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New executive order puts all grants under political control

arstechnica.com

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Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control

#61

Post by antonvs »

mindslight wrote: post #57
intermerda wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Paul Graham? Pretty sure he was anti-Trump before the last election. But I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s one of those “enlightened centrists.”

Maybe I've unfairly judged him. Last I remember seeing was some pearl clutching about how Trump/Musk needed to "be careful" with what DOGE cut or something. I took that assumption of good faith as an indication of being in the reality distortion field, like too many other VCs are.

Money makes them vulnerable.

They didn’t get to where they are without playing a conformance game. That limits the degree to which they can object to anything.

Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control

#63

Post by dotancohen »

teaearlgraycold wrote: post #4
pfannkuchen wrote: post #3

I don’t really understand why so much of science is funded by the government instead of by private philanthropy. It seems like an obvious channel for corruption of science. Sure private donors have interest driven motives too but it would be diffuse across many areas not concentrated like a political party’s interests.

Private philanthropy doesn't feel like it's free from corruption.

Recent events related to the Qatari funding make this poignant.

Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control

#64

Post by defrost »

epistasis wrote: post #15
pokstad wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the Soviets made them second…

Not because they trusted their scientists to be able to do it though. They used the plans stolen form the US instead.

It's somewhat more complicated given that much of the significant work passed on by Klaus Fuchs to the Soviets that they acknowledge was responsible for the first Soviet fission bomb was Fuchs own work .. he shared with the British, the Americans, the Canadians, and the Soviets .. who were all ostensibly allies at the time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaus_Fuchs

Adding to @eastbound's comment the Soviets were also responsible for the first remote operated "robot" on the moon.

Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control

#65

Post by ewoodrich »

ojbyrne wrote: post #38
noncoml wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The replies to his tweet are a cesspool. Why do people still use Twitter?

You have to be logged in to see the comments. So…

Just swap x.com with xcancel.com, I used a Chrome extension to set up a redirect rule so it's automatic.

Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control

#66

Post by mnky9800n »

827a wrote: post #23
pfannkuchen wrote: post #3

I don’t really understand why so much of science is funded by the government instead of by private philanthropy. It seems like an obvious channel for corruption of science. Sure private donors have interest driven motives too but it would be diffuse across many areas not concentrated like a political party’s interests.

The biggest reason is because we have a strategic multinational interest in remaining a leader in science. China (and other countries) will fund science. We have to as well, or we fall behind. Its national security. We also have a strategic interest in draining intelligent individuals from other countries and nationalizing them in ours, which science funding plays a major part in doing. One of the reasons why its com…

It’s also that most r1 university budgets single largest contributor is grant overhead which is the approximate 50% of the grant you win is given to the university. But the people who write and win these grants have little say over how this money is spent. Also because universities are impervious to reorganising there is a lot of extra weight within departments as well.

Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control

#68

Post by mnky9800n »

energy123 wrote: post #50
pfannkuchen wrote: post #3

I don’t really understand why so much of science is funded by the government instead of by private philanthropy. It seems like an obvious channel for corruption of science. Sure private donors have interest driven motives too but it would be diffuse across many areas not concentrated like a political party’s interests.

Neoclassical economics has an answer! The market can't provide public goods like basic research since it's non-excludable. This is a market failure, causing inefficient allocation of resources. Therefore, the government has to provide it. This can improve efficiency of resource distribution, if done well. Whether it's done well is not a foregone conclusion. That's why we need effective and technocratic state capacity…

I don’t feel like what you said provided an answer.

Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control

#70

Post by pokstad »

epistasis wrote: post #15
pokstad wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the Soviets made them second…

Not because they trusted their scientists to be able to do it though. They used the plans stolen form the US instead.

Well then maybe it is easier to let someone else do the heavy lifting first
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