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The donor class often has very stupid or industrially motivated ideas about what kind of research should be done. In the former case, you're mostly just adding
by noqc 3y ago
The donor class often has very stupid or industrially motivated ideas about what kind of research should be done. In the former case, you're mostly just adding another idiot to your list of pseudobosses. In the latter case, what's really happening is that the rest of the funding is now going to end up subsidizing some private research endeavour. This is a form of capture, and should basically be avoided.
The current state of the system for graduate students is bad, but it is not improved by allowing private investment.
- WalterBright 3y ago> The donor class often has very stupid people who are very good at making money make stupid investments? > industrially motivated ideas which drive increased prosperity in our economy > it is not improved by allowing private investment wow. Maybe we shouldn't allow things like inventing semiconductors, jet engines, television, etc.
- defrost 3y ago> people who are very good at making money make stupid investments? Absolutely, particularly when the "investment" is a donation to charity or a university that's more to assuage guilt or plaster a name for posterity than it is for any return. People that do end up with a great deal of money aren't always the sharpest crayons in the sun - many have luck and good advisors.
- WalterBright 3y ago> that's more to assuage guilt or plaster a name for posterity than it is for any return And you know this, how? > always If you have to insert this word, you've created a strawman.
- richbell 3y ago> > > People that do end up with a great deal of money aren't always the sharpest crayons in the sun - many have luck and good advisors. > > always > If you have to insert this word, you've created a strawman. It's a strawman to say that "something isn't always true?" Really? Come on.
- WalterBright 3y agoWhen I say "people like ice cream" and you say "not all people like ice cream" that's creating a straw man.
- richbell 3y agoThat is not what a strawman is.
- WalterBright 3y agoYeah it is. You're arguing against my point by creating a false representation of what I said.
- richbell 3y agoNo, Walter, it is you who created a false representation of what noqc said when you replied to their comment saying "people who are very good at making money make stupid investments?"
- WalterBright 3y agoNot at all. I did not add "all".
- dustingetz 3y ago> people who are very good at making money assumptions like that can get one killed
- bmitc 3y ago> people who are very good at making money make stupid investments? Just because someone makes a lot of money doesn't mean they are intelligent or did so upon their own virtue. And it doesn't necessarily mean they're good at investments and capital allocation. >> it is not improved by allowing private investment > wow. Maybe we shouldn't allow things like inventing semiconductors, jet engines, television, etc. An incredibly sizable portion of technological development in the U.S. in the past 100 years is due to government (i.e., public) funding, not private funding.
- WalterBright 3y ago> An incredibly sizable portion of technological development in the U.S. in the past 100 years is due to government (i.e., public) funding, not private funding. Never mind semiconductors, jet engines, television, internet phones, AI, electric cars, engines, steel making, typewriters, the whole textile industry, telephones, CDs, electric guitars, autotune, cameras, need I go on? > Just because someone makes a lot of money doesn't mean they are intelligent or did so upon their own virtue. And it doesn't necessarily mean they're good at investments and capital allocation. Maybe read biographies of Musk, Jobs, Gates, Bezos, Buffet, Rockefeller, Walton, Sears, etc., then tell me how stupid they are.
- bmitc 3y agoI didn't say all technology. My point was that we don't owe everything to private investments. > Maybe read biographies of Musk, Jobs, Gates, Bezos, Buffet, Rockefeller, Walton, Sears, etc., then tell me how stupid they are. I don't need to because I know what the words "cult of personality" mean.
- WalterBright 3y ago> I didn't say all technology Neither did I. > My point was that we don't owe everything to private investments. I didn't say everything. > I don't need to because ... A credible case needs more than saying you don't need to know anything about them.
- YossarianFrPrez 3y agoAh for sure. I'm not suggesting that it be seen as an investment, or a gift for anything other than undirected basic research.