6 ms·

As an American that has received his fair share of indoctrination and with no deep love for a lot of China's domestic as well as foreign policy, I am curious ab

As an American that has received his fair share of indoctrination and with no deep love for a lot of China's domestic as well as foreign policy, I am curious about a few things, sincerely: 1. Are these as egregious as we are led to believe? 2. Are these really a sign of deep foreign influence? 3. Can it be that these are actually just minor oversights of a large number of individuals without needing to jump to the worst conclusion of these scientists being spies (as one other comment has already asserted)? I am not trying to water down what may be a serious case of foreign influence, but if this is something common and/or easy to fall into, it's possible this is an overreaction and may cause harm to the research community. The article is worded in a way that doesn't clarify if the focus was only on Chinese influence or if this was broadly designed to capture any foreign influence. I ask these questions to broaden the discussion because oftentimes research and academic centers can have overly broad requests on disclosure which can be very invasive and, truth be told, if everyone answered fully and clearly, a lot of people would probably be excluded, and that begs the question if these are essential or not in my humble opinion. To be clear, I am very much for limiting foreign influence on domestic policy, whether it's via research or otherwise, but I think it bears practicing greater skepticism when something may just be a proxy for "action" rather than sincere positive results.

free_rms 6y ago
Sir. We find your questioning of official policy very concerning. Are you now or have you ever been a member of the communist party?
sdenton4 6y ago
Yeah, from the article: "Lauer also presented data on the nature of the violations that NIH has uncovered. Some 70% (133) of the researchers had failed to disclose to NIH the receipt of a foreign grant, and 54% had failed to disclose participation in a foreign talent program. In contrast, Lauer said, only 9% hid ties to a foreign company, and only 4% had an undisclosed foreign patent. Some 5% of cases involved a violation of NIH’s peer-review system." So sounds like ~90% of the 189 violations maybe just not checking a box. It's not clear to me what the violations were for the 54 people who were fired. From where I sit, science espionage from China certainly sounds plausible (And should be dealt with), but ginning up negligible issues to get rid of the wrong kind of people is a completely plausible move from the current administration.
- the-dude 6y ago
  Enforcement might deter ( is this proper English? ).
  - edanm 6y ago
    It seems technically valid (maybe?) but it's pretty hard to parse. You should at least add another word or two to indicate what it would deter.
    - neltnerb 6y ago
      Slightly ambiguous because I think the GP actually meant something like "enforcement may decline (to penalize or press charges)" which is definitely true and likely the case if 90% of these are paperwork errors. There are definitely paperwork errors I can imagine, but it's difficult to imagine it being as simple a mistake as not checking the box that says "you have a job". More likely would be a grant office not being fully aware of a professors' funding sources or miscategorizing their funding in such a way that the grant office person helping with the paperwork marked it wrong and the professor didn't check carefully. That I would consider to be an "honest mistake" that gets corrected by moving money around and a strongly worried letter. Other stories I've heard go as far as two married professors who took their grant money and used it instead to move to an island resort for three months or something like that and didn't actually do the project at all. That was definitely a crime, but largely only because it involved the federal government. If they'd gotten a grant from a private company and didn't do what they promised it would likely be a civil lawsuit unless it rose to the level of actual illegal fraud.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- free_rms 6y ago
  It's probably even dumber than that. 1) Trump or someone else in the WH becomes convinced that the NIH is full of Chinese spies 2) Some poor flak winds up with the job of producing some spies to fire, or else 3) We wind up with this weak sauce You know who would have absolutely none of these paperwork gaps? An actual spy.
neltnerb 6y ago
I didn't see any specific proposed punishments in the article other than some people no longer being allowed to review articles for some journals. Having gotten grants and attended the "if you lie about using US money it is a felony" mandatory in person talk... Well, it's not necessarily that they had foreign grants, though it is possible that would have made them ineligible for something. But not disclosing stuff like that is really bad. I don't know why they didn't, the reasons might be innocuous in which case I doubt there would be harsh punishments. Or maybe they got two grants from different governments paying for the same research (big no) or maybe they were simply given money by a foreign asset that now can blackmail them into disclosing secret research that the US funded. The article doesn't really give that level of detail so I can only say it ranges from "mistake on your taxes" bad where the repercussions are mostly financial penalities and "stole money and gave nuclear missile designs to a foreign country because of the influence of their money". If I were to bet: they either didn't keep good track of things, are the kind of people that simply don't care about the rules enough to know they broke them (even though they don't intend harm it's definitely their fault), or they would have been ineligible for funding if they disclosed the foreign source and were too greedy to take a pass on it.
- coliveira 6y ago
  The answer is that nothing of this seems to be a crime, and scientists are not in the business of filling reports, but doing research. If you get money from the USA, there is no law saying that you cannot get money from China. The science is the same and the money is the same. What the US is trying to do is to stop innovation and criminalize the collaboration with Chinese institutions.
  - ipsocannibal 6y ago
    You are obfuscating the point. This issue is not about researchers receiving funds from China. Its about failing to disclose that this funding has been received. The US is trying to ensure transparency in how the research that is being funded in part by the American tax payer is ultimately paid for. Should US citizens not know this? Does transparency in research funding not matter?
throwawaygh 6y ago
The answer to all of your questions is "it depends". I can say with certainty that no one is going to be able to provide an accurate answer without looking at each case individually. Generally speaking: - It's typically okay to receive money from foreign companies and foreign-owned businesses/organizations. Both culturally and legally. E.g., the government explicitly black-lists instead of white-lists. - Forgetting to report small amounts of money (low five figures at a time) can be chalked up to sloppiness, even if the total amount adds up to six figures over a long period of time. E.g., just as a graduate student I received mid five figures worth of travel grants and honorariums from a half dozen different funding agencies, many of them foreign-owned. As a more senior researcher I now keep track of every penny in and out of my group, but many of my colleagues do not. And that's reasonable -- they effectively run small consulting shops with seven figure annual budgets and were never taught how to run a small business! Don't get me wrong, they should be way more serious about these things (and most people now realize this), but there's lots of failure to report that IMO doesn't rise to the level of fraud or criminal conspiracy. - Forgetting to report larger funding streams (six figures/yr for multiple years, or any funding stream that adds up to more than maybe a half million) is either fraud or at least such inexcusable oversight that firing is perhaps not an unreasonable action. - This all gets more complicated if the funding was received "on the side" (i.e., not through the university). Note: it is 100% Ok and even normal for professors to do consulting/advising on the side. To be clear, they still need to report this funding. But, again, it's super believable that someone could forget to report or not know they were supposed to report for a side gig. - Similarly, this all gets more complicated if the funding was received many years ago and was not a huge sum. E.g., did I receive any money from <insert random European country> while doing my PhD or the first couple years afterward? No fucking clue, that entire time of life was a whirlwind and no one trained me to keep track of such things.
- caseysoftware 6y ago
  Scientists and their organizations have an obligation to identify and mitigate conflicts of interest. If scientists are receiving funding off the books without disclosing, they're either actively or "accidentally" preventing that. Further, they likely breached their ethics policy which is usually the part of their contract, employment agreement, etc ^ These apply regardless of the source. Now considering the source, you have to investigate if they disclosed or were asked to disclose information on the policies, studies, etc they came in contact with. Alternatively, did they adjust or were they asked to adjust their positions, policies, studies, etc that they were involved in? ^ Turns out those apply regardless of the source too. In the most charitable explanation, they were incredibly sloppy multiple times in multiple ways. In the worst explanation, they committed espionage and/or damaged the entire process. The answer is likely somewhere in between.
currymj 6y ago
If you look into the news reporting on the individual cases, some look bad (emails documenting attempts to cover up, smuggling lab materials out of the country) and some don't (despite not including it on the grant form, researchers acknowledged the funding in published papers and didn't try to hide it).

free_rms 6y ago

Sir. We find your questioning of official policy very concerning. Are you now or have you ever been a member of the communist party?

sdenton4 6y ago

Yeah, from the article: "Lauer also presented data on the nature of the violations that NIH has uncovered. Some 70% (133) of the researchers had failed to disclose to NIH the receipt of a foreign grant, and 54% had failed to disclose participation in a foreign talent program. In contrast, Lauer said, only 9% hid ties to a foreign company, and only 4% had an undisclosed foreign patent. Some 5% of cases involved a violation of NIH’s peer-review system." So sounds like ~90% of the 189 violations maybe just not checking a box. It's not clear to me what the violations were for the 54 people who were fired. From where I sit, science espionage from China certainly sounds plausible (And should be dealt with), but ginning up negligible issues to get rid of the wrong kind of people is a completely plausible move from the current administration.

the-dude 6y ago
Enforcement might deter ( is this proper English? ).
- edanm 6y ago
  It seems technically valid (maybe?) but it's pretty hard to parse. You should at least add another word or two to indicate what it would deter.
  - neltnerb 6y ago
    Slightly ambiguous because I think the GP actually meant something like "enforcement may decline (to penalize or press charges)" which is definitely true and likely the case if 90% of these are paperwork errors. There are definitely paperwork errors I can imagine, but it's difficult to imagine it being as simple a mistake as not checking the box that says "you have a job". More likely would be a grant office not being fully aware of a professors' funding sources or miscategorizing their funding in such a way that the grant office person helping with the paperwork marked it wrong and the professor didn't check carefully. That I would consider to be an "honest mistake" that gets corrected by moving money around and a strongly worried letter. Other stories I've heard go as far as two married professors who took their grant money and used it instead to move to an island resort for three months or something like that and didn't actually do the project at all. That was definitely a crime, but largely only because it involved the federal government. If they'd gotten a grant from a private company and didn't do what they promised it would likely be a civil lawsuit unless it rose to the level of actual illegal fraud.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
free_rms 6y ago
It's probably even dumber than that. 1) Trump or someone else in the WH becomes convinced that the NIH is full of Chinese spies 2) Some poor flak winds up with the job of producing some spies to fire, or else 3) We wind up with this weak sauce You know who would have absolutely none of these paperwork gaps? An actual spy.

neltnerb 6y ago

I didn't see any specific proposed punishments in the article other than some people no longer being allowed to review articles for some journals. Having gotten grants and attended the "if you lie about using US money it is a felony" mandatory in person talk... Well, it's not necessarily that they had foreign grants, though it is possible that would have made them ineligible for something. But not disclosing stuff like that is really bad. I don't know why they didn't, the reasons might be innocuous in which case I doubt there would be harsh punishments. Or maybe they got two grants from different governments paying for the same research (big no) or maybe they were simply given money by a foreign asset that now can blackmail them into disclosing secret research that the US funded. The article doesn't really give that level of detail so I can only say it ranges from "mistake on your taxes" bad where the repercussions are mostly financial penalities and "stole money and gave nuclear missile designs to a foreign country because of the influence of their money". If I were to bet: they either didn't keep good track of things, are the kind of people that simply don't care about the rules enough to know they broke them (even though they don't intend harm it's definitely their fault), or they would have been ineligible for funding if they disclosed the foreign source and were too greedy to take a pass on it.

coliveira 6y ago
The answer is that nothing of this seems to be a crime, and scientists are not in the business of filling reports, but doing research. If you get money from the USA, there is no law saying that you cannot get money from China. The science is the same and the money is the same. What the US is trying to do is to stop innovation and criminalize the collaboration with Chinese institutions.
- ipsocannibal 6y ago
  You are obfuscating the point. This issue is not about researchers receiving funds from China. Its about failing to disclose that this funding has been received. The US is trying to ensure transparency in how the research that is being funded in part by the American tax payer is ultimately paid for. Should US citizens not know this? Does transparency in research funding not matter?

throwawaygh 6y ago

The answer to all of your questions is "it depends". I can say with certainty that no one is going to be able to provide an accurate answer without looking at each case individually. Generally speaking: - It's typically okay to receive money from foreign companies and foreign-owned businesses/organizations. Both culturally and legally. E.g., the government explicitly black-lists instead of white-lists. - Forgetting to report small amounts of money (low five figures at a time) can be chalked up to sloppiness, even if the total amount adds up to six figures over a long period of time. E.g., just as a graduate student I received mid five figures worth of travel grants and honorariums from a half dozen different funding agencies, many of them foreign-owned. As a more senior researcher I now keep track of every penny in and out of my group, but many of my colleagues do not. And that's reasonable -- they effectively run small consulting shops with seven figure annual budgets and were never taught how to run a small business! Don't get me wrong, they should be way more serious about these things (and most people now realize this), but there's lots of failure to report that IMO doesn't rise to the level of fraud or criminal conspiracy. - Forgetting to report larger funding streams (six figures/yr for multiple years, or any funding stream that adds up to more than maybe a half million) is either fraud or at least such inexcusable oversight that firing is perhaps not an unreasonable action. - This all gets more complicated if the funding was received "on the side" (i.e., not through the university). Note: it is 100% Ok and even normal for professors to do consulting/advising on the side. To be clear, they still need to report this funding. But, again, it's super believable that someone could forget to report or not know they were supposed to report for a side gig. - Similarly, this all gets more complicated if the funding was received many years ago and was not a huge sum. E.g., did I receive any money from <insert random European country> while doing my PhD or the first couple years afterward? No fucking clue, that entire time of life was a whirlwind and no one trained me to keep track of such things.

caseysoftware 6y ago
Scientists and their organizations have an obligation to identify and mitigate conflicts of interest. If scientists are receiving funding off the books without disclosing, they're either actively or "accidentally" preventing that. Further, they likely breached their ethics policy which is usually the part of their contract, employment agreement, etc ^ These apply regardless of the source. Now considering the source, you have to investigate if they disclosed or were asked to disclose information on the policies, studies, etc they came in contact with. Alternatively, did they adjust or were they asked to adjust their positions, policies, studies, etc that they were involved in? ^ Turns out those apply regardless of the source too. In the most charitable explanation, they were incredibly sloppy multiple times in multiple ways. In the worst explanation, they committed espionage and/or damaged the entire process. The answer is likely somewhere in between.

currymj 6y ago

If you look into the news reporting on the individual cases, some look bad (emails documenting attempts to cover up, smuggling lab materials out of the country) and some don't (despite not including it on the grant form, researchers acknowledged the funding in published papers and didn't try to hide it).