3 ms·

Kudos to you for writing such a long ordeal in a humorous manner or at least that’s what I felt while reading it. On topic, it’s probably another example of wh

Kudos to you for writing such a long ordeal in a humorous manner or at least that’s what I felt while reading it. On topic, it’s probably another example of why scaling a system is so hard. Especially when it comes to tasks that require deep thinking. I can’t help but notice the government policy of sponsoring mass PhDs in the hope of raising a knowledge based society is itself changing the definition of knowledge here.

molteanu 1y ago
Yes, fifteen years after the fact, during which time my mind constantly bombards me with, "Why did I happen? Did I do something wrong? It was not fair! I did my best!" and such, I can't help it but write in in a humorous manner, otherwise it's hard to put it behind you and forget about it. On the second point, yes the total number of PhD graduates for a similar time period was 12.000 (official Government numbers) so this was a doubling of PhD's just like that, out of the blue. No wonder it was chaotic. There was also enormous political pressure regarding "the Government is incompetent as it cannot absorb what is basically free EU money". So, ok, they've absorbed it, sort of. I think you are right. Reading the online articles and official documentation from that period, which is really scarce (there is no such program available on the EU official website, for example, or I wasn't able to find it), it feels like this was a big experiment, the success of which is not mentioned in the news either. What I could find is that it was part of the Lisbon Strategy [1], also mentioned in the official documents published by the Government. From the linked wikipedia article: "Its aim was to make the EU the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world capable of sustainable economic growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion, by 2010. It was set out by the European Council in Lisbon in March 2000. By 2010, most of its goals were not achieved. It was succeeded by the Europe 2020 strategy." [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisbon_Strategy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisbon_Strategy
- intended 1y ago
  For what its, worth, given your situation, and given the circumstances, you did what could be done. As a fun question, what would you do now, to do what you did, but better?
- soco 1y ago
  They just continued the same way of working they had already before. I went through a similar stunt around the end of the 90s (yes also Romania) but I called it quits after half a year. Sometimes I regret it, but sometimes I'm aware that either I or the group would have exploded had I stayed more. I respect your resilience.
  - molteanu 1y ago
    Had I decided to call it quits, I would have probably asked myself, even to this day, questions like: did I make the right choice, what if things would have improved, what would have happened if I've tried harder, maybe there was just a misunderstanding, maybe it was my fault, maybe working at the University would have been the smart choice, etc. I actually still have the emails asking for the project coordinator, the one responsible for scholarships for all of us (I've searched them out, out of curiosity while writing this article and their CV is 12 pages long and, naturally, this project is listed there as a success) for ways to abandon the whole thing. I didn't even get a reply. I was already 2 years in so I've would have had to return the whole sum back, money I didn't have. I was penniless, as all PhD candidate seem to be. So I did what I had and could do, which is summarized in the post.
    - soco 1y ago
      Ah yes I wasn't paid for it, so there was no financial pressure to stay...
- eadmund 1y ago
  > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisbon_Strategy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisbon_Strategy Oh, that page is darkly funny itself. ‘[The Lisbon Strategy’s] aim was to make the EU “the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world capable of sustainable economic growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion,” by 2010.’ Yeah, that didn’t happen. ‘Spain's prime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero pointed out that the non-binding character of the Lisbon Strategy contributed to the failure.’ Typical bureaucratic response: freedom is the problem. There is definitely a role for government in fostering innovation and productivity, but it is very much a secondary role. Providing a predictable, stable, safe environment, and using government funds for things that the government actually needs to use seems to have worked for the U.S. for a long time, even before the two world wars.
- lycopodiopsida 1y ago
  To this day, 9 years later, I don't like to be referred by "Dr. so-and-so", not because I am ashamed of my thesis, but because I did hate every second of it. Screw the academia grinding mill, compared to it big business is almost human.
- fuzzfactor 1y ago
  When everything is dominated by a lack-of-knowledge based bureaucracy, and there's only a few short years to make a difference for 1.650.000 people, you are going to have to get started earlier rather than later ;) That's a lot of people to actually try to get on board as to what a "knowledge-based society" should be, they would have to relate it to something they were already familiar with. If the only resource you have to work with is a "not-as-much-knowledge-as-you-thought" based institution, then start calling it a beacon of a knowledge-based society. Somebody's going to have to spread the word anyway, and if more functional resources don't come within reach, at least you've done your part. It's interesting that some people are bound to believe you have achieved a knowledge-based society if it's just repeated over and over.
attila-lendvai 1y ago
truth (knowledge) and force (government) are the antithesis of each other. mix the two, and one gets annihilated.
godelski 1y ago
> I can’t help but notice the government policy of sponsoring mass PhDs in the hope of raising a knowledge based society is itself changing the definition of knowledge here. Honestly, I think more PhDs and "deep thinkers" does provide a net benefit to society. I actually wish we would scale it more. But I also think we often step on our own feet while doing this. In an effort to be "efficient" we create perverse incentives and it's clear that how we have things structured that people are more willing to pursue metric maximization than maximize a metric's intent[0]. If anything, I'm of the belief that you abandon the notion of efficiency as with governments, returns on investments can be long term (much longer than for a company). In general, people pursuing high levels of academia (or adjacent domains like research labs), are naturally interested in things that are pushing the bounds of our knowledge. We have a really bad track record at per-determining what is impactful and not. If anything, we're pretty good at rejecting things that have high impact (paradigm shifts). Frankly I'm aware of little to no fields that do not result in practical utility in the long run. There's plenty of math research that was long thought to be of no practical importance but did end up greatly influencing other domains Research is expensive, but certainly we have the money for it. And frankly, a huge chunk in that cost is the administration. Which a large portion of that comes down to the measuring and determination. I wouldn't argue to distribute funds without question, but I'd wager that the amount we spend to ensure research funds are spent effectively is greater that the funds we would lost/spend ineffectively were we to perform significantly less administration. [0] https://talyarkoni.org/blog/2018/10/02/no-its-not-the-incentives-its-you/ https://talyarkoni.org/blog/2018/10/02/no-its-not-the-incent...
trod1234 1y ago
Well what was described is pretty much the standard. To put a little context, and this is a bit speculation on my part but seems to conform based on conversations I've had from people who have lived at that time. This kind of policy at institutions started right after Sputnik. There was a sudden surge in demand for mathematics and engineers, and they couldn't find enough people so they threw money at the problem. The unfortunate side effect was that its a problem that money can't solve, and so when you can't find anyone that meets the rigorous standards, you must lower standards. This seems to have happened in math education around that time the effects of which did not become visible until much later, and it eventually snowballed to most of academia. The effect has been that most math teachers, excluding a few professors that buck the norm which are the exception, started teaching by rote following what is known today as a lying to children paradigm. This is a pedagogical approach that is the opposite of the paradigm that was taught prior which was a first-principled approach (based in the greeks and rome). You are given flawed models upfront, which you must learn some things, and unlearn other things you previously learned to unconscious competence with little guidance. This includes all the elements and structure of real torture (from the 1950s), and the process is repeated over and over sieving only the most compliant or blind people forward, and inducing PTSD in the creative, brilliant, and genius. The process destroys minds, steals economic benefit of intelligence, and selects for average. Torture is known to reduce, often permanently, the capability for rational thought. It follows the now refuted ideology of gnosticism. Intuitive understanding is eschewed, and you only become useful the closer you progress to gnosis (mastery), and informally, only the masters decide who gets to progress (through clever gimmicks, deceit, and orchestrated structural failure, that takes advantage of the drive to do less work, government funded work trends towards the least common denominator of production which often becomes negative). You now have more pHd's, but fewer people who actually met the 1960s definition of a pHd. There are exceptions because this is a spectrum, but this has been the trend for the majority for decades, and the issues described are known issues with any centralized hierarchy. It hasn't been strictly knowledge-based since at least the late 60s. You see a sharp degradation of published material in education across all subjects starting in the 70s.

molteanu 1y ago

Yes, fifteen years after the fact, during which time my mind constantly bombards me with, "Why did I happen? Did I do something wrong? It was not fair! I did my best!" and such, I can't help it but write in in a humorous manner, otherwise it's hard to put it behind you and forget about it. On the second point, yes the total number of PhD graduates for a similar time period was 12.000 (official Government numbers) so this was a doubling of PhD's just like that, out of the blue. No wonder it was chaotic. There was also enormous political pressure regarding "the Government is incompetent as it cannot absorb what is basically free EU money". So, ok, they've absorbed it, sort of. I think you are right. Reading the online articles and official documentation from that period, which is really scarce (there is no such program available on the EU official website, for example, or I wasn't able to find it), it feels like this was a big experiment, the success of which is not mentioned in the news either. What I could find is that it was part of the Lisbon Strategy [1], also mentioned in the official documents published by the Government. From the linked wikipedia article: "Its aim was to make the EU the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world capable of sustainable economic growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion, by 2010. It was set out by the European Council in Lisbon in March 2000. By 2010, most of its goals were not achieved. It was succeeded by the Europe 2020 strategy." [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisbon_Strategy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisbon_Strategy

intended 1y ago
For what its, worth, given your situation, and given the circumstances, you did what could be done. As a fun question, what would you do now, to do what you did, but better?
soco 1y ago
They just continued the same way of working they had already before. I went through a similar stunt around the end of the 90s (yes also Romania) but I called it quits after half a year. Sometimes I regret it, but sometimes I'm aware that either I or the group would have exploded had I stayed more. I respect your resilience.
- molteanu 1y ago
  Had I decided to call it quits, I would have probably asked myself, even to this day, questions like: did I make the right choice, what if things would have improved, what would have happened if I've tried harder, maybe there was just a misunderstanding, maybe it was my fault, maybe working at the University would have been the smart choice, etc. I actually still have the emails asking for the project coordinator, the one responsible for scholarships for all of us (I've searched them out, out of curiosity while writing this article and their CV is 12 pages long and, naturally, this project is listed there as a success) for ways to abandon the whole thing. I didn't even get a reply. I was already 2 years in so I've would have had to return the whole sum back, money I didn't have. I was penniless, as all PhD candidate seem to be. So I did what I had and could do, which is summarized in the post.
  - soco 1y ago
    Ah yes I wasn't paid for it, so there was no financial pressure to stay...
eadmund 1y ago
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisbon_Strategy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisbon_Strategy Oh, that page is darkly funny itself. ‘[The Lisbon Strategy’s] aim was to make the EU “the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world capable of sustainable economic growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion,” by 2010.’ Yeah, that didn’t happen. ‘Spain's prime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero pointed out that the non-binding character of the Lisbon Strategy contributed to the failure.’ Typical bureaucratic response: freedom is the problem. There is definitely a role for government in fostering innovation and productivity, but it is very much a secondary role. Providing a predictable, stable, safe environment, and using government funds for things that the government actually needs to use seems to have worked for the U.S. for a long time, even before the two world wars.
lycopodiopsida 1y ago
To this day, 9 years later, I don't like to be referred by "Dr. so-and-so", not because I am ashamed of my thesis, but because I did hate every second of it. Screw the academia grinding mill, compared to it big business is almost human.
fuzzfactor 1y ago
When everything is dominated by a lack-of-knowledge based bureaucracy, and there's only a few short years to make a difference for 1.650.000 people, you are going to have to get started earlier rather than later ;) That's a lot of people to actually try to get on board as to what a "knowledge-based society" should be, they would have to relate it to something they were already familiar with. If the only resource you have to work with is a "not-as-much-knowledge-as-you-thought" based institution, then start calling it a beacon of a knowledge-based society. Somebody's going to have to spread the word anyway, and if more functional resources don't come within reach, at least you've done your part. It's interesting that some people are bound to believe you have achieved a knowledge-based society if it's just repeated over and over.

attila-lendvai 1y ago

truth (knowledge) and force (government) are the antithesis of each other. mix the two, and one gets annihilated.

godelski 1y ago

> I can’t help but notice the government policy of sponsoring mass PhDs in the hope of raising a knowledge based society is itself changing the definition of knowledge here. Honestly, I think more PhDs and "deep thinkers" does provide a net benefit to society. I actually wish we would scale it more. But I also think we often step on our own feet while doing this. In an effort to be "efficient" we create perverse incentives and it's clear that how we have things structured that people are more willing to pursue metric maximization than maximize a metric's intent[0]. If anything, I'm of the belief that you abandon the notion of efficiency as with governments, returns on investments can be long term (much longer than for a company). In general, people pursuing high levels of academia (or adjacent domains like research labs), are naturally interested in things that are pushing the bounds of our knowledge. We have a really bad track record at per-determining what is impactful and not. If anything, we're pretty good at rejecting things that have high impact (paradigm shifts). Frankly I'm aware of little to no fields that do not result in practical utility in the long run. There's plenty of math research that was long thought to be of no practical importance but did end up greatly influencing other domains Research is expensive, but certainly we have the money for it. And frankly, a huge chunk in that cost is the administration. Which a large portion of that comes down to the measuring and determination. I wouldn't argue to distribute funds without question, but I'd wager that the amount we spend to ensure research funds are spent effectively is greater that the funds we would lost/spend ineffectively were we to perform significantly less administration. [0] https://talyarkoni.org/blog/2018/10/02/no-its-not-the-incentives-its-you/ https://talyarkoni.org/blog/2018/10/02/no-its-not-the-incent...

trod1234 1y ago

Well what was described is pretty much the standard. To put a little context, and this is a bit speculation on my part but seems to conform based on conversations I've had from people who have lived at that time. This kind of policy at institutions started right after Sputnik. There was a sudden surge in demand for mathematics and engineers, and they couldn't find enough people so they threw money at the problem. The unfortunate side effect was that its a problem that money can't solve, and so when you can't find anyone that meets the rigorous standards, you must lower standards. This seems to have happened in math education around that time the effects of which did not become visible until much later, and it eventually snowballed to most of academia. The effect has been that most math teachers, excluding a few professors that buck the norm which are the exception, started teaching by rote following what is known today as a lying to children paradigm. This is a pedagogical approach that is the opposite of the paradigm that was taught prior which was a first-principled approach (based in the greeks and rome). You are given flawed models upfront, which you must learn some things, and unlearn other things you previously learned to unconscious competence with little guidance. This includes all the elements and structure of real torture (from the 1950s), and the process is repeated over and over sieving only the most compliant or blind people forward, and inducing PTSD in the creative, brilliant, and genius. The process destroys minds, steals economic benefit of intelligence, and selects for average. Torture is known to reduce, often permanently, the capability for rational thought. It follows the now refuted ideology of gnosticism. Intuitive understanding is eschewed, and you only become useful the closer you progress to gnosis (mastery), and informally, only the masters decide who gets to progress (through clever gimmicks, deceit, and orchestrated structural failure, that takes advantage of the drive to do less work, government funded work trends towards the least common denominator of production which often becomes negative). You now have more pHd's, but fewer people who actually met the 1960s definition of a pHd. There are exceptions because this is a spectrum, but this has been the trend for the majority for decades, and the issues described are known issues with any centralized hierarchy. It hasn't been strictly knowledge-based since at least the late 60s. You see a sharp degradation of published material in education across all subjects starting in the 70s.