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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

#911

Post by esalman »

alaxhn wrote: post #69
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?

Let's not sugarcoat it. DEI is the new N-word. Only people who are covert racists would be bothered by a mere statement about inclusion.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#912

Post by nradov »

lumost wrote: post #210
scarab92 wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s not that many jobs going in academia in other countries, and you’ll be looking at a significant pay cut due to the strong US dollar. Most likely, people who leave academia will be leaving for industry instead. I do feel for those in the hard sciences, they have become collateral damage in what is mostly a battle between politicians and humanities departments.

I've been suspicious that the quality of life cut is distinct from the pay cut. Living in a dense European city, you do not need a car, healthcare is free, and you are generally afforded more time off and a stricter wlb compromise compared to the US. One doesn't need to eat takeout as often if there is time to cook. Depending on the country, rent/housing costs are more or less under control. On the other hand swiss/N…

Quality of life is highly subjective. Different people prefer different things. Many of us who value open space and privacy would see moving to a dense city as a step down.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#913

Post by esalman »

muaytimbo wrote: post #877

It's past time these institutions were audited. I had an NSF fellowship and was on numerous NIH grants during my PhD work (Chemist). All of them, even in 2013, had DEI language that made it clear if you were a white/chinese/indian male you were not going to be funded. The institutions, already, were self sabotaging, doling out tons of taxpayer money, not to the best ideas, but to labs that had a few women of various…

I am a male of Indian descent, my PI was white male and we collaborated with a number of Asian male PIs and postdocs. I was in PhD research starting in 2015. All of us were funded.

Quit the BS.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#914

Post by watersb »

Research labs wholly owned and operated by large corporations were prevalent sources of innovation throughout the 20th century in the United States.

Obvious, probably for Hacker News crowd:

• Bell Labs • Xerox PARC • IBM Watson, Almaden Research • Dow Chemical

I'm missing the big ones from petroleum and agricultural businesses. Aerospace.

I'm willing to believe that a political retreat from 21st century choices looks towards legendary captains of industry, rather than sprawling government bureaucracy, as a source of American greatness.

My attempt to frame this week's gleeful destruction of government institutions as a revitalization of the fountainhead.

But I don't know. It's easier to just call it the same old spiteful hatred of science that is as American as apple pie.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#915

Post by esalman »

herodotus wrote: post #842

Another win for China. While the US guts its research capacity, China already dominates scientific research (according to Perplexity, 29% of the most highly cited peer reviewed articles are authored by Chinese scientists). Of course all those people who voted for this regime don't believe that there is any benefit to funding science. After all, what did science ever do for them? (OK, except for the science of pick-up…

The slump began from first DJT presidency. US lost the 5G race to China. If deepseek etc. are any indication, they are losing the AI race too. Looking and the prevalence of cheap Chinese EVs all over the world, US is losing on that front too.

Meanwhile MAGA are patting themselves in the back because they are "tired of winning".

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#916

Post by yodsanklai »

ocschwar wrote: post #55
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.

Some of my favorite novels are David Lodge's campus novels, and an element in them is the never-ending lure of American academia for British scholars. Now it's the EU's turn. Computer science is already becoming very, very French. See you guys in Grenoble.

France is extremely unattractive for research. Lecturers positions suck (high teaching load and you need to speak French). Full-time researcher positions are extremely hard to get, and they pay very little, especially junior position. 2500 euros per month, which isn't enough in Paris and just ok in a smaller city.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#917

Post by obelos »

dekhn wrote: post #24
nyc_data_geek1 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's very clear once you realize the people perpetrating this don't care one whit for the "economy" writ large, only their personal wealth and that of their cronies. The dumber, meaner and more desperate the population is, the easier the time they think they'll have ruling over them, as unto kings in this new gilded age. Of course, they forget what came after the gilded age. It's raining stockbrokers - err, oligarchs…

that's bad strategic thinking (obviously) because it places at a huge disadvantage to our main competitors.

To a large degree their wealth is transnational and will move on to the next trough after emptying this one.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#918

Post by leptons »

AlexandrB wrote: post #846
leptons wrote: post #514

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Deport all the people who harvest crops, and people in the US will be starving pretty quickly. It could happen within 1 year. And this is exactly the track we are on right now.

I don't really get this argument or why it's adopted by left-wing commentators. It assumes that supply and demand don't exist and the agricultural industry couldn't get workers if they paid market rates for such labor. It's basically advocating for immigration as a way to subsidize the agricultural industry by giving them a desperate workforce they can exploit.

You can't make a change like this, this quickly, and expect people not to starve. Crops will be literally rotting on the vine while farmers desperately plead for people to work long hours in hot fields for low wages. Do you know anyone who would do that? No? I don't either. I'm not sure how you expect farmers that work on thin margins to suddenly be able to offer a higher wage that Americans would do this work for. It's honestly insanity to expect this to work out in the short term.

I'm not sure why conservative commentators can't see the result of this knee-jerk policy of deporting every illegal immigrant, and even those with birthright citizenship. It's a scorched earth policy, and you are only going to reap ashes from it.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#919

Post by cvwright »

amelius wrote: post #529
kortilla wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s not lottery mentality and thinking that it’s equivalent is why Europe isn’t innovating. If someone wins the lottery and gets rich, society isn’t better off. If someone starts a new company that made a cure for some disease and gets rich, society is much better off. You absolutely want to attract people that want to make huge breakthroughs with unlikely odds of success.

You are assuming that only money will make people do incredible things, but you only have to look at open source to know that this is false.

Almost all of the really high quality open source projects got that way because companies paid devs good money to work on them.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#920

Post by user3939382 »

jmcqk6 wrote: post #893
muaytimbo wrote: post #877

It's past time these institutions were audited. I had an NSF fellowship and was on numerous NIH grants during my PhD work (Chemist). All of them, even in 2013, had DEI language that made it clear if you were a white/chinese/indian male you were not going to be funded. The institutions, already, were self sabotaging, doling out tons of taxpayer money, not to the best ideas, but to labs that had a few women of various…

Wow so not a single white/chinese/indian male has been funded since 2013? For over a decade? That's an incredible claim. Literally.

So sex and racial prejudice has to be 100% efficient to be wrong?
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