#69

Post by alaxhn »

thatfrenchguy wrote: post #6

So many brilliant researchers in the US are funded by NSF grants. Even beyond public research, just the private sector benefits just from the training (and associated freedom from not having to chase money and TA) that NSF fellows get is immense. Injecting dumb politics and refusing grants just because people put the words "biases" in their application is a great way to appeal to Republicans's undereducated voters (s…

So you don't think being forced to include a statement on diversity in every single grant request reviewed by the NIH was "injecting dumb politics" but you do think that being forced to NOT include a statement on diversity in every single grant request is?

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#70

Post by alextingle »

cft wrote: post #36
dan_can_code wrote: post #3

The cynic in me thinks that the US is going to roll over and take this fascist shake down. The optimist in me thinks that the people will rise up with a resounding NO and do something about it. Right now I'm not sure which I believe.

Time to leave HN for me. It's become a cesspool of this vitriol.

Which bit of that is vitriol?
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