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So many brilliant researchers in the US are funded by NSF grants. Even beyond public research, just the private sector benefits just from the training (and asso
by thatfrenchguy 2y ago
So many brilliant researchers in the US are funded by NSF grants. Even beyond public research, just the private sector benefits just from the training (and associated freedom from not having to chase money and TA) that NSF fellows get is immense.
Injecting dumb politics and refusing grants just because people put the words "biases" in their application is a great way to appeal to Republicans's undereducated voters (see https://www.commerce.senate.gov/services/files/4BD2D522-2092-4246-91A5-58EEF99750BC https://www.commerce.senate.gov/services/files/4BD2D522-2092... for an example of their idiotic rhetoric) but also a crazy gamble on the US's ability to be a superpower in two decades.
Just look at what happened in France when right-wing governments started defunding research: a slow but massive brain drain of the best minds. What does the current administration think will happen to our economy when they start burning future brains when they're at the seed stage?
- nyc_data_geek1 2y agoIt's very clear once you realize the people perpetrating this don't care one whit for the "economy" writ large, only their personal wealth and that of their cronies. The dumber, meaner and more desperate the population is, the easier the time they think they'll have ruling over them, as unto kings in this new gilded age. Of course, they forget what came after the gilded age. It's raining stockbrokers - err, oligarchs!
- dekhn 2y agothat's bad strategic thinking (obviously) because it places at a huge disadvantage to our main competitors.
- nyc_data_geek1 2y agoWhat makes you think they care?
- dekhn 2y agoIt's hard to be a feudal lord with bows and arrows when the civilization next door has cannons and covets your resources. I thought they'd care because if they are working so hard to sieze control, you'd think they'd want to hold on to it.
- obelos 2y agoTo a large degree their wealth is transnational and will move on to the next trough after emptying this one.
- 0cf8612b2e1e 2y agoNo matter what happens in the next few years, the damage is done. It is now known that the next administration could kill your apolitical career with the stroke of the pen if your ideas vaguely support the wrong team. If you have talent, why deal with the (frequently) middling pay and the existential risk that could follow every election?
- alaxhn 2y agoSo you don't think being forced to include a statement on diversity in every single grant request reviewed by the NIH was "injecting dumb politics" but you do think that being forced to NOT include a statement on diversity in every single grant request is?
- bloopernova 2y agoI think people are more concerned about the economic fallout and the illegality of what is being done.
- flocciput 2y ago> forced to NOT include == "not being allowed to include" i.e. a restriction on free speech with more worrying implications than "injecting dumb politics"
- tgma 2y agoReally? You see a narrow contextual restriction for irrelevant information in a grant/hiring packet to be worse than compelled speech?
- scarab92 2y agoDiversity statements were used to facilitate race-based grant approvals. They should never have been legal.
- magicink81 2y agoNever were legal.
- lnwlebjel 2y agoThis is false. The grants were not approved based on race. The grants were approved based on merit toward the goals of the field of science to which they were submitted. Showing how your work had broader impacts toward a more diverse, equitable and inclusive society was one part of a list of many criteria, recently updated here: https://new.nsf.gov/funding/merit-review#our-merit-review-criteria-f24 https://new.nsf.gov/funding/merit-review#our-merit-review-cr...