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This feels like a spectator sport to me - elite classes fighting amongst themselves while ordinary people are caught in the crossfire. Sure, I do feel bad for

This feels like a spectator sport to me - elite classes fighting amongst themselves while ordinary people are caught in the crossfire. Sure, I do feel bad for the well meaning professors, scientists, and researchers (some of whom are personal friends) that are losing their grant funding - techies of all people should be sympathetic to a sudden disruption in funding. But if the elites are asking us to take sides, they need to make a stronger case that they're really on _our side_ - that requires more than appealing to mutual self-interest. Academia must reconcile a litany of shortcomings and broken promises. For the promise of education, we see a large and growing contingent of debt holders outweighing the number of available employment opportunities. Tuition is at an ATH, yet more and more students are walking away with worse outcomes. A grim forecast for the younger generation. For the promise of research, we've seen a shift from truth-seeking to grant-seeking, a punitive culture of ideological conformity, and a pipeline to brain-drain the rest of the world, favoring foreign talent over local. Hardly the unbiased bastion of free-thought we've been taught is the foundation of good science. As for ideology, I'm not sure the intelligentsia has ever been neutral, if that's even possible, or if neutrality itself isn't another ideology. As far as I can tell, this is just the pendulum swinging back. Academia is experiencing the consequences of its failure to live up to its promises to society and hold itself accountable for the negative externalities of its own agenda.

epistasis 1y ago
This is a very odd way to put this, as a battle between elites. Scientific research is a general benefit to the entire US economy, one of its greatest strengths that makes the US economy so much better than anywhere else in the world. How does framing this as a competition between elites even affect the common person? Shouldn't I care about what helps the US the most? I don't give a damn about elites or taking sides or being on a side of that battle. I want what's best for the US. > Academia is experiencing the consequences of its failure to live up to its promises to society and hold itself accountable for the negative externalities of its own agenda. I'm sorry but could you explain any of this? There's a lot of assumptions in here that I can not even begin to unpack, and any possible meaning I can assign to your statements here are easily disproven with even a minimum of research, so I don't want to misunderstand you.
- disambiguation 1y ago
  Feel free to unpack at your leisure, it's all in my original comment. I think it's both clear and concise, though you're welcome to be specific about what's left you feeling confused.
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
Tadpole9181 1y ago
So... Burn down academia with no replacement? Shutter and board research and leave America with no future? And, of course, not in even the guise of reform. But an outright and open political witch hunt to ban all those who oppose "dear leader" and dare allow opposing free speech, progressive anthropological research, and objective sciences in unpopular topics like climate change? That's your preferred approach? That is what "academia deserves" for... What? Charging too much? And that's not even an objective statement - the market bears this cost! If the US government was actually worried, maybe they could put all this effort into an actual reform effort, or modernized scholarships / financing, or tightening accreditation requirements. Not to mention, US education and research is still one of our strong points, drawing in the brightest minds from the entire world.
- disambiguation 1y ago
  > US education and research is still one of our strong points, drawing in the brightest minds from the entire world. The Average Joe graduates with enormous student debt and ends up in a low paying job, one that's entirely unrelated to their degree. They never experienced the benefits of education nor research. In fact, they feel quite ripped off by the whole affair, so this point holds no stock for them. > So... Burn down academia with no replacement? Shutter and board research and leave America with no future? This is a bit of a hysterical reaction to "budget cuts." Academia isn't going anywhere and probably won't change much, it's just going to have less money. In fact, k-12 education is seeing far more severe budget cuts as part of the bill, but there are fewer prophecies of doom in its honor. Academics argue passionately for their own bread, but not for those who are starving. (They also send their kids to private school)
  - maxerickson 1y ago
    Median student loan debt is about $25,000 dollars. That's a lot, but not so much that it wouldn't be covered by a very modest increase in lifetime earnings. The mean is closer to $40,000, which is still going to be covered by a modest improvement in earnings. I think we should be working on changing things so that students graduate with less debt, and working on ensuring that time spent studying is worthwhile to the individual, but it's weird to treat extreme cases as if they are universal.
UltraSane 1y ago
Scientific research is NOT "elite".
- disambiguation 1y ago
  The institutions are elite. So are the people who study there, and so are the decision makers directing the goals and strategies behind the research.
- mike_hearn 1y ago
  There's no great definition of elite but a reasonable approximation is the one often used for intellectual: people whose income or status in society depends on their production of ideas, without needing to test if the ideas actually work. This definition captures academics, university administrators, journalists, writers, analysts and other talking heads on TV, Hollywood screenwriters, many kinds of civil servant, people rich enough to be philanthropists, and frequently but not always politicians. Those are the classes of people that are usually being handwaved towards when the word elite is used.
  - maxsilver 1y ago
    > people whose income or status in society depends on their production of ideas, without needing to test if the ideas actually work. In general I'd agree -- but academic researchers (and the projects previously funded by the National Science Foundation) are not this. By definition, they are testing "if the ideas actually work", that testing is what the funding is paying for. These folks aren't really "elite" -- not in perception, nor in class or wages. (they usually make less than the average programmer or CS graduate).
    - mike_hearn 1y ago
      The definition of elite people seem to be using doesn't depend on wages. It's not a synonym for well paid. There's no requirement to test if your ideas work if you're an academic. The funding pays for papers to get published, and that's all that's checked. To publish a paper you might need to at least pretend to test your ideas, maybe, but only in some of the better fields and journals. Nobody will check if you actually did test them though, so just making data up is a perfectly viable strategy. Worst case, you might get caught ten years from now if some random independent chooses to investigate and manages to go viral on social media. In very extreme cases you might get fired, but that won't stop you immediately getting another job doing exactly the same thing at another university (c.f. Brian Wansink). But those are in the best, most scientific fields. In others you can just write papers all day that say all kinds of things, never test or even predict anything, and still have a successful career. That's how you get papers like the famous "feminist glaciology" paper [1], or thousands of COVID papers that present model outputs but never validate if the results matched reality, or thousands of string theory papers that don't make any predictions. None of these problems will stop academics from being cited by journalists in high profile news outlets as if their ideas are already validated, nor being consulted by powerful politicians who then transcribe their policy demands into law, nor having their claims be automatically taken as gospel on forums like HN. If their ideas do become law and then cause a disaster, nothing will happen to them and they won't even suffer loss of reputation. For example, Einstein was a big supporter of Soviet-style planned economies, as were many academics of his era. That was a disastrous idea, and his supporting it - as late as 1949 no less - should have harmed his reputation for being a genius. But nobody remembers this today. In these respects, they are the very epitome of what it means to be elite. [1] https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0309132515623368 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0309132515623368

epistasis 1y ago

This is a very odd way to put this, as a battle between elites. Scientific research is a general benefit to the entire US economy, one of its greatest strengths that makes the US economy so much better than anywhere else in the world. How does framing this as a competition between elites even affect the common person? Shouldn't I care about what helps the US the most? I don't give a damn about elites or taking sides or being on a side of that battle. I want what's best for the US. > Academia is experiencing the consequences of its failure to live up to its promises to society and hold itself accountable for the negative externalities of its own agenda. I'm sorry but could you explain any of this? There's a lot of assumptions in here that I can not even begin to unpack, and any possible meaning I can assign to your statements here are easily disproven with even a minimum of research, so I don't want to misunderstand you.

disambiguation 1y ago
Feel free to unpack at your leisure, it's all in my original comment. I think it's both clear and concise, though you're welcome to be specific about what's left you feeling confused.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]

Tadpole9181 1y ago

So... Burn down academia with no replacement? Shutter and board research and leave America with no future? And, of course, not in even the guise of reform. But an outright and open political witch hunt to ban all those who oppose "dear leader" and dare allow opposing free speech, progressive anthropological research, and objective sciences in unpopular topics like climate change? That's your preferred approach? That is what "academia deserves" for... What? Charging too much? And that's not even an objective statement - the market bears this cost! If the US government was actually worried, maybe they could put all this effort into an actual reform effort, or modernized scholarships / financing, or tightening accreditation requirements. Not to mention, US education and research is still one of our strong points, drawing in the brightest minds from the entire world.

disambiguation 1y ago
> US education and research is still one of our strong points, drawing in the brightest minds from the entire world. The Average Joe graduates with enormous student debt and ends up in a low paying job, one that's entirely unrelated to their degree. They never experienced the benefits of education nor research. In fact, they feel quite ripped off by the whole affair, so this point holds no stock for them. > So... Burn down academia with no replacement? Shutter and board research and leave America with no future? This is a bit of a hysterical reaction to "budget cuts." Academia isn't going anywhere and probably won't change much, it's just going to have less money. In fact, k-12 education is seeing far more severe budget cuts as part of the bill, but there are fewer prophecies of doom in its honor. Academics argue passionately for their own bread, but not for those who are starving. (They also send their kids to private school)
- maxerickson 1y ago
  Median student loan debt is about $25,000 dollars. That's a lot, but not so much that it wouldn't be covered by a very modest increase in lifetime earnings. The mean is closer to $40,000, which is still going to be covered by a modest improvement in earnings. I think we should be working on changing things so that students graduate with less debt, and working on ensuring that time spent studying is worthwhile to the individual, but it's weird to treat extreme cases as if they are universal.

UltraSane 1y ago

Scientific research is NOT "elite".

disambiguation 1y ago
The institutions are elite. So are the people who study there, and so are the decision makers directing the goals and strategies behind the research.
mike_hearn 1y ago
There's no great definition of elite but a reasonable approximation is the one often used for intellectual: people whose income or status in society depends on their production of ideas, without needing to test if the ideas actually work. This definition captures academics, university administrators, journalists, writers, analysts and other talking heads on TV, Hollywood screenwriters, many kinds of civil servant, people rich enough to be philanthropists, and frequently but not always politicians. Those are the classes of people that are usually being handwaved towards when the word elite is used.
- maxsilver 1y ago
  > people whose income or status in society depends on their production of ideas, without needing to test if the ideas actually work. In general I'd agree -- but academic researchers (and the projects previously funded by the National Science Foundation) are not this. By definition, they are testing "if the ideas actually work", that testing is what the funding is paying for. These folks aren't really "elite" -- not in perception, nor in class or wages. (they usually make less than the average programmer or CS graduate).
  - mike_hearn 1y ago
    The definition of elite people seem to be using doesn't depend on wages. It's not a synonym for well paid. There's no requirement to test if your ideas work if you're an academic. The funding pays for papers to get published, and that's all that's checked. To publish a paper you might need to at least pretend to test your ideas, maybe, but only in some of the better fields and journals. Nobody will check if you actually did test them though, so just making data up is a perfectly viable strategy. Worst case, you might get caught ten years from now if some random independent chooses to investigate and manages to go viral on social media. In very extreme cases you might get fired, but that won't stop you immediately getting another job doing exactly the same thing at another university (c.f. Brian Wansink). But those are in the best, most scientific fields. In others you can just write papers all day that say all kinds of things, never test or even predict anything, and still have a successful career. That's how you get papers like the famous "feminist glaciology" paper [1], or thousands of COVID papers that present model outputs but never validate if the results matched reality, or thousands of string theory papers that don't make any predictions. None of these problems will stop academics from being cited by journalists in high profile news outlets as if their ideas are already validated, nor being consulted by powerful politicians who then transcribe their policy demands into law, nor having their claims be automatically taken as gospel on forums like HN. If their ideas do become law and then cause a disaster, nothing will happen to them and they won't even suffer loss of reputation. For example, Einstein was a big supporter of Soviet-style planned economies, as were many academics of his era. That was a disastrous idea, and his supporting it - as late as 1949 no less - should have harmed his reputation for being a genius. But nobody remembers this today. In these respects, they are the very epitome of what it means to be elite. [1] https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0309132515623368 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0309132515623368