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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

#611

Post by handle584 »

jjav wrote: post #507
yieldcrv wrote: post #494

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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. If you're very young, single and childless, sort of. You can pick the lowest tier of health coverage from your employer which is often fully covered by the employer and have no other major costs. If you're young and single and healthy this can work out. Of course, if you have some kind of accident or medical emergency,…

>in the US we get to work our nice 60 to 80 hour weeks

That is hardly the norm, if you work in the hottest AI startup or some field of quant then sure, but average SWE do work the same 40 hour week. Lack of paid vacation is true tho.

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

#612

Post by sbayg »

doom2 wrote: post #546
sbayg wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s always the poor and uneducated voters that get the blame. It’s never the actual billionaires who got Trump elected and who control everything he does and much of the media zeitgeist because, you know, 100s of billions can really flood the zone. I don’t think you’re evil for being fooled, but try to think a bit deeper about where power and blame lie. It’s not uneducated rural folk the median yuppie finds uncool.

Why not both? I read an article recently about the Texas Senate race and one Republican voter they interviewed said it was about "the immigrants and the guns." So low information voters get a pass because they're awash in right wing propaganda? What happened to the oft cited right wing value of "personal responsibility"?

Because divide and conquer is why you remain insignificant.

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

#613

Post by SubiculumCode »

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."

There are plenty of sedans that run diesel, especially in Europe, but even in America.

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

#614

Post by xhkkffbf »

j7ake wrote: post #564
conception wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Private companies don’t do basic research.

Check Physics and Chemistry Nobel prize of last 5 years, Google was involved in half of them.

IBM researchers won a few Nobel prizes themselves.

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

#615

Post by parineum »

kennywinker wrote: post #487
parineum wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Representation matters, but not nearly as much as the opposite side of things - who gets opportunities. You're acting like these things aren't intertwined. You can't adjust the lever of representation without affecting who gets opportunities. You can believe what you want about the merits of adjusting those levers but to pretend like you can limit your pool of people to a smaller group of people and not affect the…

> You can't adjust the lever of representation without affecting who gets opportunities. For sure they are intertwined. More inclusion = more representation, and vice versa. But you’re saying representation is pointless because people can enter fields they don’t see themselves represented in and I am saying i think representation is a (positive) side effect not the goal. You can argue that it’s pointless all you want…

> But you’re saying representation is pointless because people can enter fields they don’t see themselves represented in and I am saying i think representation is a (positive) side effect not the goal.

What I actually think that I haven't said is that "representation" is a self defeating idea that encourages people to view themselves as different.

> I agree. Limiting your pool is a bad idea. That’s literally why inclusivity is a good thing. Because people self-limit the pool to people who look like them, and because other societal barriers limit the pool by excluding people. Actively acting to include people broadens the pool, it doesn’t limit it.

That's true, however, when the high end of the pool all looks a certain way because of systemic issues then the team built will tend to look that way and not be inclusive.

Thise creating the team could have the best of intentions the outcome could very likely be the same as if they were discriminatory.

People feel social and sometimes legal pressure to make sure it looks like they aren't discriminatory so, when they are choosing that last (few) member, they'll limit the pool of possibilities.

The other half of what you said is logical though, that inclusion probably leads to a more diverse future but at the cost of the present. The cost of the present is the part you're pretending doesn't exist.

> If you think on the scale of an individual hire or grant, i guess i can see how it would seem like limiting the pool - but zoom out like two steps and you’d see that’s not true.

Every single hire is an individual hire.

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

#616

Post by SubiculumCode »

jballer wrote: post #439
gwerbin wrote: post #168

More of the same at this point. If you are politically connected, or stay in an narrow lane of approved work, you get your grant. But if you stray from the politically approved path, or appear disloyal to our First Citizen and the Party, then your grant will be canceled. The remaining supporters of the incumbent party like to claim that they aren't actually doing anything worse than in the past, and if anything they…

This cuts both ways: grants are more valuable as political favors when they are immune to cancellation, and grants with objectively-established value are harder to terminate without political blowback.

When grants are primarily determined by peer review from scientists, with strict enforcement of rules preventing conflicts of interest, they are not about political favors, but easy cancelation of those grants makes science makes for a terrible research environment.

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

#617

Post by SubiculumCode »

halJordan wrote: post #420
wisemanwillhear wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does science need to be through the government? Irrespective of the proposal, science research is just as open after this change as before so long as it's funded by private citizens who can control the channels through which they donate to this work. On the other hand, if we can't get private citizens to donate to science research, then they are not likely to vote for it either--polls don't register much of a con…

Science needs to be done through the government because of a) hire incredibly expensive science is and b) hire incredibly concentrated wealth is. The USG is quite often the only group able and willing to fund most projects.

autocorrect is the worst, right?

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

#618

Post by [deleted] »

convolvatron wrote: post #423
JCTheDenthog wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Private citizen fund scientific research [under threat of prison or deadly force.] I mean I'm not inherently opposed to laws or government, but I think a lot of people need to be more measured and considerate of what they are using tax money for when it is being taken from their fellow citizens at gunpoint.

ignoring a gratuitous reference to use of force, absolutely. having a discussion as society about what we are funding is in fact democracy. sadly there is an issue in the sciences in that lay people may have difficulty seeing the benefit of connecting the dots. but we should try. and as flawed as it is, the adversarial system we have in the US is at least a forum for those discussion. using grep to defund grants that…

[deleted]

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

#619

Post by Supermancho »

phs318u wrote: post #576
Supermancho wrote: post #555

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a matter of statistical certainty (as opposed to absolute certainty), dimorphic is correct. I happen to subscribe to bimodal - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLH-y2nLocw but I understand why the dimorphic viewpoint has utility. There are exceptional individuals, in every population. Just like there is a non-zero chance that a baseball thrown at a wall will pass through a wall due to a quirk of quantum fluctuation…

If you’re legitimately comparing the probability of sexual non-dimorphism in the population to the chance of a thrown baseball passing through a wall, then there’s not much likelihood the of an objective discussion here. For the record, various studies conclude the ratio of individuals that are neither 46,XX nor 46,XY as being anywhere between 0.02% to 1.3% of the population. Or roughly 10^30 more likely than throwin…

> If you’re legitimately comparing the probability of sexual non-dimorphism in the population to the chance of a thrown baseball passing through a wall, then there’s not much likelihood the of an objective discussion here.

I specifically mentioned the purpose of the thought experiment as a matter of framing a perspective, rather than setting it as some kind of rough equivalency. This is reinforced by the endorsed video.

You've intentionally missed the point, which is disingenuous. Good luck with whatever.

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

#620

Post by SubiculumCode »

arjie wrote: post #220
tvink wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't think the rest of the world is doing funded research?

Interestingly, if the US stopped spending you’d need the top 17 remaining countries to double their spending to absorb the American science industry. Doubling is a tall order and seventeen is a large number. Most likely fewer scientists will find employment in government funded academia if this came to be.

Or paid half as well
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