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My father was a university researcher/teacher (assistant professor) in Czechoslovakia, during communist regime. It's not as black and white as these links might

by js8 3y ago

My father was a university researcher/teacher (assistant professor) in Czechoslovakia, during communist regime. It's not as black and white as these links might lead you to. He was never higher ranking (didn't get professorship) until the 1989 revolution, AFAICT he was more interested in research (thermodynamics) than career. During real socialism, academia was often a refuge of smart and freethinking people, if you were able to get there (some didn't for political reasons). It wasn't a highly paid job. And it also was very inefficient. There were completely useless departments, and the department heads were political positions. But some good science got done, without having to toe the party line, and without having to bend metrics and having to publish lots of repeated nonsense. (I am not advocating that particular system, I think it was worse, but I am pointing out that measurement is not inevitable.) One result of liberal (capitalist) approach to science is that people get really good at marketing themselves. That's why science in the Eastern Europe often gets bad optics, because that self-promoting aspect of it wasn't as prevalent there.

woolion 3y ago
If we're at anecdotes I know people from former Communist countries and their experience were worse than that, with many deaths within the family intellectuals in one case. As a result they tend to be staunch pro-capitalists, to a fault. Under tyrannical regimes some people manage to live fairly reasonably well while many suffer. I don't doubt that but it doesn't invalidate a clear general trend. During a long time under a capitalist regime academia was a refuge of smart and freethinking people. The "real socialism" sounds like a "true scotsman" fallacy. Why wouldn't you apply the same standard and consider that the time academia was working prerry well in capitalist countries was "true capitalism" and the current state of failing academia (to a degree) is a symptom of a "false", degenerate form of capitalism? I think your comment can be interpreted in different ways, but if I was to go with the more measured version I think you should agree with Godelski's points more. In particular there isn't even really one example of a communist country that evolved with the political stability that democracies did. I'm not sure that if such a thing had happened, it wouldn't have devolved with the same bureaucratic tendencies --which goes back to my first point: given the level or brutal instability metric hacking could not arise.
- js8 3y ago
  The time when academia was working "pretty well" in the West was less capitalist than is today. It was quite social-democratic, with a relatively strong state (and academic independence).
tsunamifury 3y ago
Chinese science and metric hacking disagree as well as Russian under communism. I’m sorry but you have a wildly romantic view of your fathers time.
godelski 3y ago
> But some good science got done, without having to toe the party line, and without having to bend metrics and having to publish lots of repeated nonsense. Yeah no one should doubt that there wasn't good science coming out of Soviet Russia. Anyone that thinks so is ignoring a lot of history and this belief contradicts the entire premise of the Cold War. I mean how many countries have sent probes to the moon (~9 of them)? What about to other planets? What about Mars? (US/USSR/China. USSR and Russia all crashed and China is only 2020). And they produced a lot of good mathemticians, even if they discriminated against the Jews (google "Jewish Math Problems"). I agree, the system is definitely not preferred and too political, but no one should doubt that there weren't world class researchers from there. My concern is really that we're adopting such bureaucratic prioritization. It's also worth noting that this dominance of bureaucrats/politicians played a major role in the Chernobyl disaster, though neither should discount the fact that this was highly classified research at the time given how new the technology was. (Also let's not forget what happened to academic in China...)

by js8 3y ago

woolion 3y ago

If we're at anecdotes I know people from former Communist countries and their experience were worse than that, with many deaths within the family intellectuals in one case. As a result they tend to be staunch pro-capitalists, to a fault. Under tyrannical regimes some people manage to live fairly reasonably well while many suffer. I don't doubt that but it doesn't invalidate a clear general trend. During a long time under a capitalist regime academia was a refuge of smart and freethinking people. The "real socialism" sounds like a "true scotsman" fallacy. Why wouldn't you apply the same standard and consider that the time academia was working prerry well in capitalist countries was "true capitalism" and the current state of failing academia (to a degree) is a symptom of a "false", degenerate form of capitalism? I think your comment can be interpreted in different ways, but if I was to go with the more measured version I think you should agree with Godelski's points more. In particular there isn't even really one example of a communist country that evolved with the political stability that democracies did. I'm not sure that if such a thing had happened, it wouldn't have devolved with the same bureaucratic tendencies --which goes back to my first point: given the level or brutal instability metric hacking could not arise.

js8 3y ago
The time when academia was working "pretty well" in the West was less capitalist than is today. It was quite social-democratic, with a relatively strong state (and academic independence).

tsunamifury 3y ago

Chinese science and metric hacking disagree as well as Russian under communism. I’m sorry but you have a wildly romantic view of your fathers time.

godelski 3y ago

> But some good science got done, without having to toe the party line, and without having to bend metrics and having to publish lots of repeated nonsense. Yeah no one should doubt that there wasn't good science coming out of Soviet Russia. Anyone that thinks so is ignoring a lot of history and this belief contradicts the entire premise of the Cold War. I mean how many countries have sent probes to the moon (~9 of them)? What about to other planets? What about Mars? (US/USSR/China. USSR and Russia all crashed and China is only 2020). And they produced a lot of good mathemticians, even if they discriminated against the Jews (google "Jewish Math Problems"). I agree, the system is definitely not preferred and too political, but no one should doubt that there weren't world class researchers from there. My concern is really that we're adopting such bureaucratic prioritization. It's also worth noting that this dominance of bureaucrats/politicians played a major role in the Chernobyl disaster, though neither should discount the fact that this was highly classified research at the time given how new the technology was. (Also let's not forget what happened to academic in China...)