4 ms·

Sorry but who actually thinks that being a scientist is the “key to prosperity”? I think far and away most scientists become researchers despite the fact that

by wredue 3y ago

Sorry but who actually thinks that being a scientist is the “key to prosperity”? I think far and away most scientists become researchers despite the fact that it’s generally not at all a prosperous venture.

swatcoder 3y ago
Not "being a scientist": "science". Science is seen as the road to human (not just personal) propsperity by people educated in the last 100-ish years, which is mostly everybody now, which puts extreme pressure to perform/produce on what was once a pure little hobby sport whose spectators were almost all invested as players themselves.
starcraft2wol 3y ago
Like journalism, they trade money for social status and prestige.
- bumby 3y ago
  Maybe, but it's probably a relatively small circle that elevates someone's status by being in academia. (Not to say that isn't the circle whose opinions matter to them, though).
- jampekka 3y ago
  Or just to do something that they are interested in. And to have quite a bit of freedom.
  - starcraft2wol 3y ago
    After seeing that academics still have to take a “two job” approach with serious research and fun research I’m not convinced of this. Not to mention the very protracted timelines to get to that stage of freedom.
    - jampekka 3y ago
      That depends on whether you accept the risk of having to find another line of work. Depending on the place, you can do almost anything you want even at PhD level. I've been on a chain of grants, doing quite freely what I want, for over a decade. But I accept it may break at any point and then I'll just go do something else. After PhD there will be nobody telling, and often not even caring, what to do. But that may mean that you don't get your PhD or you don't get another grant to live on. If you get a tenure it almost literally means that you can't be fired even if you do nothing at all. What is surprising is that almost all with tenure keep running the rat race even though they don't really get anything at least material out of it. (Nitpick: I think serious research is the fun one. The one churned to get another grant is neither serious nor fun.)
      - starcraft2wol 3y ago
        How did you get a position without a postdoc? > After PhD there will be nobody telling, and often not even caring, what to do. If you make the hiring cut in you’re in for about 5 years of grunt work and committees as an assistant prof, right? By “serious research” I mean the one they do for career advancement and hiring.
        jampekka 3y ago
        > How did you get a position without a postdoc? I am a postdoc, just have been for quite a while (on four different grants at least). In Finnish academia it's not that uncommon to stay a postdoc even until retirement. > That’s not true. If you make the hiring cut in you’re in for about 5 years of grunt work as an assistant prof. For teaching and admin yes. But at least in fields I know, what research you do or whether you do at all is all up to you. Of course the risk is that you'll be unemployed after the assistant prof. term ends. My point is that if you don't care about that, you're quite free to do whatever research-wise.
feoren 3y ago
Science and the advancement of technology is literally the only thing that has ever led to lasting prosperity for humans. All other periods of prosperity over the last ten thousand years have been temporary and highly localized. You can lose your golden age of prosperity through a single assassination. Only science breaks the wheel. If you factor in all future humans in your utility calculations, then science is by far the #1 noblest pursuit humans can ever undertake. We're talking about scientific advancements potentially helping trillions of people before all is said and heat-deathed. Great works of art can also be enjoyed by all future humans, but science has a super-linear (if not actually exponential) growth curve where every advancement makes future advancements a little easier. The question is whether the noble pursuit of "science" and the day-to-day activities of "being a scientist" have diverged or not. There is mounting evidence that the institution of science has been subverted to the extent that many people who are professional scientists are not actually contributing to the pursuit of science. Or, far worse, detracting from it, as we see here. It's one of the great tragedies of our era.
- fock 3y ago
  > Science and the advancement of technology is literally the only thing that has ever led to lasting prosperity for humans. All other periods of prosperity over the last ten thousand years have been temporary and highly localized. You can lose your golden age of prosperity through a single assassination. Only science breaks the wheel. How exactly do you know this civilization will not crash too? (and take with it that highly localized habitat)
  - PH95VuimJjqBqy 3y ago
    That was exactly my question when I read that quote too. Everything is temporary on a large enough scale and everyone w/i that golden era also thought it would last and that belief is part of why it didn't. Humans will never build anything that truly lasts for a very simple reason. The lessons learned get forgotten after 2 generations (3 at most). Stop and consider how the US fought for its freedom and how nowadays many people from the US would vote to have more limitations on speech.

by wredue 3y ago

swatcoder 3y ago

Not "being a scientist": "science". Science is seen as the road to human (not just personal) propsperity by people educated in the last 100-ish years, which is mostly everybody now, which puts extreme pressure to perform/produce on what was once a pure little hobby sport whose spectators were almost all invested as players themselves.

starcraft2wol 3y ago

Like journalism, they trade money for social status and prestige.

bumby 3y ago
Maybe, but it's probably a relatively small circle that elevates someone's status by being in academia. (Not to say that isn't the circle whose opinions matter to them, though).
jampekka 3y ago
Or just to do something that they are interested in. And to have quite a bit of freedom.
- starcraft2wol 3y ago
  After seeing that academics still have to take a “two job” approach with serious research and fun research I’m not convinced of this. Not to mention the very protracted timelines to get to that stage of freedom.
  - jampekka 3y ago
    That depends on whether you accept the risk of having to find another line of work. Depending on the place, you can do almost anything you want even at PhD level. I've been on a chain of grants, doing quite freely what I want, for over a decade. But I accept it may break at any point and then I'll just go do something else. After PhD there will be nobody telling, and often not even caring, what to do. But that may mean that you don't get your PhD or you don't get another grant to live on. If you get a tenure it almost literally means that you can't be fired even if you do nothing at all. What is surprising is that almost all with tenure keep running the rat race even though they don't really get anything at least material out of it. (Nitpick: I think serious research is the fun one. The one churned to get another grant is neither serious nor fun.)
    - starcraft2wol 3y ago
      How did you get a position without a postdoc? > After PhD there will be nobody telling, and often not even caring, what to do. If you make the hiring cut in you’re in for about 5 years of grunt work and committees as an assistant prof, right? By “serious research” I mean the one they do for career advancement and hiring.
      - jampekka 3y ago
        > How did you get a position without a postdoc? I am a postdoc, just have been for quite a while (on four different grants at least). In Finnish academia it's not that uncommon to stay a postdoc even until retirement. > That’s not true. If you make the hiring cut in you’re in for about 5 years of grunt work as an assistant prof. For teaching and admin yes. But at least in fields I know, what research you do or whether you do at all is all up to you. Of course the risk is that you'll be unemployed after the assistant prof. term ends. My point is that if you don't care about that, you're quite free to do whatever research-wise.

feoren 3y ago

Science and the advancement of technology is literally the only thing that has ever led to lasting prosperity for humans. All other periods of prosperity over the last ten thousand years have been temporary and highly localized. You can lose your golden age of prosperity through a single assassination. Only science breaks the wheel. If you factor in all future humans in your utility calculations, then science is by far the #1 noblest pursuit humans can ever undertake. We're talking about scientific advancements potentially helping trillions of people before all is said and heat-deathed. Great works of art can also be enjoyed by all future humans, but science has a super-linear (if not actually exponential) growth curve where every advancement makes future advancements a little easier. The question is whether the noble pursuit of "science" and the day-to-day activities of "being a scientist" have diverged or not. There is mounting evidence that the institution of science has been subverted to the extent that many people who are professional scientists are not actually contributing to the pursuit of science. Or, far worse, detracting from it, as we see here. It's one of the great tragedies of our era.

fock 3y ago
> Science and the advancement of technology is literally the only thing that has ever led to lasting prosperity for humans. All other periods of prosperity over the last ten thousand years have been temporary and highly localized. You can lose your golden age of prosperity through a single assassination. Only science breaks the wheel. How exactly do you know this civilization will not crash too? (and take with it that highly localized habitat)
- PH95VuimJjqBqy 3y ago
  That was exactly my question when I read that quote too. Everything is temporary on a large enough scale and everyone w/i that golden era also thought it would last and that belief is part of why it didn't. Humans will never build anything that truly lasts for a very simple reason. The lessons learned get forgotten after 2 generations (3 at most). Stop and consider how the US fought for its freedom and how nowadays many people from the US would vote to have more limitations on speech.