4 ms·

That's literally the thesis of “The Entrepreneurial State: debunking public vs. private sector myths” by Dr. Mazzucato. I wrote a summary if you're interested:

That's literally the thesis of “The Entrepreneurial State: debunking public vs. private sector myths” by Dr. Mazzucato. I wrote a summary if you're interested: https://medium.com/@seanaubin/book-review-the-entrepreneurial-state-8fa47c4e8056 https://medium.com/@seanaubin/book-review-the-entrepreneuria...

ako 9y ago
That's a really interesting thesis that warrants its own HN thread
- Seanny123 9y ago
  How would I phrase a HN thread with this topic without being polemic?
  - ikeyany 9y ago
    “The Entrepreneurial State: debunking public vs. private sector myths”
    - Seanny123 9y ago
      Is linking to my own blog post in bad taste? Should I link to the website of the book instead?
      - pas 9y ago
        Linking to the blog post seems to be the better choice, but maybe include a link to the book's site in the post too.
js8 9y ago
And it's not a new thesis, it has been noticed by various intellectuals at least for last 200 years. Another relatively recent book on this topic: https://www.amazon.com/Kicking-Away-Ladder-Development-Perspective/dp/1843310279 https://www.amazon.com/Kicking-Away-Ladder-Development-Persp...
afsina 9y ago
There are anti-theses for the issue. Two criticizing the book mentioned: https://mises.org/library/government-spending-innovation-true-cost-higher-you-think https://mises.org/library/government-spending-innovation-tru... and http://pricesandmarkets.org/volume-3-issue-3-winter-2015/mariana-mazzucato-the-entrepreneurial-state/ http://pricesandmarkets.org/volume-3-issue-3-winter-2015/mar...
- Seanny123 9y ago
  I wasn't totally convinced by the first linked essay. The primary arguments presented seem to be: - Government funded development only gives the government what it wants while the citizens remain unsatisfied. This is due to a lack of "market tests". - We never tested the alternative where the government doesn't fund research and let private companies innovate instead. Dr. Mazzucato addresses this in her book. She notes that the government needs to provide a pipeline from basic research to marketability. She also argues that the last twenty years, in various countries, have shown that trusting private companies to innovate doesn't give better returns. Also, I feel like Dr. Glein is over-simplifying Dr. Mazzucato's argument by claiming she argues that "many of the technologies and innovations we now value were produced single-handedly by government". Dr. Mazzucato routinely celebrates the ability of private companies to integrate innovative technologies for the public. She's mostly arguing that these companies should be taxed better (more efficiently? realistically?) by licensing the technologies. However, the argument Dr. Glein links to (https://www.jstor.org/stable/116937?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents https://www.jstor.org/stable/116937?seq=1#page_scan_tab_cont...), is very interesting! It claims that R&D personnel are a finite resource and government funding crowds out the supply of talent for the private sector. I don't know why, but I thought the supply was elastic? Maybe because I over-idealize immigration? The second essay seems to mostly re-iterate the importance of the "crowding out" effect. It also notes that Mazzucato got some data wrong because: "But in the thirties governments in the US did not fund long-term fundamental research, so companies did it themselves. Now that governments do fund long-term fundamental research, industry needs no longer do so: yet again Professor Mazzucato advocates the very policies that lead to the outcomes she deplores." tl;dr people seem to be getting different conclusions from datasets I haven't seen and I need to do more research into the "crowding out effect"
amelius 9y ago
> (...) I started reading “How to Build a Brain” by Chris Eliasmith. By the end of it, I truly felt biologically plausible modelling was hugely important for the advance of Cognitive Science. Does it give a biologically plausible explanation for backpropagation?
- Seanny123 9y ago
  Biologically plausible back-prop is an ongoing investigation: https://cogsci.stackexchange.com/q/16269/4397 https://cogsci.stackexchange.com/q/16269/4397 Basically, I'm waiting until Eric Hunsberger finishes his freaking PhD thesis: http://compneuro.uwaterloo.ca/people/eric-hunsberger.html http://compneuro.uwaterloo.ca/people/eric-hunsberger.html
Seanny123 9y ago
This blog post is now it's own thread if you want to continue the discussion there: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14437952 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14437952

ako 9y ago

That's a really interesting thesis that warrants its own HN thread

Seanny123 9y ago
How would I phrase a HN thread with this topic without being polemic?
- ikeyany 9y ago
  “The Entrepreneurial State: debunking public vs. private sector myths”
  - Seanny123 9y ago
    Is linking to my own blog post in bad taste? Should I link to the website of the book instead?
    - pas 9y ago
      Linking to the blog post seems to be the better choice, but maybe include a link to the book's site in the post too.

js8 9y ago

And it's not a new thesis, it has been noticed by various intellectuals at least for last 200 years. Another relatively recent book on this topic: https://www.amazon.com/Kicking-Away-Ladder-Development-Perspective/dp/1843310279 https://www.amazon.com/Kicking-Away-Ladder-Development-Persp...

afsina 9y ago

There are anti-theses for the issue. Two criticizing the book mentioned: https://mises.org/library/government-spending-innovation-true-cost-higher-you-think https://mises.org/library/government-spending-innovation-tru... and http://pricesandmarkets.org/volume-3-issue-3-winter-2015/mariana-mazzucato-the-entrepreneurial-state/ http://pricesandmarkets.org/volume-3-issue-3-winter-2015/mar...

Seanny123 9y ago
I wasn't totally convinced by the first linked essay. The primary arguments presented seem to be: - Government funded development only gives the government what it wants while the citizens remain unsatisfied. This is due to a lack of "market tests". - We never tested the alternative where the government doesn't fund research and let private companies innovate instead. Dr. Mazzucato addresses this in her book. She notes that the government needs to provide a pipeline from basic research to marketability. She also argues that the last twenty years, in various countries, have shown that trusting private companies to innovate doesn't give better returns. Also, I feel like Dr. Glein is over-simplifying Dr. Mazzucato's argument by claiming she argues that "many of the technologies and innovations we now value were produced single-handedly by government". Dr. Mazzucato routinely celebrates the ability of private companies to integrate innovative technologies for the public. She's mostly arguing that these companies should be taxed better (more efficiently? realistically?) by licensing the technologies. However, the argument Dr. Glein links to (https://www.jstor.org/stable/116937?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents https://www.jstor.org/stable/116937?seq=1#page_scan_tab_cont...), is very interesting! It claims that R&D personnel are a finite resource and government funding crowds out the supply of talent for the private sector. I don't know why, but I thought the supply was elastic? Maybe because I over-idealize immigration? The second essay seems to mostly re-iterate the importance of the "crowding out" effect. It also notes that Mazzucato got some data wrong because: "But in the thirties governments in the US did not fund long-term fundamental research, so companies did it themselves. Now that governments do fund long-term fundamental research, industry needs no longer do so: yet again Professor Mazzucato advocates the very policies that lead to the outcomes she deplores." tl;dr people seem to be getting different conclusions from datasets I haven't seen and I need to do more research into the "crowding out effect"

amelius 9y ago

> (...) I started reading “How to Build a Brain” by Chris Eliasmith. By the end of it, I truly felt biologically plausible modelling was hugely important for the advance of Cognitive Science. Does it give a biologically plausible explanation for backpropagation?

Seanny123 9y ago
Biologically plausible back-prop is an ongoing investigation: https://cogsci.stackexchange.com/q/16269/4397 https://cogsci.stackexchange.com/q/16269/4397 Basically, I'm waiting until Eric Hunsberger finishes his freaking PhD thesis: http://compneuro.uwaterloo.ca/people/eric-hunsberger.html http://compneuro.uwaterloo.ca/people/eric-hunsberger.html

Seanny123 9y ago

This blog post is now it's own thread if you want to continue the discussion there: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14437952 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14437952