"There was a risk that such a single-minded pursuit of so difficult a problem could hurt her academic career, but Späth dedicated all her time to it anyway."
I feel like this sentence is in every article for a reason. Thank goodness there are such obsessive people and here's a toast to those counter-factuals that never get mentioned.
> I feel like this sentence is in every article for a reason.
Breakthroughs, BY DEFINITION, come from people going against the grain. Breakthroughs are paradigm shifts. You don't shift the paradigm by following the paradigm.
I think we do a lot of disservice by dismissing the role of the dark horses. They are necessary. Like you suggest, there are many that fail, probably most do. But considering the impact, even just a small percentage succeeding warrants significant encouragement. Yet we often act in reverse, we discourage going against the grain. Often with reasons about fear of failure. In research, most things fail. But the only real failure is the ones you don't learn from (currently it is very hard to publish negative results. Resulting it not even being attempted. The system encourages "safe" research, which by its nature, can only be incremental. Fine, we want this, but it's ironic considering how many works get rejected due to "lack of novelty")
> Breakthroughs, BY DEFINITION, come from people going against the grain. Breakthroughs are paradigm shifts.
This is wrong. It's not inherent in the meaning of the word "breakthrough" that a breakthrough can occur only when someone has gone against the grain, and there are countless breakthroughs that have not gone against the grain. See: the four-minute mile; the Manhattan Project; the sequencing of the human genome; the decipherment of Linear B; research into protein folding. These breakthroughs have largely been the result of being first to find the solution to the problem or cross the theshold. That's it. That doesn't mean the people who managed to do that were working against the grain.
> Yet we often act in reverse, we discourage going against the grain. Often with reasons about fear of failure.
I don't know which "we" you're referring to, but just about everybody would agree with the statement that it's good to think creatively, experiment, and pursue either new lines of inquiry or old lines in new ways, so, again, your claim seems clearly wrong.
If you're discussing just scientific research, though, sure, there are plenty of incentives that encourage labs and PIs to make the safe choice rather than the bold or innovative choice.
Sounds like an argument over semantics and the meaning of the word "breakthrough".
Running the 4 minute mile, climbing everest - those are achievements rather than breakthroughs.
I'd also class the atomic bomb as an achievement - it was the expected/desired result of a massive investment program - though no doubt there were many breakthroughs required in order to achieve that result.
Yup, it's semantics, because the comment I answered stresses "by definition." My point is partly that that isn't the definition.
Even if we decide that breakthroughs require some kind of discontinuity, break, or, as the comment said, "paradigm shift," such discontinuity isn't necessarily "against the grain," as this would imply some kind of resistance to or rejection of "the grain."
Words can indeed mean multiple things. Their meanings aren't infinitely flexible. You wrote that the word (or concept?) "by definition" means some specific thing or must meet some specific requirement. You defined it. You didn't imply that you were relying on some specific meaning that happens to be relevant to your point. To the contrary, you wrote that the definition you provided is THE meaning -- the ONE meaning -- of the word.
That isn't the meaning of the word. It isn't any of the word's meanings. A breakthrough can "go against the grain." It isn't required to. So I didn't "turn it into something different." I read and responded to exactly what you wrote.
Your broader point, too, is, I think, clearly wrong. It paints a needlessly, inaccurately adversarial, even defensive and persecutory, picture of what you're calling "paradigm shifts" -- work that may not fit into existing lines of inquiry or research. I strongly disagree with you.
> If you understood what I meant then why turn it into something different unless you just want to argue?
Did I want to argue? Not particularly. You made a point. You stated it strongly. Why wouldn't I offer a counterpoint if I disagree? Or why shouldn't I? Moreover, I offered a refinement of your point: I said that your claims make more sense and are less objectionable if we apply them to contemporary scientific research -- research requiring grants and external funding. That's not disagreement. It's also decidedly not the point your comment makes; your post isn't about academic, scientific, or mathematical research. Your point is much, much broader. There's no evidence in your comment that "[you] meant" to make the narrower point that I made. It is literally not the point you made. It's the point I made. I had to supply it for you.
But I don't agree. I think people who discourage going against the grain are more fearful of the loss of economic input. It's unproductive to do something you know will fail; it's very expensive to encourage that failure.
I want financial independence for the sole reason that I can work on interesting problems like this without any outside nagging or funding issues from anyone else (there might still be some judgment, but I can ignore that).
Personally I think governments should fund more moonshot solo or small team efforts because high risk / high reward pays off when you reduce the variance by spreading it out over so many people. But it looks like we’re going headstrong the other direction in terms of funding in the U.S. right now, so I’m not optimistic.
> I want financial independence for the sole reason that I can work on interesting problems like this without any outside nagging or funding issues from anyone else
Ditto. This is literally the only desire I have to be wealthy. It is not about having nice things, a nice house, or any of that. It is about letting me do my own research.
I bet there is too! But I think it is also hard to form this community. Given the increased friction from the general community I think it might be time to put serious effort in determining how to make this a reality.
I don't have a great idea for it tbh. I'll pitch a bad one at least to put something out there. Maybe we can convince some billionaire to perform a post scarcity experiment? To buy large chunk of land, gather people who have both high passion and expertise in domains, and let them run wild. Less like Star Trek and more like Eureka[0]. I don't think it is a realistic expectation to get billionaire funding, but I think the idea of looking at something like Eureka (or this category of groups you see in many Sci-Fi stories) is worth drawing inspiration from: effectively post scarce (possible on small scale?), high levels of freedom (very doable), high levels of creativity and expressiveness (this is the experiment, to see if it is decreased/maintained/increased).
I'm a Swedish game developer and I feel exactly the same way. I have my dream games I work on every now and then making very little slow progress. My wildest dream would be just being able to dedicate myself to it full time. But, there are bills to pay.
Given what universities charge, they should more than be able to cover comfortable salaries for all researchers so they never need to worry about going broke. Tenure is a very useful tool!
I worked at a pro audio company where one guy spent 5 years on a power supply. It succeeded, and I always appreciated the management for supporting him.
Haha the blue led story is literally people going against the grain, a great example. Worked on it after being ordered not to. The original owner of the company believed in the inventor, too, which probably helps.
Is the nifty part about the rice cooker the temperature cutoff at 105C? Induction? That my cats turn on my zojirushi three times a day and open the lid and it doesn't harm it because it knows there's nothing in the pot?
One of these days I need to track down who actually got the patent for using IR LED in a ring around a camera lens to see in the dark.
There are tens of millions of people doing a repetitive work every day, instead of being entrepreneurs. Just let them be, not everybody needs to dedicate their existence to maximizing their career opportunities, at any level.
As someone who's research goes against the grain, I just request the same. I have no problem with people maintaining the course and doing the same thing. In fact /most/ people should probably be doing this. BUT the system discourages going of course, exploring "out of bounds." The requests of these people have always been "let me do my thing."
Just make sure "let them be" applies in both directions
Unfortunately the average persons hatred of autistic or nerdy people implies that many believe the world would be a better place if “obsessive types” didn’t exist.
Hans Asperger could only save his Austic children from nazi death camps by convincing the nazis that they had value to produce rockets and bombs.
It’s quite remarkable that the USA is so advanced given how deep and ruthless our anti-intellectualism goes.
This is a great point. If a small percentage of the population is openly and aggressively negative towards another part of the population, it makes sense that they would both artificially appear as if they are a larger part of the population, to each other. I think it goes both ways.
I _highly_ doubt 90% of nerdy people were tormented during childhood. Have you spent time in/around academia? These people are massive nerds and horrendous childhood torment is pretty rare.
My point was more that its doesn't take a large chunk of a population to mistreat others to make mistreatment almost inescapable.
For child sexual abuse, which is studied more than "anti-nerd bullying" offenders are just a few percent of the population, if that (I can't actually find good sources for population incidence of being an abuser) but the offended against are 1/6 to 1/3 of the population.
Another interesting point is that some nerdy folks might not even notice the bullying that much - I once had a friend from high school say that they always felt bad for how much bullying I experienced, and I said "what? what do you mean?" I felt that many of the folks in high school were terribly evil people, but I didn't get that upset by the bullying itself. Just determined to move as soon as I could. Not like as a strategy to over come the bullying, just to get among people I can respect.
Our son was specifically chosen to be in his 4th Grade class because it spent part of the day hosting the spectrum kids within their "regular" class. He was chosen for that honor because of his kindness.
He has been taught to love others since he was born, and the Path of Love has borne fruit for all those around all four of us.
All the people who say it can't be done have never tried consciously evolving with Divine help.
{Complete lyrics} --Sinead O'Connor in Massive Attack's "What Your Soul Sings"
US intellectualism is patchy. Sure a lot of people are not into it but on the other hand you probably have more well paid academic posts than any other country.
How do you know their peers, teachers, and bosses aren’t autistic too? Autistic people can’t be peers, teachers, and bosses? Autistic people can be assholes too. Maybe that’s what it really is: some people are just assholes.
Obviously everything is a spectrum but I agree. If anything, "a touch of the 'tism" is the new "I have OCD" because you like a clean desk, something people are fine with saying without regards to it being true.
The average person is probably uncomfortable around autistic people because they don't know how to deal with them and, when you see someone like that, it's usually best to avoid interacting with them. Not because autistic people are dangerous but people acting out of the ordinary sometimes are.
The lumping in of nerdy with autistic is ridiculous too. The average person just doesn't care about your interests unless they are in common. Nerdy typically just means having a niche interest or hobby.
It's shocking that you can just bury your head in the sand about the colloquial usage of "autist" (often happening at the same time as "Incel") replacing "retard" in the lexicon of the average zoomer.
It's not a persecution complex to identify the ways that hate gets used, deployed, and repackaged for a new generation. Putting your head in the sand about stuff like this is why Trump winning the election was SO shocking to some and extremely obvious to others.
Probably the most powerful man in the world right now openly self-identifies as autistic. Obviously there are very many autistic people who get treated very badly, but I don't think it's reasonable to say that the average person "hates" autistic people.
Yeah I wouldn't want to be an autistic person that doesn't suck right now.
I imagine it's a lot like my experience of having ADHD and being trapped between wanting leeway and support but also wanting to be held accountable and considered capable of improving and watching the Tiktokification of my disorder force me to argue that actually people with ADHD can do things and no having it doesn't fully excuse you from ever meeting commitments or doing the fucking dishes, especially if you're rejecting all and any treatment or strategy.
If anything autistic/nerdy people are lionized these days with tons of people larping as them online, claiming they are autistic because they sometimes feel awkward at a social event.
What are you talking about, why do you think that autistics are treated better in Europe, Africa, Asia? Also, people do not "hate" them, people in general hate everybody, don't play the victim
Isn't it basically the same? Nazi Germany in 1934 was relatively advanced, too.
I think the difference is^W was that USA celebrated it in a Homer Simpson kind of "Ha ha! NERDS!" way, while meth-Hitler was like "let's sterilize them but try to extract math from them to... (whatever batshit goal)"
Anti-intellectualism seems to be a thing when the intellectual/moderately-competent people have already brought success. (Until then it's more like anti-witchcraft, or whatever...)
Most of "The Road" absolutely kills me. But Scalzi wrote something that's etched forever into my brain:
“For as much as I hate the cemetery, I’ve been grateful it’s here, too. I miss my wife. It’s easier to miss her at a cemetery, where she’s never been anything but dead, than to miss her in all the places where she was alive.”
― John Scalzi, Old Man's War
The company's board (politcos) and syndicate (there is none) is a bit weird for a FDA approval...maybe there are some caveats or scope notes that I have not seen.
Sorry, but why hold any of these people out as purveyors of truth?
I could rip a apart Thiel, Adams or Taleb on ___(their own dumb kryptonite). For example, listen to Taleb on religion. He's a buffoon. On power laws...very insightful.
I see no reason to glorify individuals outside of their domains.
Regarding Trump, he's just a Republican, as Hillary is just a Democrat. They are the faces of the machine. This is how most Trump-backers get comfort with Trump.
If Trump TRULY TRULY was anti-establishment, he would sound more like Lawrence Lessig and less like Archie Bunker.
I think the core of Trumps message and support base is that the people in power seems to have forgotten about, and left all the Archie Bunkers behind. This seems like a valid argument, and one that I agree with wholeheartedly.
As a gay man, I also worry that those of us who fought hard for equality may be trying to close the doors behind us, and prevent some other group from getting there.
I can't vote for Trump, largely because I consider him to be a buffoon - but that doesn't mean he's all wrong either. Even idiots sometimes have a good point to make.
I don't know if you've been following it but even lifelong Republicans who are gay have decried the new GOP party platform as being the most actively anti-LGBT in the party's history.
And Trump has declared that his Supreme Court picks will be based on opposition to marriage equality, so shutting the door to other groups is perhaps the least of your worries.
OPM is terrible. Even the academics realize it (I think). This paper evaluates the analysis. There's a caveat on pg. 24. GIGO. In my opinion, it's not just a caveat. It's a killer. I'm not sure what the overarching societal value to applying OPM to private, illiquid company valuations could be.
TechCrunch has become the in-flight magazine of technology. How many of these marketing pieces are meaningful for anyone involved in the technology community? Moving on...
So build a better systems. Super successful artists have the ability to create better and "fairer" platforms for other artists and consumers (if that's your belief). We are all open to new models. Let's see how Patreon does, for example. I hated this article.
Well, they can start by fixing their localization. I'm currently in Amsterdam and thought I would try it just now, but I get "country.price.1 country.currency" listed under subscription cost.
The biggest problem with any new "system" I've seen is that none of the facilitate artist discovery. Especially now that the bar to produce and distribute music is at the lowest it's ever been, there is no easy way to discover new artists.
Sure there is. Join the communities that support the genre(s) of music you enjoy. Listen to the various internet radio programs that feature the music you enjoy -- those curators will introduce you to new music, and new-to-you music.
As many flaws as the major labels previously had, they did discover and nurture artists. Internet radio is not going to discover a random lounge cover singer in the middle of flyover US. You are not going to have an internet radio station that features random unknown artists that has widespread reach. The bar to discovery is much higher and arguably requires less on the music end and more on the promo end than it has in the past. This leads to more of the chaff rising to the top.
That's been true but there are some artist examples that are showing new artists can embrace the new dynamic and reach fans. CHVRCHES got their start on SoundCloud. Chance the Rapper still is in the "mixtape" game. Pretty much any "viral" hit that isn't actively on a Major Label at the time of the release can be considered, I think, to be a case study in how the dynamics are changing. Edit: Forgot Run The Jewels as well.
These days, the barrier to entry for discovery is lower than it's ever been. If you get your music on all of the various internet music services and some of the internet-radio programming, you are much more heavily distributed worldwide than any garage-band in the 70s or 80s could ever have been at the time.
The 'bar for discovery' has two parts: The bar for potential discovery is now very, very low. But for actual discovery it is high because the "signal-to-noise" ratio is very low: by that I mean there is so much crap (noise) to wade through before you find a great band (signal) that the work of curating has shifted from the radio stations and record labels to the consumer. The nice thing is that you can find excellent music the major labels will simply ignore. The not so nice thing: it requires work on your part to seek out and engage with the curators of content.
This is why finding the internet radio programs that feature the genre you enjoy, and following the music-programmers who curate with taste that you share, is vital to a good discovery experience.
I disagree. The ones I listen to do just that: not only flyover country, but Canada, Australia, UK, Italy and all over the rest of Europe. And the facebook groups for the genres I follow frequently post music from excellent, up and coming or obscure bands.
Widespread reach? It's the internet! How widespread do you need to be? ;)
Also, labels != radio. It's not radio's job to nuture and develop bands. But they can expose bands to greater audiences, which allows people like us to "discover" new-to-us bands.
I feel like this sentence is in every article for a reason. Thank goodness there are such obsessive people and here's a toast to those counter-factuals that never get mentioned.
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