10 ms·

There's a big truth here that screams out to me. If you want to do great work, you need freedom first.

hprotagonist 4y ago
If you pay a man a salary for doing research, he and you will want to have something to point to at the end of the year to show that the money has not been wasted. In promising work of the highest class, however, results do not come in this regular fashion, in fact years may pass without any tangible result being obtained, and the position of the paid worker would be very embarrassing and he would naturally take to work on a lower, or at any rate a different plane where he could be sure of getting year by year tangible results which would justify his salary. The position is this: You want one kind of research, but, if you pay a man to do it, it will drive him to research of a different kind. The only thing to do is to pay him for doing something else and give him enough leisure to do research for the love of it. -- from the biography of J. J. Thompson
- auggierose 4y ago
  Amen. It's really a simple thing to understand. But most people involved in academia don't (want to).
  - hprotagonist 4y ago
    we all know. we just can’t figure out how the fuck to get it funded. That sort of blue-sky culture needs a whole lot of disinterested money, and that’s hard to come by. In previous generations, we’ve used monopolists, the gentry, and other ways…always a challenge.
    - auggierose 4y ago
      If you know, you'll find a way to do the research you want anyway. So, no problem here. But I guess the problem is finding out which research you really want to do. You might find other aspects of life more rewarding / interesting / important.
    - pdimitar 4y ago
      Sadly there's plenty of money being spent in the world every second and even 1% of them would be enough to fund most of the science on the planet for years in the future... :( You wouldn't believe how much money do top Twitch / YouTube streamers get in an hour. I understand that they provide entertainment / influence and many people need that and pay them -- it's fair business and I don't look down on it. On the other hand... aren't there like sooooo many other and much more pressing concerns in the world to fix with surplusmoney? Yes, there are. So yeah I sympathize with the "we can't figure out how to fund proper free research". It's really a shame on humanity.
      - cs137 4y ago
        Part of the problem is that the way we conceptualize money leads us to treat it as if it's a real thing, as opposed to an accounting system the state creates for various purposes, some of which are desirable and some of which are not. If it can be done, it can be afforded. Only if it is physically impossible can it not be "afforded". That is where we ought to start as a society. Where will we get the money for a universal basic income? There are an infinitude of options--the state literally made the stuff up. The question isn't why there is so little money for so many important things, and so much money wasted--the question is why, despite being ostensibly democratic, we are so bad at statecraft (and have been since the Boomers took charge).
        AnimalMuppet 4y ago
        Problem is, not everything that can be done can be afforded (at least, not all at once). Or, to put it in Thomas Sowell's terms, economics is about the allocation of limited resources that have alternate uses. You want the government to print a bunch of money? Great. Now we have a bunch of money. We don't have any more actual stuff to buy with the money, though. Are we any better off? No. Is science any better off? Maybe - depends on what we do with the new money. Are the poor and disadvantaged any better off? Maybe - it depends on how much money is created, and how that money is distributed. Sounds like what you really want is to smooth out who has access to how much stuff, and also support science better. Printing a bunch of money (and distributing it) might do it, but it depends a great deal on the details.
    - cs137 4y ago
      Something I've learned is that most people are only really good (that is, good enough to contribute notably and distinguish themselves) at one thing. A few of us are good at two things, but even there, those two things tend to be related more closely than it seems at first. This is part of why our society has such horrible leadership, especially in the private sector. People who are good at climbing bureaucratic hierarchies, most typically, are not good at anything else: not very smart, not very ethical, etc. Academia was supposed to protect people from having to do the things they're bad at--such as sell their ideas to people who lack the ability to deeply understand them--and, unfortunately, it went derelict in that duty a long time ago. Salesmen, in any field other than sales, are like an invasive species who outcompete the natives with their superior social polish, but who struggle to actually do anything, which leads to systemic underperformance and the erosion of trust, which only makes the competitive necessity of salesmanship even greater, setting in motion a death spiral from which a private entity (or, in the long term, an entire industry) almost never recovers.
      - walleeee 4y ago
        > Salesmen, in any field other than sales, are like an invasive species who outcompete the natives with their superior social polish, but who struggle to actually do anything, which leads to systemic underperformance and the erosion of trust, which only makes the competitive necessity of salesmanship even greater As a graduate student it's hard not to internalize this framework even though it's soul destroying and leads all too predictably to poor science If you're very lucky your career success might be orthogonal to or even aligned with your sense of curiosity and intellectual honesty, more often they're antipathetic and you will have to sacrifice one for the other
    - xwdv 4y ago
      Can’t we just invent some kind of kickstarter for research? Certified researchers pitch something to millions and people donate small amounts to fund them? Some guy just got $300k from the internet just for working at Burger King.
      - tomrod 4y ago
        Unfortunately democracy doesn't do great in areas where technocrats are needed.
      - EUV071STR48 4y ago
        You could do that on kickstarter. An audience exists there already. Although it's mostly small investors/ backers there. You have thought more of the bigger investors, haven't you? Research is expensive indeed...
      - nephanth 4y ago
        Um, a lot of research is, in goal, substance, and subject, completely incomprehensible to non-specialists. So in practice I see a lot of obstructions to this method :/
      - hprotagonist 4y ago
        to a first approximation, what you’re proposing is that citizens pay their taxes, and then the state funds research at accredited non-profit institutes of higher learning. it’s the best we have right now; it is not without drawbacks. You’re not going to escape wanting to reinvent the grant proposal system.
  - ciphol 4y ago
    The problem is that a few people would use their leisure to do important basic research, while most would use their leisure to do... leisure.
yt-sdb 4y ago
“A room of one’s own” by Virginia Woolf is a great book about this topic. Financial freedom proceeds creative thinking.
mathgladiator 4y ago
Absolutely! I recently wrote about and shared this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31956590 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31956590
- EUV071STR48 4y ago
  "page not found" not the HN ofc, but the website you linked in the thread
  - mathgladiator 4y ago
    Thats unfortunate. I feel like surge.sh has been having issues as of late.

If you pay a man a salary for doing research, he and you will want to have something to point to at the end of the year to show that the money has not been wasted. In promising work of the highest class, however, results do not come in this regular fashion, in fact years may pass without any tangible result being obtained, and the position of the paid worker would be very embarrassing and he would naturally take to work on a lower, or at any rate a different plane where he could be sure of getting year by year tangible results which would justify his salary. The position is this: You want one kind of research, but, if you pay a man to do it, it will drive him to research of a different kind. The only thing to do is to pay him for doing something else and give him enough leisure to do research for the love of it. -- from the biography of J. J. Thompson

auggierose 4y ago
Amen. It's really a simple thing to understand. But most people involved in academia don't (want to).
- hprotagonist 4y ago
  we all know. we just can’t figure out how the fuck to get it funded. That sort of blue-sky culture needs a whole lot of disinterested money, and that’s hard to come by. In previous generations, we’ve used monopolists, the gentry, and other ways…always a challenge.
  - auggierose 4y ago
    If you know, you'll find a way to do the research you want anyway. So, no problem here. But I guess the problem is finding out which research you really want to do. You might find other aspects of life more rewarding / interesting / important.
  - pdimitar 4y ago
    Sadly there's plenty of money being spent in the world every second and even 1% of them would be enough to fund most of the science on the planet for years in the future... :( You wouldn't believe how much money do top Twitch / YouTube streamers get in an hour. I understand that they provide entertainment / influence and many people need that and pay them -- it's fair business and I don't look down on it. On the other hand... aren't there like sooooo many other and much more pressing concerns in the world to fix with surplusmoney? Yes, there are. So yeah I sympathize with the "we can't figure out how to fund proper free research". It's really a shame on humanity.
    - cs137 4y ago
      Part of the problem is that the way we conceptualize money leads us to treat it as if it's a real thing, as opposed to an accounting system the state creates for various purposes, some of which are desirable and some of which are not. If it can be done, it can be afforded. Only if it is physically impossible can it not be "afforded". That is where we ought to start as a society. Where will we get the money for a universal basic income? There are an infinitude of options--the state literally made the stuff up. The question isn't why there is so little money for so many important things, and so much money wasted--the question is why, despite being ostensibly democratic, we are so bad at statecraft (and have been since the Boomers took charge).
      - AnimalMuppet 4y ago
        Problem is, not everything that can be done can be afforded (at least, not all at once). Or, to put it in Thomas Sowell's terms, economics is about the allocation of limited resources that have alternate uses. You want the government to print a bunch of money? Great. Now we have a bunch of money. We don't have any more actual stuff to buy with the money, though. Are we any better off? No. Is science any better off? Maybe - depends on what we do with the new money. Are the poor and disadvantaged any better off? Maybe - it depends on how much money is created, and how that money is distributed. Sounds like what you really want is to smooth out who has access to how much stuff, and also support science better. Printing a bunch of money (and distributing it) might do it, but it depends a great deal on the details.
  - cs137 4y ago
    Something I've learned is that most people are only really good (that is, good enough to contribute notably and distinguish themselves) at one thing. A few of us are good at two things, but even there, those two things tend to be related more closely than it seems at first. This is part of why our society has such horrible leadership, especially in the private sector. People who are good at climbing bureaucratic hierarchies, most typically, are not good at anything else: not very smart, not very ethical, etc. Academia was supposed to protect people from having to do the things they're bad at--such as sell their ideas to people who lack the ability to deeply understand them--and, unfortunately, it went derelict in that duty a long time ago. Salesmen, in any field other than sales, are like an invasive species who outcompete the natives with their superior social polish, but who struggle to actually do anything, which leads to systemic underperformance and the erosion of trust, which only makes the competitive necessity of salesmanship even greater, setting in motion a death spiral from which a private entity (or, in the long term, an entire industry) almost never recovers.
    - walleeee 4y ago
      > Salesmen, in any field other than sales, are like an invasive species who outcompete the natives with their superior social polish, but who struggle to actually do anything, which leads to systemic underperformance and the erosion of trust, which only makes the competitive necessity of salesmanship even greater As a graduate student it's hard not to internalize this framework even though it's soul destroying and leads all too predictably to poor science If you're very lucky your career success might be orthogonal to or even aligned with your sense of curiosity and intellectual honesty, more often they're antipathetic and you will have to sacrifice one for the other
  - xwdv 4y ago
    Can’t we just invent some kind of kickstarter for research? Certified researchers pitch something to millions and people donate small amounts to fund them? Some guy just got $300k from the internet just for working at Burger King.
    - tomrod 4y ago
      Unfortunately democracy doesn't do great in areas where technocrats are needed.
    - EUV071STR48 4y ago
      You could do that on kickstarter. An audience exists there already. Although it's mostly small investors/ backers there. You have thought more of the bigger investors, haven't you? Research is expensive indeed...
    - nephanth 4y ago
      Um, a lot of research is, in goal, substance, and subject, completely incomprehensible to non-specialists. So in practice I see a lot of obstructions to this method :/
    - hprotagonist 4y ago
      to a first approximation, what you’re proposing is that citizens pay their taxes, and then the state funds research at accredited non-profit institutes of higher learning. it’s the best we have right now; it is not without drawbacks. You’re not going to escape wanting to reinvent the grant proposal system.
- ciphol 4y ago
  The problem is that a few people would use their leisure to do important basic research, while most would use their leisure to do... leisure.

yt-sdb 4y ago

“A room of one’s own” by Virginia Woolf is a great book about this topic. Financial freedom proceeds creative thinking.

mathgladiator 4y ago

Absolutely! I recently wrote about and shared this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31956590 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31956590

EUV071STR48 4y ago
"page not found" not the HN ofc, but the website you linked in the thread
- mathgladiator 4y ago
  Thats unfortunate. I feel like surge.sh has been having issues as of late.