5 ms·

If we want to make speculations of what research could be, I would like to speculate that research could be funded by society as a whole and its benefits go to

If we want to make speculations of what research could be, I would like to speculate that research could be funded by society as a whole and its benefits go to society as a whole.

JamesBarney 6y ago
I think how much research is societally funded vs personally funded seem pretty orthogonal to me. Should society spend more money on research? Yes Should society ban individuals from spending money on research? No
- nlosti 6y ago
  The second question is leaving a lot to be desired. Which individuals? What if they're part of an organisation? What is the actual research they are trying to fund? What could they gain from the research? What do you mean by 'should society ban'? I could go on... These are important qualifiers. There is an imbalance of power when it comes to people like Epstein and you need to be careful how this imbalance affects science. If your wealth/person ratio is immensely high i'd start to raise eyebrows.
  - JamesBarney 6y ago
    > Which individuals? What if they're part of an organisation? What is the actual research they are trying to fund? What could they gain from the research? Legally, I think any individual should be able to write any other individual a check so that the second individual can afford to study any subject. I assume institutions will have more restrictions to maintain scientific credibility. > What do you mean by 'should society ban'? This doesn't seem confusing to me. Banning means to legally restrict. With an onerous example being "Only the government can fund research, private contributions to any organization that performs research is banned". Maybe you could elucidate which part of that was unclear.
    - nlosti 6y ago
      I just think agreeing to let any individual in all cases, legally, be able to give money to another individual for research, is maybe jumping the gun a bit. Ok perhaps you don't agree with my idea of wealth inequality, fair enough, but if for example you are trying to fund WMD research, or research into pseudoscience, or research that is inherently biased, I would actually like to see that banned I'm afraid. Other workarounds maybe include banning the research area itself, or banning newspapers from publishing it, whatever.
      - JamesBarney 6y ago
        Yeah it seems like we have two very different views of what government should do, you want to live in a society where what you can spend your money on is heavily restricted, the government has strong powers to restrict what newspapers can publish, and the government decides what types of science are approved, biased, and pseudoscience. That government seems closer to something like China, where I prefer a less authoritarian government where individuals have more control over what they can say, and spend money on. Different strokes for different folks I guess.
- throwawaygh 6y ago
  > Should society ban individuals from spending money on research? No Agreed. No one is saying otherwise! The actual question at hand is whether large institutions should allow their faculty to take money from arbitrary sources. This is a question both for the institutions and for the institutions' major stakeholders/clients (which, in the case of Harvard, includes the federal government). Epstein could've started a stand-alone research institute and hired a bunch of people away from their tenured faculty positions. I doubt many excellent researchers would've taken him up on that offer, but he surely could've recruited some bright young unknowns in any field other than CS with less-than-FAANG salaries! He could've also donated to someone else's research institute. I think it's fair to say that Epstein cost these institutions far more in reputational damage than he provided in cash. So the choice re: him seems pretty straight-forward.
  - JamesBarney 6y ago
    The article seems to purposefully obfuscate this, but all of the money he donated was before his arrest. And when he tried to donate more money after his arrest Harvard said no.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
- TeaDrunk 6y ago
  I think individuals simply shouldn't have that much influence over the brightest minds via having more money.
  - JamesBarney 6y ago
    It seems strange to me to believe that a wealthy person can spend a 100 million dollars on a yacht, but if he instead gives that money to one of the brightest minds we have a problem.
    - nlosti 6y ago
      No I think the former should not be possible either.
    - mcv 6y ago
      This is the big paradox of the situation. Of course we want investment in science. But we don't want science to only serve the interests of the rich. We don't want the rich to choose which science happens. And the same goes for many other aspects of life. Money buys power, so the rich get to decide a lot, and that undermines democracy, objective journalism, and much more. So maybe we want money not to buy power, but only luxury? But then you get rich people who only spend their money on luxury yachts and give back nothing to society.
  - s1artibartfast 6y ago
    It is unclear from the article that that Epstein had any influence over what the brightest minds were researching.
  - Nasrudith 6y ago
    That seems rather objectifying of the brightest minds. They have their own agency and motivations. It is ultimately up to them whether they are swayed or tell objectionable sources to get bent.
- dredmorbius 6y ago
  What if one party has all the money?

If we want to make speculations of what research could be, I would like to speculate that research could be funded by society as a whole and its benefits go to society as a whole.

JamesBarney 6y ago

I think how much research is societally funded vs personally funded seem pretty orthogonal to me. Should society spend more money on research? Yes Should society ban individuals from spending money on research? No

nlosti 6y ago
The second question is leaving a lot to be desired. Which individuals? What if they're part of an organisation? What is the actual research they are trying to fund? What could they gain from the research? What do you mean by 'should society ban'? I could go on... These are important qualifiers. There is an imbalance of power when it comes to people like Epstein and you need to be careful how this imbalance affects science. If your wealth/person ratio is immensely high i'd start to raise eyebrows.
- JamesBarney 6y ago
  > Which individuals? What if they're part of an organisation? What is the actual research they are trying to fund? What could they gain from the research? Legally, I think any individual should be able to write any other individual a check so that the second individual can afford to study any subject. I assume institutions will have more restrictions to maintain scientific credibility. > What do you mean by 'should society ban'? This doesn't seem confusing to me. Banning means to legally restrict. With an onerous example being "Only the government can fund research, private contributions to any organization that performs research is banned". Maybe you could elucidate which part of that was unclear.
  - nlosti 6y ago
    I just think agreeing to let any individual in all cases, legally, be able to give money to another individual for research, is maybe jumping the gun a bit. Ok perhaps you don't agree with my idea of wealth inequality, fair enough, but if for example you are trying to fund WMD research, or research into pseudoscience, or research that is inherently biased, I would actually like to see that banned I'm afraid. Other workarounds maybe include banning the research area itself, or banning newspapers from publishing it, whatever.
    - JamesBarney 6y ago
      Yeah it seems like we have two very different views of what government should do, you want to live in a society where what you can spend your money on is heavily restricted, the government has strong powers to restrict what newspapers can publish, and the government decides what types of science are approved, biased, and pseudoscience. That government seems closer to something like China, where I prefer a less authoritarian government where individuals have more control over what they can say, and spend money on. Different strokes for different folks I guess.
throwawaygh 6y ago
> Should society ban individuals from spending money on research? No Agreed. No one is saying otherwise! The actual question at hand is whether large institutions should allow their faculty to take money from arbitrary sources. This is a question both for the institutions and for the institutions' major stakeholders/clients (which, in the case of Harvard, includes the federal government). Epstein could've started a stand-alone research institute and hired a bunch of people away from their tenured faculty positions. I doubt many excellent researchers would've taken him up on that offer, but he surely could've recruited some bright young unknowns in any field other than CS with less-than-FAANG salaries! He could've also donated to someone else's research institute. I think it's fair to say that Epstein cost these institutions far more in reputational damage than he provided in cash. So the choice re: him seems pretty straight-forward.
- JamesBarney 6y ago
  The article seems to purposefully obfuscate this, but all of the money he donated was before his arrest. And when he tried to donate more money after his arrest Harvard said no.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
TeaDrunk 6y ago
I think individuals simply shouldn't have that much influence over the brightest minds via having more money.
- JamesBarney 6y ago
  It seems strange to me to believe that a wealthy person can spend a 100 million dollars on a yacht, but if he instead gives that money to one of the brightest minds we have a problem.
  - nlosti 6y ago
    No I think the former should not be possible either.
  - mcv 6y ago
    This is the big paradox of the situation. Of course we want investment in science. But we don't want science to only serve the interests of the rich. We don't want the rich to choose which science happens. And the same goes for many other aspects of life. Money buys power, so the rich get to decide a lot, and that undermines democracy, objective journalism, and much more. So maybe we want money not to buy power, but only luxury? But then you get rich people who only spend their money on luxury yachts and give back nothing to society.
- s1artibartfast 6y ago
  It is unclear from the article that that Epstein had any influence over what the brightest minds were researching.
- Nasrudith 6y ago
  That seems rather objectifying of the brightest minds. They have their own agency and motivations. It is ultimately up to them whether they are swayed or tell objectionable sources to get bent.
dredmorbius 6y ago
What if one party has all the money?