4 ms·
No, my point is that it is extremely common to take money from two sources, or even more! Nobody batted an eye at this, and in fact even today nobody bats an ey
by knzhou 7y ago
No, my point is that it is extremely common to take money from two sources, or even more! Nobody batted an eye at this, and in fact even today nobody bats an eye, unless one of the sources is in China. In that case it becomes "luring talent" and "IP theft", with all the trappings of selectively applied moral principle.
Real IP theft would look like, say, abducting thousands of German scientists at gunpoint [0], not giving scientists grants to set up labs.
0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip
- mturmon 7y agoOK, I realize in using the shorthand "take money from two sources", I have clouded the issue. Sorry about that. As always, the actual issue is the failure to disclose the possible CoI -- as in the present case. It sucks, BTW. Turns out the guy was the PhD advisor of my neighbor up the street.
- knzhou 7y agoI don't disagree with this, but what I don't understand is the nationalist outrage. Suppose a professor slacked off on their job by taking a long vacation in France. That would be wrong and deserving of punishment -- but it wouldn't have set off panic over him "selling out" the country. Yet that is what is happening.
- bdcravens 7y agoI don't think it's "nationalist outrage". The outrage is over violating the rules, as many developers and scientists on HN have done work for the government, and followed the rules. I believe you are seeing a connection (given US government and US commenters) that simply isn't there. Correlation doesn't equal causation; that's a first rule of science.
- auggierose 7y agoSometimes correlation implies causation though: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B077YGFJ8N/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B077YGFJ8N/ref=dp-kindle-redirec...
- mturmon 7y agoIt's also good to suspend judgement until the case works its way through the courts. The Wen Ho Lee case is a point of reference here - he was accused of the worst kind of espionage and "convicted" after leaks in the NYT - but then the case dissolved and Lee got a big settlement.
- nl 7y agoCan you link to some comments showing this nationalist outrage? All I see is people going "he was dumb to lie about it".
- yorwba 7y agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22177621 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22177621 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22176877 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22176877 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22176830 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22176830 Of course I found them at the bottom where they belong, so I think knzhou is misreading the prevailing sentiment.
- nl 7y agoThey are all pretty low-value comments, but only one of them seems to be a nationalist criticism (or two if you count "paid millions to to assist a foreign government - which I think is political but barely nationalist).
- ktln2 7y agoNot common (and acceptable) if you are taking grants from ONR, DARPA or Air Force grants.
- kube-system 7y agoWhile being literally abducted is definitely a conflict of interest that might concern a grantor, I do believe many grantors may have legitimate concerns below that threshold.