4 ms·

Does anybody know of a realistic way to pursue research (by this definition) as a career, without becoming a grant-seeking professor (I have moral qualms about

by javert 14y ago

Does anybody know of a realistic way to pursue research (by this definition) as a career, without becoming a grant-seeking professor (I have moral qualms about taking taxpayer money)? For background, I'm getting a PhD in CS. It seems like research labs are few and far between, and (unfortunately) I can't stay a grad student forever.

ryporter 14y ago
You could consider a job in Finance researching new trading strategies. While this is certainly very far from pure research, a job in this area can satisfy most of the bullet points listed in the article. For example, at my current job, I have plenty of time to sit around and think about new trading strategies and no deadline for producing one that makes it into production. New ideas then go through prototype and back-testing stages, and most never see the light of day. This isn't at all considered to be a problem. The only bullet point that my job doesn't satisfy is the first-- the types of strategies I'm working on simply aren't sufficiently deep to warrant investing years in developing the initial version of any one of them.
forinti 14y ago
"I have moral qualms about taking taxpayer money" That's strange. If you do your job properly, why shouldn't you get paid even if it is by the taxpayer?
- montecarl 14y ago
  It is always wrong to steal. Even if you think you deserve the money.
  - amit_m 14y ago
    Taxation is not theft. It is a societal agreement. I know of no society, except extremely primitive hunter-gatherer societies, that has no notion of tax for public services. And even there, you could say everyone is "stealing" from the public goods all the time. (if you hunt and eat an animal, then you have stolen it from the rest of the people).
    - montecarl 14y ago
      When did I agree? Do I have a choice in the matter? How does one opt out? It doesn't sound like any kind of agreement I have ever heard of. What is a public good? Who decides what is public? If I hunt and eat an wild animal, i.e. one that was not raised on a farm, I am not stealing it from anyone. By your definition the only way I am not stealing it is if I kill it and divide equally to everyone.
      - amit_m 14y ago
        This choice is decided in a democratic process. Countries with very high levels of taxation and public services (e.g. scandinavian countries) have earned a high level of trust from their voters that the money is put to good use. To pay less taxes you could either relocate to some place with less taxes (this is quite possible in the US, since state and city taxes vary). Or you could work democratically to change the system. If you really want to live in any place approximating anarcho-capitalism, you would have to move to a 3rd world country. If one could opt out of taxes, that would be the end of the tax system. Of course no individual wants to pay for the public services. Everybody want the other guy to pay! In the same manner, you could ask why one cannot opt out of the penal system. --- As to the "hunting as theft" issue: as long as there are plenty of animals to hunt, you are not taking from anyone. That was the state of affairs 100,000 years ago. When resources are limited they must be managed/taxed in some way. Humanity has not solved most of these issues at this point. See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons So you could ask: when did I agree to those japanese fishing vessels depleting the fisheries next to my shores, do I have a choice in the matter? Their fishing raises the price of wild fish and serves as a de-facto sushi tax, only you don't get to eat any of the sushi... My point is, we are not in the paleolithic period anymore. The world is too complex and resources are too few for fully individualistic economic philosophies.
- lifebeyondfife 14y ago
  Doing research for a company has the end goal of benefitting that companies' shareholders. Doing research for a publicly funded institution has the end goal of benefitting society. Look at the decoding of the human genome. No company has a patent on that because public institutions did it first.
  - jkimmel 14y ago
    While patents on genetic sequences have some tricky specifications (you have to patent "non-standard" biological uses), I know Celera holds a number of patents related to the Human Genome Project. From what I recall in general biology, Celera actually used automation to outpace the public institutions even though they started later. If you're curious, here's a patent list and some background on the company: https://www.celera.com/celera/intellectual_property https://www.celera.com/celera/intellectual_property http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celera_Corporation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celera_Corporation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craig_Venter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craig_Venter
  - wwwtyro 14y ago
    Arguably, though, goals and results are two different things. "The road to hell is paved with good intentions", and all that. What does the evidence say about which benefits society more?
    - HarryHirsch 14y ago
      A company works for its shareholders, which are a very restricted group, and public funds work for society. Intuitively, the outcome is clear. It's also supported by actual data: wages stopped rising in the US in the 1970s, while productivity kept going up; this is correlated with the introduction of concepts like "shareholder value".
      - wwwtyro 14y ago
        Google is a company that has produced tremendous benefit to society, in spite of having shareholders.
Nursie 14y ago
Get yourself into one of the big corps with a huge R&D section? I know IBM have a pretty big research organisation, but how easy it is to get there, and how secure the positions are I have no idea. I don't really see why taxpayer funded research is bad, and I say that as a taxpayer not a researcher.
pharrington 14y ago
May I ask why you have moral problems with being paid by the taxpayer? To me it seems funding science is one of the better things the government does with its revenue.
amit_m 14y ago
So you have a problem in taking taxpayer money for working on science that advances all of mankind? Instead you could work in Ad targeting/personalization, where you will help trick people into clicking on ads for products they have no interest in, while invading their privacy in borderline-illegal ways. Or you could do for-profit research whose only purpose is to convince decision makers to buy X, regardless of the true reality. (drug companies put billions into this type of work) Or you could work in Microsoft Research or similar environments. It is actually quite similar to academia in many regards. The funding is also mostly taken by force (of monopoly, many individuals and companies have no choice but to work in Microsoft Office due to deliberate format incompatibilities).
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
decasteve 14y ago
Work for a tax-credit seeking company? I'm not sure of the situation in the US but in Canada we have something called: Scientific Research & Experimental Development (SRED) program, where the government will reimburse a company a percent of the money spent on R&D.
MaysonL 14y ago
Google Jeff Hawkins

by javert 14y ago

ryporter 14y ago

You could consider a job in Finance researching new trading strategies. While this is certainly very far from pure research, a job in this area can satisfy most of the bullet points listed in the article. For example, at my current job, I have plenty of time to sit around and think about new trading strategies and no deadline for producing one that makes it into production. New ideas then go through prototype and back-testing stages, and most never see the light of day. This isn't at all considered to be a problem. The only bullet point that my job doesn't satisfy is the first-- the types of strategies I'm working on simply aren't sufficiently deep to warrant investing years in developing the initial version of any one of them.

forinti 14y ago

"I have moral qualms about taking taxpayer money" That's strange. If you do your job properly, why shouldn't you get paid even if it is by the taxpayer?

montecarl 14y ago
It is always wrong to steal. Even if you think you deserve the money.
- amit_m 14y ago
  Taxation is not theft. It is a societal agreement. I know of no society, except extremely primitive hunter-gatherer societies, that has no notion of tax for public services. And even there, you could say everyone is "stealing" from the public goods all the time. (if you hunt and eat an animal, then you have stolen it from the rest of the people).
  - montecarl 14y ago
    When did I agree? Do I have a choice in the matter? How does one opt out? It doesn't sound like any kind of agreement I have ever heard of. What is a public good? Who decides what is public? If I hunt and eat an wild animal, i.e. one that was not raised on a farm, I am not stealing it from anyone. By your definition the only way I am not stealing it is if I kill it and divide equally to everyone.
    - amit_m 14y ago
      This choice is decided in a democratic process. Countries with very high levels of taxation and public services (e.g. scandinavian countries) have earned a high level of trust from their voters that the money is put to good use. To pay less taxes you could either relocate to some place with less taxes (this is quite possible in the US, since state and city taxes vary). Or you could work democratically to change the system. If you really want to live in any place approximating anarcho-capitalism, you would have to move to a 3rd world country. If one could opt out of taxes, that would be the end of the tax system. Of course no individual wants to pay for the public services. Everybody want the other guy to pay! In the same manner, you could ask why one cannot opt out of the penal system. --- As to the "hunting as theft" issue: as long as there are plenty of animals to hunt, you are not taking from anyone. That was the state of affairs 100,000 years ago. When resources are limited they must be managed/taxed in some way. Humanity has not solved most of these issues at this point. See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons So you could ask: when did I agree to those japanese fishing vessels depleting the fisheries next to my shores, do I have a choice in the matter? Their fishing raises the price of wild fish and serves as a de-facto sushi tax, only you don't get to eat any of the sushi... My point is, we are not in the paleolithic period anymore. The world is too complex and resources are too few for fully individualistic economic philosophies.
lifebeyondfife 14y ago
Doing research for a company has the end goal of benefitting that companies' shareholders. Doing research for a publicly funded institution has the end goal of benefitting society. Look at the decoding of the human genome. No company has a patent on that because public institutions did it first.
- jkimmel 14y ago
  While patents on genetic sequences have some tricky specifications (you have to patent "non-standard" biological uses), I know Celera holds a number of patents related to the Human Genome Project. From what I recall in general biology, Celera actually used automation to outpace the public institutions even though they started later. If you're curious, here's a patent list and some background on the company: https://www.celera.com/celera/intellectual_property https://www.celera.com/celera/intellectual_property http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celera_Corporation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celera_Corporation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craig_Venter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craig_Venter
- wwwtyro 14y ago
  Arguably, though, goals and results are two different things. "The road to hell is paved with good intentions", and all that. What does the evidence say about which benefits society more?
  - HarryHirsch 14y ago
    A company works for its shareholders, which are a very restricted group, and public funds work for society. Intuitively, the outcome is clear. It's also supported by actual data: wages stopped rising in the US in the 1970s, while productivity kept going up; this is correlated with the introduction of concepts like "shareholder value".
    - wwwtyro 14y ago
      Google is a company that has produced tremendous benefit to society, in spite of having shareholders.

Nursie 14y ago

Get yourself into one of the big corps with a huge R&D section? I know IBM have a pretty big research organisation, but how easy it is to get there, and how secure the positions are I have no idea. I don't really see why taxpayer funded research is bad, and I say that as a taxpayer not a researcher.

pharrington 14y ago

May I ask why you have moral problems with being paid by the taxpayer? To me it seems funding science is one of the better things the government does with its revenue.

amit_m 14y ago

So you have a problem in taking taxpayer money for working on science that advances all of mankind? Instead you could work in Ad targeting/personalization, where you will help trick people into clicking on ads for products they have no interest in, while invading their privacy in borderline-illegal ways. Or you could do for-profit research whose only purpose is to convince decision makers to buy X, regardless of the true reality. (drug companies put billions into this type of work) Or you could work in Microsoft Research or similar environments. It is actually quite similar to academia in many regards. The funding is also mostly taken by force (of monopoly, many individuals and companies have no choice but to work in Microsoft Office due to deliberate format incompatibilities).

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]

decasteve 14y ago

Work for a tax-credit seeking company? I'm not sure of the situation in the US but in Canada we have something called: Scientific Research & Experimental Development (SRED) program, where the government will reimburse a company a percent of the money spent on R&D.

MaysonL 14y ago

Google Jeff Hawkins