5 ms·

I'm not sure I find those statistics compelling. I'd like to see the numerical method used to compute the first derivative. Was it just a finite difference? The

I'm not sure I find those statistics compelling. I'd like to see the numerical method used to compute the first derivative. Was it just a finite difference? The Nobel prizes are lumpy and so they smoothed the function as well. I'd be much more interested in a comparison between the European union and the USA, which are similar in GDP and population. Would be very interesting to see the aggregate and slope of China and India as well. Are they gaining? My perception has been that they are not, but the data is so lumpy, and the nobel such a lagging indicator, that I'm not sure it has meaning.

fgheorghe 8y ago
I am surprised British “research” is seen as valuable anywhere else but Britain.
- pdpi 8y ago
  Definitely. Turing, Rayleigh, Wiles, Dirac, Thomson, Rutherford, Fleming, Crick... who cares about any of their work? They’re all just hacks.
  - teddyh 8y ago
    How much of the work which made those people famous was actually made in the UK? If a UK citizen is working and/or living abroad, can the work they do really be “credited”, so to speak, to the UK? Conversely, should not UK get the credit, if non-UK citizens have immigrated to the UK and do their work at UK institutions?
    - throwaway080383 8y ago
      Hawking spent his entire professional life in the UK. Wiles bounced around between Princeton, Paris, and Oxford, but he was educated up through his PhD in the UK. From my perspective as an American in number theory, it seems there is no shortage of strong people coming from UK, Australia, Germany, France, India, and China, but there are many who come to the US and stay here. Anecdotally, it seems rare for a very strong person in the US to move elsewhere, unless it is back to their home country.
- presscast 8y ago
  I'm surprised you think this. UCL is consistently top-notch in a number of fields. Example: did you know their software powers >90% of fMRI studies in cognitive neuroscience? The Wellcome Trust is a major part of why this happens, and that's very much a part of British research.
- dang 8y ago
  Nationalistic trolling will get you banned here. Please post civilly and substantively, or not at all. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
blt 8y ago
I had the same reaction. It looks like they fit a spline to the data, and then took the analytical derivative of the spline. But there are other ways to do it like locally weighted regression. In general estimating derivatives from real world data is noisy, ill conditioned, should be treated carefully.

fgheorghe 8y ago

I am surprised British “research” is seen as valuable anywhere else but Britain.

pdpi 8y ago
Definitely. Turing, Rayleigh, Wiles, Dirac, Thomson, Rutherford, Fleming, Crick... who cares about any of their work? They’re all just hacks.
- teddyh 8y ago
  How much of the work which made those people famous was actually made in the UK? If a UK citizen is working and/or living abroad, can the work they do really be “credited”, so to speak, to the UK? Conversely, should not UK get the credit, if non-UK citizens have immigrated to the UK and do their work at UK institutions?
  - throwaway080383 8y ago
    Hawking spent his entire professional life in the UK. Wiles bounced around between Princeton, Paris, and Oxford, but he was educated up through his PhD in the UK. From my perspective as an American in number theory, it seems there is no shortage of strong people coming from UK, Australia, Germany, France, India, and China, but there are many who come to the US and stay here. Anecdotally, it seems rare for a very strong person in the US to move elsewhere, unless it is back to their home country.
presscast 8y ago
I'm surprised you think this. UCL is consistently top-notch in a number of fields. Example: did you know their software powers >90% of fMRI studies in cognitive neuroscience? The Wellcome Trust is a major part of why this happens, and that's very much a part of British research.
dang 8y ago
Nationalistic trolling will get you banned here. Please post civilly and substantively, or not at all. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

blt 8y ago

I had the same reaction. It looks like they fit a spline to the data, and then took the analytical derivative of the spline. But there are other ways to do it like locally weighted regression. In general estimating derivatives from real world data is noisy, ill conditioned, should be treated carefully.