chasovschik

there is a fear that Trump will take a chunk out of federal support to universities.

i used to be dead against that, but now i am not sure anymore.

a lot of that support goes to support admins not science directly.

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and i have mixed feelings about science.

the present system of peer review works. it may be flawed but it works. and it is not expensive, per se.

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and i have mixed feelings about science.

Половина того, что сейчас называется наукой - вообще не наука (см. приведенный твит). А в оставшейся половине есть, например, климатология, где тоже от науки остались рожки да ножки, одна сплошная сессия ВАСХНИЛ 1949-го года. Остальным я интересуюсь мало, но подозреваю, что мракобес Трамп на это остальное не покушается. Хотя крику, конечно, там очень много; ну так где его сейчас мало.

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тут я вне моей зоны комфорта, я знаю что биллионы уходят в универы - кажется в 10 первых более всего.
одновременно я знаю НЕМНОЖКО какой процент научного аутпута - фуфло а бывает и хуже ( мы всегда знали что Газзанига - жулик, но неподтверждение его базовых достижений ставит большой жирный знак позора на.. не только на него. я могу в личку о чем я, если интересно).

ноя не уверена что процент фуфла не оправдывает процент хорошей науки, может фуфло необходимо.

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Без фуфла там никак невозможно. Ну у них есть инструментарий рано или поздно фуфло отбрасывать - если, конечно, там не начинают устраивать лысенковщену. Тогда получается скорее поздно, чем рано, плюс разные побочные последствия для мирного населения.

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Трамп собирается и NEA обездолить. Почему мы до сих пор не видим марша людей искусства, не понимаю? С массовыми перформансами и оставленными за собой инсталляциями из говна?

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ну, НЕА давно пора обездолить.

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yankel.livejournal.com

Сурово. Кто следующий? Марш лойеров....

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Хочу марш современных художников, я вон выше писал. А то они пренебрегают своими гражданскими обязанностями, только карикатуры мудацкие рисуют.

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yankel.livejournal.com

Тоже неплохо

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Я на эту тему писал немножко с другой точки зрения -- что даже самая лучшая научная группа это всего лишь островок покоя в гнезде гадюк. Участие в массовых протестах может привести к интересному эффекту: те, у кого научная карьера как бы есть, на протест не пойдут. Или пойдут, но будут считаться мудрыми и нейтральными.
А те, кто карьеру как бы строит, попрощается с ней.

Сейчас раскопаю первоначальную реплику.

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самая лучшая научная группа это всего лишь островок покоя в гнезде гадюк.""""""

why??

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Imagine that you are a postdoc. If you are not abused directly, this is because you have a supervisor who blocks and neutralizes abuse on his level.

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you are speaking with an assumption that i am unfamiliar with htis world. but i am. and i have seem postdoc abuse and heard of it. it is not a RULE. an exception, rather, same for PhD student abuse and junior faculty abuse.

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I may have thinner skin. Or had different experiences.

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well, you are generalizing, though... if you don't mind, share here. or in lichka? i respect your feelings, but what you said is grating me as.. baseless.

(of course there are assholes everywhere, granted. and good people everywhere).

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I knew a university postdoc who got paid X per year, which, I imagine, was not enough to live comfortably, although of course for science! you can manage.
He got himself an evening job that paid Y. When his supervisor found out, he reduced his grant share to X-Y. With the reasoning "I will not pay you a full salary if you are not fully dedicated".

I guess my point is : survivor's bias! If you worked next to these two and did not go into fine details of their relationship, you would believe that everything is completely fine.

Edited Date: 2017-02-05 10:48 pm (UTC)

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wait.

you tell me - about an asshole.

how does that make all of us assholes...????

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No, that was an example of abuse going completely unpunished, even unnoticed. Of course, an example does not prove anything. Just a generalization. In professional, institutional science, there is a mechanism for keeping people on the edge of success, sometimes for years, sometimes forever [until they quit].

I believe that, by default, this mechanism will always be used unless something is stopping it.

You seem to be saying that, by default, people are good and they will not oppress even if there is a system for it.

Edited Date: 2017-02-06 12:06 am (UTC)

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i am only saying that you have not shown me what you mean by

a::::::::: mechanism for keeping people on the edge of success, sometimes for years, sometimes forever [until they quit].:::::::::::

that is a strong statement. it needs to be substantiated.

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This deserves an essay. I don't have the complete picture in my mind, but if you wish, we can argue point by point.

For example, there is financial overhead.

Early career scientists are cheaper for their immediate group, mature scientists are more profitable for the larger organization. Get enough of both types in one place and, on a fixed budget, young researchers cannot be promoted, and older researchers cannot be dislodged. This is not abuse yet, just arithmetic. Abuse begins when a young scientist needs to be persuaded that there are very good reasons her work is not rewarded, and at the same time she should not quit.

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i have something horrible to tell you. 'and i am a loser, not a winner, so let's talk loser to loser.

it IS a meritocracy. chances are, if you got plowed under, you and your work were just not good. or you could not play the game.... those who succeed in science are equally divided between genuinely good and playahs.

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See, that is where I am not on the same page with many bright opinionated people. I don't think that "work is not good" is as important in science as popular media would have us believe.

I don't think that science is a playground for geniuses. I think it is a playground for devilishly stubborn people. A mentally alert janitor could be a motile force in science, if there are ninety ways to observe something, and he will systematically check eighty-nine of them.
Of course, if I am talking about a janitor, we will see that he missed insightful and exciting conclusions. But he will write his work down and a different person would read it and correct the errors, and progress will be made.

We don't have an ideal system for that right now. We have a boardgame between geniuses and charismatic administrators, where everyone else is a pawn.

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i got lost in your janitor analogy, sorry.

but your last phrase dose betray a sore loser, i am indeed sorry for you if this is your perception.

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On the other hand, everything is a meritocracy. The rules of the game are published, they are not that hard to understand. Keep playing or quit.

My original statement -- before this conversation veered off -- was that participation in mass political process may harm careers of young researchers, even though it appears that it won't.

Edited Date: 2017-02-06 01:20 am (UTC)

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you are - for a scientist - extremely non-lucid vague and tangential in your pronouncements. it is tiring, i am sorry.

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(reposting from Jan 25)

Re: march of scientists. Just saying. I would like our general audience to realize that many scientists are not owners of tech businesses and not tenured professors.
Many are hovering around the junior status of "early-career researcher" from age 18 to maybe age 45. Their positions are unstable, their funding is temporary, and most of it comes from federal government. While none of them exactly starve, many are foreign-born and may be the only one in the family legally allowed to work. [Which means they support spouses and children on postdoc salary. Which may be ~100k, but most likely is 40k, and sometimes 20k.]
Furthermore, even the best scientific groups can be clan-like, everybody knows everybody. It is entirely possible to take the fall not for something you did or said, but for something your patron did or said. The punishments are not severe ... if you don't care about continuing to be a scientist. But it is entirely possible to keep someone on the edge of acceptance and make her miss it. Using legal, organizational means only.
In science, people can be petty, and they will reject you just because you are not pleasant, and there are plenty of pleasant people to replace you. None of this comes from my direct experience. But I was very, very lucky. And I still observed plenty indirectly.
Getting to my point.
If there is an a-political bi-partisan protest of scientists, it needs to be done right.
* It needs to be kept pure from meta-political considerations. This means don't invite people from unrelated political movements even if they are also very upset.
* It needs to be completely non-violent. It means no verbal abuse against ignorant personalities.
* It needs to include active researchers with made names. And exclude younger researchers, as much as possible.
Otherwise all of us -- even people not participating in the march -- will be given a unique opportunity to destroy our own scientific careers and political idealism at the same time.

...

As for my own participation, I would not like to stand next to someone with a poster "Save our environment, and also kill all the jews". Or the like. [I am exaggerating, of course. But still.]

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При определенном повороте событий могу себе представить ситуацию, где научная карьера будет зависеть от возможности доказать, что абитуриент был на баррикадах 22 апреля 2017 года, сражаясь с тираном. А не отсиживался у себя в лаборатории, хехехе.

Подозреваю даже, что в некоторых науках дело будет обстоять примерно так при любом повороте событий.

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Я тоже могу это себе представить, но не думаю. От учёных ожидается нейтральность, слишком большое участие даже в правильных баррикадах вредно.

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