3 ms·

I can't decide whether Teller's head is stuck up the rafters of the ivory tower he lives in or whether it is held up where the sun does not shine. There are so

by melony 4y ago

I can't decide whether Teller's head is stuck up the rafters of the ivory tower he lives in or whether it is held up where the sun does not shine. There are so many students in academia searching for the magic path through graduate school where you can get a permanent role either in teaching or tenureship (research) that it is becoming a crisis for both STEM fields and otherwise. It is easy for him to preach when he is one of the few that have "made it" through a combination of intellectual pedigree, geopolitical necessity, and the plucking of low hanging fruits in an emerging field.

XorNot 4y ago
Yeah I really don't understand what he's saying there - where does he think his salary comes from? Money buys those interested individuals time to pursue that interest, and the more of it we have the more people we can put in the right time and place to find the next big thing.
- ZephyrBlu 4y ago
  I think the key point is the "and worked in modest conditions", emphasis on modest. Injecting a ton of money creates perverse incentives and attracts people who are not interested pursuing something out of curiosity and interest, but for the money. I think it probably creates a hostile environment for people who are there out of pure interest, because if there is a way to earn more money/status/power/whatever by doing something other than good work people will do it. So you effectively get punished for doing what you're supposed to instead of playing the game. I think the "professional money extractor" explanation here is an apt description: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18003253 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18003253.
  - melony 4y ago
    Academia is a career, not some sort of side project for bored scientists. We don't measure the competence of developers by the time they spend on side projects outside of work. You don't have to be full of visionary ideas to do research, and talent is everywhere. Teller would't be where he was had he been born in South America or Africa. If you only give money and positions to people with "passion" when there is a clear demand for more, that's called exploitation. Maybe consider becoming an aerospace investor instead, that field is full of talent chasing after lost dreams for pennies. If you are a software engineer on this forum, you know damn well what your net worth is in the current North American market compared to the other legacy engineering fields. It is patronizing to expect the other scientific fields to be worth "less" than CS.
  - dale_glass 4y ago
    > Injecting a ton of money creates perverse incentives and attracts people who are not interested pursuing something out of curiosity and interest, but for the money. That's just an excuse to exploit people. The same nonsense as with teachers. "We want teachers that are passionate, not there just for the money". Bah. In the end we're trying to get stuff done, and it doesn't really matter whether the pipes are kept clean by somebody really passionate for sanitation, or somebody who just thinks the pay is good enough to tolerate the smell.

by melony 4y ago

XorNot 4y ago

Yeah I really don't understand what he's saying there - where does he think his salary comes from? Money buys those interested individuals time to pursue that interest, and the more of it we have the more people we can put in the right time and place to find the next big thing.

ZephyrBlu 4y ago
I think the key point is the "and worked in modest conditions", emphasis on modest. Injecting a ton of money creates perverse incentives and attracts people who are not interested pursuing something out of curiosity and interest, but for the money. I think it probably creates a hostile environment for people who are there out of pure interest, because if there is a way to earn more money/status/power/whatever by doing something other than good work people will do it. So you effectively get punished for doing what you're supposed to instead of playing the game. I think the "professional money extractor" explanation here is an apt description: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18003253 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18003253.
- melony 4y ago
  Academia is a career, not some sort of side project for bored scientists. We don't measure the competence of developers by the time they spend on side projects outside of work. You don't have to be full of visionary ideas to do research, and talent is everywhere. Teller would't be where he was had he been born in South America or Africa. If you only give money and positions to people with "passion" when there is a clear demand for more, that's called exploitation. Maybe consider becoming an aerospace investor instead, that field is full of talent chasing after lost dreams for pennies. If you are a software engineer on this forum, you know damn well what your net worth is in the current North American market compared to the other legacy engineering fields. It is patronizing to expect the other scientific fields to be worth "less" than CS.
- dale_glass 4y ago
  > Injecting a ton of money creates perverse incentives and attracts people who are not interested pursuing something out of curiosity and interest, but for the money. That's just an excuse to exploit people. The same nonsense as with teachers. "We want teachers that are passionate, not there just for the money". Bah. In the end we're trying to get stuff done, and it doesn't really matter whether the pipes are kept clean by somebody really passionate for sanitation, or somebody who just thinks the pay is good enough to tolerate the smell.