6 ms·

Someone ELI5: Why is the Trump administration defunding scientific research? Is there a bigger picture we're not seeing, or is it 8D chess he's playing ?

sbierwagen 1y ago
It's not subtle. Donald perceives colleges as bastions of wokeness. Nature literally endorsed Joe Biden: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02852-x https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02852-x Now that he's president, here come the reprisals. Zero out NSF's funding, shut down NPR, end the COVID era break on student loan enforcement, withdraw grants from Harvard.
- arrowsmith 1y ago
  > Donald perceives colleges as bastions of wokeness. Is he wrong?
  - azinman2 1y ago
    Yes because he’s throwing the baby out with the bath water, being completely myopic about the value add to society and what it takes to make America competitive. Of course he’ll be dead before the real multi-generational consequences take effect.
  - frozenport 1y ago
    Yeah, specially in STEM. Despite posturing by some academic administrators, most folks have no social agenda for a country they recently immigrated to.
- SV_BubbleTime 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - Noumenon72 1y ago
    This reads like you have a serious point to make about there being two different Nature magazines, but there aren't and there is absolutely no ambiguity that could lead you toward the concept of "nature" since he linked to the magazine that you are referring to. Not funny.
    - SV_BubbleTime 1y ago
      It’s definitely funny how it triggered you into ignoring everything but the obvious joke.
  - intermerda 1y ago
    > it’s funny because while I probably agree with you, What do you agree with? > FWIW, I think it is intellectually immature to talk about politicians like you know them. What else does Donald perceive? What was he like when you spent time with him? I think it's intellectually dishonest to pretend that OP was talking about anything other than the Nature Magazine. And to know what Donald perceives, you could ask Jeffery Epstein. Oh wait.. you can't.
- 0xDEAFBEAD 1y ago
  If your research is funded by taxpayer dollars, you're a public servant and you should welcome public accountability. You should accept that explaining the public benefit of what you do is part of your job, and accept the possibility that the public won't see eye-to-eye with regard to that benefit. The fundamental problem is that scientists stopped thinking of themselves as public servants, and started thinking of themselves as lecturers whose job it is to scold the public. They stopped working to follow the evidence wherever it lead, and switched to promoting trendy ideologies. Remember during COVID how we were all supposed to isolate, until the Floyd protests started and suddenly the need for isolation disappeared? "Three-in-four liberal faculty support mandatory diversity statements while 90% of conservative faculty and 56% of moderate faculty see them as political litmus tests." ... "For decades, college and university faculty have identified as predominantly left-leaning (e.g., affiliating with the Democratic party, self-identifying as liberal), a skew that has become more pronounced over the past three decades.[40] For instance, in the Higher Education Research Institute’s 1990 faculty survey, 6% identified as “far left,” 16% identified as “conservative,” and 0.4% identified as “far right.” In 2020 these percentages were 12%, 10%, and 0.2%, respectively.[41] College students are also predominantly left-leaning, though the rate is closer to 2:1 left vs. right, compared to 6:1 among faculty.[42]" ..."significant portions of faculty say that they would discriminate against colleagues with different ideological views in professional settings (e.g., during anonymous peer-review) or during day-to-day social interactions.[43]" https://www.thefire.org/research-learn/academic-mind-2022-what-faculty-think-about-free-expression-and-academic-freedom https://www.thefire.org/research-learn/academic-mind-2022-wh... Now consider that self-described "conservatives" significantly outnumber self-described "liberals" in the US electorate: https://news.gallup.com/poll/388988/political-ideology-steady-conservatives-moderates-tie.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/388988/political-ideology-stead... Academics successfully hacked away the branch that they themselves were standing on. Large fractions of the US electorate no longer believe that the research these academics do is a good-faith attempt to advance their interests as voters and taxpayers. And so they're not interested in funding it. Fair play if you ask me. If academia wants funding, it should do deep reforms in order to re-earn the trust of voters.
  - pastage 1y ago
    You are not automatically a public servant if you are funded by taxes. In my definition that only happens when you start making decision that affect other people. E.g. handle who gets a tax cut, go to jail, or other things that we need to out source to people that serve our interests in powerful ways. It is important to differentiate them from people that just do a thing for money. Further more saying things like "It is your fault that you are in front of my fist" is not productive. Being antiscience is the problem here not being antileft.
ISL 1y ago
Reproducible and empirical fact is anathema to any administration that wants the "truth" to be the talking-point of the day.
kube-system 1y ago
This administration and its influencers have some strong opinions about significantly shrinking the size and role of government, and eliminating activities they don’t believe the government should be engaged in.
aaron695 1y ago
[dead]

sbierwagen 1y ago

It's not subtle. Donald perceives colleges as bastions of wokeness. Nature literally endorsed Joe Biden: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02852-x https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02852-x Now that he's president, here come the reprisals. Zero out NSF's funding, shut down NPR, end the COVID era break on student loan enforcement, withdraw grants from Harvard.

arrowsmith 1y ago
> Donald perceives colleges as bastions of wokeness. Is he wrong?
- azinman2 1y ago
  Yes because he’s throwing the baby out with the bath water, being completely myopic about the value add to society and what it takes to make America competitive. Of course he’ll be dead before the real multi-generational consequences take effect.
- frozenport 1y ago
  Yeah, specially in STEM. Despite posturing by some academic administrators, most folks have no social agenda for a country they recently immigrated to.
SV_BubbleTime 1y ago
[flagged]
- Noumenon72 1y ago
  This reads like you have a serious point to make about there being two different Nature magazines, but there aren't and there is absolutely no ambiguity that could lead you toward the concept of "nature" since he linked to the magazine that you are referring to. Not funny.
  - SV_BubbleTime 1y ago
    It’s definitely funny how it triggered you into ignoring everything but the obvious joke.
- intermerda 1y ago
  > it’s funny because while I probably agree with you, What do you agree with? > FWIW, I think it is intellectually immature to talk about politicians like you know them. What else does Donald perceive? What was he like when you spent time with him? I think it's intellectually dishonest to pretend that OP was talking about anything other than the Nature Magazine. And to know what Donald perceives, you could ask Jeffery Epstein. Oh wait.. you can't.
0xDEAFBEAD 1y ago
If your research is funded by taxpayer dollars, you're a public servant and you should welcome public accountability. You should accept that explaining the public benefit of what you do is part of your job, and accept the possibility that the public won't see eye-to-eye with regard to that benefit. The fundamental problem is that scientists stopped thinking of themselves as public servants, and started thinking of themselves as lecturers whose job it is to scold the public. They stopped working to follow the evidence wherever it lead, and switched to promoting trendy ideologies. Remember during COVID how we were all supposed to isolate, until the Floyd protests started and suddenly the need for isolation disappeared? "Three-in-four liberal faculty support mandatory diversity statements while 90% of conservative faculty and 56% of moderate faculty see them as political litmus tests." ... "For decades, college and university faculty have identified as predominantly left-leaning (e.g., affiliating with the Democratic party, self-identifying as liberal), a skew that has become more pronounced over the past three decades.[40] For instance, in the Higher Education Research Institute’s 1990 faculty survey, 6% identified as “far left,” 16% identified as “conservative,” and 0.4% identified as “far right.” In 2020 these percentages were 12%, 10%, and 0.2%, respectively.[41] College students are also predominantly left-leaning, though the rate is closer to 2:1 left vs. right, compared to 6:1 among faculty.[42]" ..."significant portions of faculty say that they would discriminate against colleagues with different ideological views in professional settings (e.g., during anonymous peer-review) or during day-to-day social interactions.[43]" https://www.thefire.org/research-learn/academic-mind-2022-what-faculty-think-about-free-expression-and-academic-freedom https://www.thefire.org/research-learn/academic-mind-2022-wh... Now consider that self-described "conservatives" significantly outnumber self-described "liberals" in the US electorate: https://news.gallup.com/poll/388988/political-ideology-steady-conservatives-moderates-tie.aspx https://news.gallup.com/poll/388988/political-ideology-stead... Academics successfully hacked away the branch that they themselves were standing on. Large fractions of the US electorate no longer believe that the research these academics do is a good-faith attempt to advance their interests as voters and taxpayers. And so they're not interested in funding it. Fair play if you ask me. If academia wants funding, it should do deep reforms in order to re-earn the trust of voters.
- pastage 1y ago
  You are not automatically a public servant if you are funded by taxes. In my definition that only happens when you start making decision that affect other people. E.g. handle who gets a tax cut, go to jail, or other things that we need to out source to people that serve our interests in powerful ways. It is important to differentiate them from people that just do a thing for money. Further more saying things like "It is your fault that you are in front of my fist" is not productive. Being antiscience is the problem here not being antileft.

ISL 1y ago

Reproducible and empirical fact is anathema to any administration that wants the "truth" to be the talking-point of the day.

kube-system 1y ago

This administration and its influencers have some strong opinions about significantly shrinking the size and role of government, and eliminating activities they don’t believe the government should be engaged in.

aaron695 1y ago

[dead]