4 ms·

Especially when it comes to fundamental research a lot of work is "useless" until it isn't. This idea of picking winners before people even start at a college i

Especially when it comes to fundamental research a lot of work is "useless" until it isn't. This idea of picking winners before people even start at a college is not the way to go. Many people would argue that linguistics is one of those useless studies compared to comp sci, but it shares deep connections to research in logic and by extension type theory (see handbook for logic and languages)

IG_Semmelweiss 4y ago
what I understood parent to be saying is that the picked winners were picked by students, not some central arbiter of what should be studied. unless youn disagree with the laws of supply and demand, it seems the market consensus at this moment is that compsci majors are far more useful than any fundamental research (which still remains undefined). Even if the market was wrong and fundamental research could somehow be valuable, why would you not trust the primary beneficiaries oj making that decision, vs some bureaucrat that has no stake in the outcome?
- mint2 4y ago
  Law of supply and demand has no direct relevance on what benefits society as a whole
visarga 4y ago
You're right, the search space is deceptive and going directly towards the goal might lead to a dead end. Only in hindsight we can tell which stepping stones were essential. Immediate results are the best, but in the meantime we need to focus on novelty and interestingness. A great video about open-endedness (warning - very long) with Kenneth Stanley, author of the book "Why Greatness Cannot be Planned" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhYGXYeMq_E&t=350s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhYGXYeMq_E&t=350s
jimbob45 4y ago
Gender Studies and Literature will never not be useless professionally. That said, there is immense value in having some number of scholars study those fields in great detail and we would suffer as a species if we let our knowledge in those fields rot. Would it perhaps be prudent to cap the number of participants in those departments to match the number of real-world vacancies available?
Der_Einzige 4y ago
"Every time I fire a linguist, the performance of the speech recognizer goes up" -https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Jelinek https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Jelinek

IG_Semmelweiss 4y ago

what I understood parent to be saying is that the picked winners were picked by students, not some central arbiter of what should be studied. unless youn disagree with the laws of supply and demand, it seems the market consensus at this moment is that compsci majors are far more useful than any fundamental research (which still remains undefined). Even if the market was wrong and fundamental research could somehow be valuable, why would you not trust the primary beneficiaries oj making that decision, vs some bureaucrat that has no stake in the outcome?

mint2 4y ago
Law of supply and demand has no direct relevance on what benefits society as a whole

visarga 4y ago

You're right, the search space is deceptive and going directly towards the goal might lead to a dead end. Only in hindsight we can tell which stepping stones were essential. Immediate results are the best, but in the meantime we need to focus on novelty and interestingness. A great video about open-endedness (warning - very long) with Kenneth Stanley, author of the book "Why Greatness Cannot be Planned" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhYGXYeMq_E&t=350s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhYGXYeMq_E&t=350s

jimbob45 4y ago

Gender Studies and Literature will never not be useless professionally. That said, there is immense value in having some number of scholars study those fields in great detail and we would suffer as a species if we let our knowledge in those fields rot. Would it perhaps be prudent to cap the number of participants in those departments to match the number of real-world vacancies available?

Der_Einzige 4y ago

"Every time I fire a linguist, the performance of the speech recognizer goes up" -https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Jelinek https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Jelinek