6 ms·

People have struggled with this for time eternal, and from Google 20% time and other "skunkworks" projects, some of the greatest discoveries and inventions were

by asah 3y ago

People have struggled with this for time eternal, and from Google 20% time and other "skunkworks" projects, some of the greatest discoveries and inventions were made off the books. One of my favorite (1993): Wiles, with his from-childhood fascination with Fermat's Last Theorem, decided to undertake the challenge of proving the conjecture, at least to the extent needed for Frey's curve.[18]: 226 He dedicated all of his research time to this problem for over six years in near-total secrecy, covering up his efforts by releasing prior work in small segments as separate papers and confiding only in his wife.[18]: 229–230 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Wiles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Wiles

atrettel 3y ago
I have heard a similar story about Richard Feynman. If I recall correctly, Feynman claimed to have only applied for grants on work that he already completed, that way he knows he can fulfill what he set out. I am unable to find the source for this but I presume it was in his autobiography.
- antognini 3y ago
  This is a common trick for theorists. You need to have essentially completed the work in order to write a compelling grant proposal.
  - lisper 3y ago
    I did this when I was a researcher even though I was not a theorist (I was working in mobile robots). I always worked a year ahead, and write a proposal for what I had done the year before. I acquired a reputation as someone who always delivered. Then one year I had a proposal rejected on the grounds that what I was proposing was impossible to achieve within the budget and time frame I was proposing. That's when I quit.
    - genericone 3y ago
      They wanted you to ask for more time and money? What kind of grift were they actually running?
      - marcosdumay 3y ago
        People evaluate the proposals expecting them to be estimations. And when somebody estimate some work taking too little time or money, people often don't trust that estimate. This is all completely normal and reasonable. Except for the part where you are expected to estimate results of scientific research.
        mcmoor 3y ago
        Yeah too good to be true things are red flag for fraud or pipe dream
    - ok_dad 3y ago
      I hope you quit, took 6 months off, then came back with the previously finished work and told them, “You were right! It only took six months and zero grant money; I did this while traveling in Japan.” That might have blown their little bureaucrat minds.
      - lisper 3y ago
        The problem is that the reviews were anonymous (which was supposed to make the process less political). My direct managers knew what I was doing.
- dekhn 3y ago
  it's not uncommon for labs to ahve a grad student working on a skunkworks project funded by a previous, unrelated grant. They generate initial data, which is shown in the grant application. But often the grad student is still working in parallel with the extremely long grant cycle to get more publishable results and can sometimes even get to a full paper before being funded. I think of it like speculative execution and pipelining.
- YakBizzarro 3y ago
  That's the sad reality of most grants today
fnordpiglet 3y ago
You always have to remember to feed the KPIs, otherwise the management boogie men will take away your health care.
- awesomeMilou 3y ago
  Healthcare coverage is tied to reaching KPI's in he US?
- anonporridge 3y ago
  This is why you FIRE, so management loses their control authority and you can actually focus on solving problems without their interference.
osigurdson 3y ago
Harder questions need to be asked regarding how metrics tie to actual objectives. Just because I have a chart trending in the right direction is meaningless. “Number of papers published” is not a good metric. We need more trust and fewer metrics / games. The thing I really don’t want to pay for (as a tax payer) is the bureaucracy in the middle of all of this.
- kiba 3y ago
  Might be a good idea to bring back the concept of the gentleman scientist, who are generally independently wealthy. Charles Darwin is one such scientist.
  - pvaldes 3y ago
    It seems that we are getting short of people interested into paying with their own money for the privilege of solving other's people problems for free. Is very strange.
  - hn_throwaway_99 3y ago
    Great, I think it'd be so much better if a qualification for scientist was "already rich".
    - _dain_ 3y ago
      maybe, but it's a hell of a lot easier to get rich when you don't spend your 20s on a phd working for peanuts
  - linguae 3y ago
    As a researcher who is seeking alternatives to the pressures of both academic and industrial research, one of the things I’m thinking about for my long-term career plan is to relocate to an area with a lower cost of living (bye Silicon Valley) and make an arrangement where I work part time for money (possibilities include being a contractor, doing freelance or consulting work, or starting a business that doesn’t require more than 20 hours per week to operate) and spend the other 20 hours a week on research. I’d love to be able to do research based on my own interests without having to worry about business or career concerns. I’ve come to realize that when one is paid to do research, the researcher is suddenly under pressure by the person or institution paying the researcher. “He who pays the piper calls the tune,” after all. But if I make a living through non-research tasks, then I’ll have research freedom. The tough part is coming up with a business idea that would allow this type of lifestyle; that’s where I’m currently at. If I could make $130,000 per year, heck, even $65,000, and live in an inexpensive part of America then I’d be fine, but the trick is figuring out how to make that much money in only 20 hours instead of 40.
artursapek 3y ago
I created and sold a software system to a company and joined them. I stayed there for 6 years continuing to work on it and building a big team. During this time, I quietly spun off a small rogue effort to build a newer client app for the system in Rust. This quickly became our most popular product. The company is now winding down the project overall, but decided to keep and adapt this Rust client to its own backends. It is the only part which survived and it was the only thing I wasn’t given orders to build.
yonaguska 3y ago
I find myself doing this for tech debt items far too often.

by asah 3y ago

atrettel 3y ago

I have heard a similar story about Richard Feynman. If I recall correctly, Feynman claimed to have only applied for grants on work that he already completed, that way he knows he can fulfill what he set out. I am unable to find the source for this but I presume it was in his autobiography.

antognini 3y ago
This is a common trick for theorists. You need to have essentially completed the work in order to write a compelling grant proposal.
- lisper 3y ago
  I did this when I was a researcher even though I was not a theorist (I was working in mobile robots). I always worked a year ahead, and write a proposal for what I had done the year before. I acquired a reputation as someone who always delivered. Then one year I had a proposal rejected on the grounds that what I was proposing was impossible to achieve within the budget and time frame I was proposing. That's when I quit.
  - genericone 3y ago
    They wanted you to ask for more time and money? What kind of grift were they actually running?
    - marcosdumay 3y ago
      People evaluate the proposals expecting them to be estimations. And when somebody estimate some work taking too little time or money, people often don't trust that estimate. This is all completely normal and reasonable. Except for the part where you are expected to estimate results of scientific research.
      - mcmoor 3y ago
        Yeah too good to be true things are red flag for fraud or pipe dream
  - ok_dad 3y ago
    I hope you quit, took 6 months off, then came back with the previously finished work and told them, “You were right! It only took six months and zero grant money; I did this while traveling in Japan.” That might have blown their little bureaucrat minds.
    - lisper 3y ago
      The problem is that the reviews were anonymous (which was supposed to make the process less political). My direct managers knew what I was doing.
dekhn 3y ago
it's not uncommon for labs to ahve a grad student working on a skunkworks project funded by a previous, unrelated grant. They generate initial data, which is shown in the grant application. But often the grad student is still working in parallel with the extremely long grant cycle to get more publishable results and can sometimes even get to a full paper before being funded. I think of it like speculative execution and pipelining.
YakBizzarro 3y ago
That's the sad reality of most grants today

fnordpiglet 3y ago

You always have to remember to feed the KPIs, otherwise the management boogie men will take away your health care.

awesomeMilou 3y ago
Healthcare coverage is tied to reaching KPI's in he US?
anonporridge 3y ago
This is why you FIRE, so management loses their control authority and you can actually focus on solving problems without their interference.

osigurdson 3y ago

Harder questions need to be asked regarding how metrics tie to actual objectives. Just because I have a chart trending in the right direction is meaningless. “Number of papers published” is not a good metric. We need more trust and fewer metrics / games. The thing I really don’t want to pay for (as a tax payer) is the bureaucracy in the middle of all of this.

kiba 3y ago
Might be a good idea to bring back the concept of the gentleman scientist, who are generally independently wealthy. Charles Darwin is one such scientist.
- pvaldes 3y ago
  It seems that we are getting short of people interested into paying with their own money for the privilege of solving other's people problems for free. Is very strange.
- hn_throwaway_99 3y ago
  Great, I think it'd be so much better if a qualification for scientist was "already rich".
  - _dain_ 3y ago
    maybe, but it's a hell of a lot easier to get rich when you don't spend your 20s on a phd working for peanuts
- linguae 3y ago
  As a researcher who is seeking alternatives to the pressures of both academic and industrial research, one of the things I’m thinking about for my long-term career plan is to relocate to an area with a lower cost of living (bye Silicon Valley) and make an arrangement where I work part time for money (possibilities include being a contractor, doing freelance or consulting work, or starting a business that doesn’t require more than 20 hours per week to operate) and spend the other 20 hours a week on research. I’d love to be able to do research based on my own interests without having to worry about business or career concerns. I’ve come to realize that when one is paid to do research, the researcher is suddenly under pressure by the person or institution paying the researcher. “He who pays the piper calls the tune,” after all. But if I make a living through non-research tasks, then I’ll have research freedom. The tough part is coming up with a business idea that would allow this type of lifestyle; that’s where I’m currently at. If I could make $130,000 per year, heck, even $65,000, and live in an inexpensive part of America then I’d be fine, but the trick is figuring out how to make that much money in only 20 hours instead of 40.

artursapek 3y ago

I created and sold a software system to a company and joined them. I stayed there for 6 years continuing to work on it and building a big team. During this time, I quietly spun off a small rogue effort to build a newer client app for the system in Rust. This quickly became our most popular product. The company is now winding down the project overall, but decided to keep and adapt this Rust client to its own backends. It is the only part which survived and it was the only thing I wasn’t given orders to build.

yonaguska 3y ago

I find myself doing this for tech debt items far too often.