3 ms·

The NSF budgets millions to fight a problem not demonstrated to exist

4 points by peanutcrisis 3y ago

slater 3y ago
> the problem of “systematic” (or “structural”) racism in STEM, which probably doesn’t exist. The word "probably" is doing immense heavy lifting in that sentence.
- nh23423fefe 3y ago
  like "systematic"
- peanutcrisis 3y ago
  Your portrayal here doesn’t seem intellectually honest. Suppose he claims that the Flying Spaghetti Monster probably doesn’t exist. Remarking that “‘probably’ is doing some immense heavy lifting here” would certainly give the impression that it does exist, which is your intent. However, no substantiation has been provided, and the FSM might very well not exist. In other words, all you did was employ sophistry to write off the views of those you disagree with without offering any rebuttal of substance, while appearing that you actually did. That doesn’t strike me as engaging in good faith. Still, it doesn’t make the crux of the author’s argument any less sound; if you want to invest a huge pile of money into solving a problem, you’d probably want to be sure that the problem is well-defined and actually exist.
JoeyBananas 3y ago
Grants are not a scientific phenomenon that can be understood using science logic. They're a political phenomenon that can only be understood with political logic.
- jfengel 3y ago
  Science itself is not a scientific phenomenon. And that's OK. The "scientific method" doesn't tell you what to study, or how to go about studying it. It's ultimately a matter of intuition about what is most likely to be productive. Your intuition is guided by your experience, but it rarely gives you a "this is what you must study next" pointer. Funding is yet one more layer on top of that, since it has to balance expected financial returns to society with things that aren't ever expected to make money. Sometimes they do anyway, but that's not why we do them. We do them out of a sense of curiosity -- the same reason we make art. I suspect that on balance our "just plain curiosity" work has paid for itself, but only because a tiny number of things (like quantum physics and number theory) have had insane returns. The vast majority will not, and you cannot tell which it will be. Your phrase "political logic" has all kinds of negative connotations. But ultimately, politics is the process by people work together, and science is one aspect of people working together. That's messy; it's always messy. But it's also a real thing, and we cannot pretend it doesn't exist just because we can't write equations for it. Because if we set that standard, we'd have to abandon science itself.

4 points by peanutcrisis 3y ago

> the problem of “systematic” (or “structural”) racism in STEM, which probably doesn’t exist. The word "probably" is doing immense heavy lifting in that sentence.

nh23423fefe 3y ago
like "systematic"
peanutcrisis 3y ago
Your portrayal here doesn’t seem intellectually honest. Suppose he claims that the Flying Spaghetti Monster probably doesn’t exist. Remarking that “‘probably’ is doing some immense heavy lifting here” would certainly give the impression that it does exist, which is your intent. However, no substantiation has been provided, and the FSM might very well not exist. In other words, all you did was employ sophistry to write off the views of those you disagree with without offering any rebuttal of substance, while appearing that you actually did. That doesn’t strike me as engaging in good faith. Still, it doesn’t make the crux of the author’s argument any less sound; if you want to invest a huge pile of money into solving a problem, you’d probably want to be sure that the problem is well-defined and actually exist.

JoeyBananas 3y ago

Grants are not a scientific phenomenon that can be understood using science logic. They're a political phenomenon that can only be understood with political logic.

jfengel 3y ago
Science itself is not a scientific phenomenon. And that's OK. The "scientific method" doesn't tell you what to study, or how to go about studying it. It's ultimately a matter of intuition about what is most likely to be productive. Your intuition is guided by your experience, but it rarely gives you a "this is what you must study next" pointer. Funding is yet one more layer on top of that, since it has to balance expected financial returns to society with things that aren't ever expected to make money. Sometimes they do anyway, but that's not why we do them. We do them out of a sense of curiosity -- the same reason we make art. I suspect that on balance our "just plain curiosity" work has paid for itself, but only because a tiny number of things (like quantum physics and number theory) have had insane returns. The vast majority will not, and you cannot tell which it will be. Your phrase "political logic" has all kinds of negative connotations. But ultimately, politics is the process by people work together, and science is one aspect of people working together. That's messy; it's always messy. But it's also a real thing, and we cannot pretend it doesn't exist just because we can't write equations for it. Because if we set that standard, we'd have to abandon science itself.