I don’t know anything about interventionist causality, and Objectivism seems like a waste of time. The rest all seem to have produced worthwhile results.
But this is costless analysis! Of course if you buy lots of lottery tickets, and look only at the winners, then buying lottery tickets looks worthwhile. You have to consider the opportunity costs, not just of these research projects, but also of every other similarly situated research project. And you also have to do time-discounting. Bombelli discovering complex numbers in 1572 looks like a waste, when they weren’t useful for 200 years or more.
Moreover, I don’t know why “corporations” is the comparison. The comparison is the private sector generally. Huge amounts of scientific work are done, and continue to be done, by enthusiastic amateurs, and the charitable sector. I am not making the claim that in an ideal world all government academics should be fired (although I do think that would be a big improvement on the current situation). I merely claimed that, on the margin, we are hugely oversupplied with academics, and undersupplied with businessmen.
Ok. So, helpful fundamental research, as it is currently produced: (a) imposes a heavy opportunity cost, (b) has a low success rate, (c) is generally discovered “too early,” leading to waste. What is your proposal for doing better? Can you give me some examples of things like complex numbers discovered in the private sector, by charities, or ‘enthusiastic amateurs’?
Incidentally, the success rate of fundamental research for a given finite time horizon k is an untestable quantity. Thus, (b) is a weak complaint. (a) is hard to argue also, because you need to construct counterfactual scenarios that people will believe.
Can you give me some examples of things like complex numbers discovered in the private sector, by charities, or ‘enthusiastic amateurs’?
Examples that fit Salemicus’s narrative in this context aren’t non-existent. For example, Fermat was a lawyer by profession and did math as a hobby in his free time. There are many similar examples prior to the 19th century or so. And some major charities have helped fund successful research- one sees a lot of this with a variety of diseases.
Amateurs: Evolutionary Theory (Darwin, 1830s-50s), Photoelectric effect, Brownian Motion, Special Relativity, Matter-Energy (Einstein, 1905), Linear B (Ventris, 1951),
Incidentally, the success rate of fundamental research for a given finite time horizon k is an untestable quantity. Thus, (b) is a weak complaint. (a) is hard to argue also, because you need to construct counterfactual scenarios that people will believe.
Actually, if the success rate of this spending is as unknowable and untestable as you say it is, that’s an excellent argument to stop forcing unwilling people to pay for it. But note that although I’m happy to fight you on your strongest ground (pure scientific research), surely you must then concede that the rest of the battlefield is mine, and that all government spending on academia that can’t be justified in these terms (e.g. arts, humanities, medicine, space exploration, etc) should be eliminated. I’m not doctrinaire—I’d settle for that compromise.
EDIT: I’d truly be fascinated to know why was this voted down.
I don’t know precisely why your comment was voted down, but one obvious guess is factual issues:
Amateurs: Evolutionary Theory (Darwin, 1830s-50s)
Darwin got most of his ideas from his time working the survey/exploration ship the HMS Beagle. As you may gather from the “HMS” in front, this was a ship in the British navy which had specific funding to hire and provide support to a naturalist.
But note that although I’m happy to fight you on your strongest ground (pure scientific research), surely you must then concede that the rest of the battlefield is mine, and that all government spending on academia that can’t be justified in these terms (e.g. arts, humanities, medicine, space exploration, etc) should be eliminated. I’m not doctrinaire—I’d settle for that compromise.
This is why I suspect you are getting downvoted. First, it shows a confused notion of what is “pure scientific research”- a large part of space exploration and medical research counts as pure research for purposes of the arguments being made by IlyaShpitser and others in this context. Moreover, you seem to be wanting a “compromise” as if the truth must be somehow negotiable. The key of discussion is to understand what is likely to be actually true. Settling for a compromise isn’t how one reaches truth (and no, Aumann’s agreement theorem doesn’t apply here).
I will not argue with your post as although I disagree with some things you stated, I requested comments on why downvoted. However, I think the following correction is necessary:
I don’t know precisely why your comment was voted down, but one obvious guess is factual issues:
Amateurs: Evolutionary Theory (Darwin, 1830s-50s)
Darwin got most of his ideas from his time working the survey/exploration ship the HMS Beagle. As you may gather from the “HMS” in front, this was a ship in the British navy which had specific funding to hire and provide support to a naturalist.
Darwin was a “gentleman naturalist,” held no official post on the Beagle, received no salary, and in fact had to pay to go on the journey. The ship was going for surveying purposes, and would have gone on its journey regardless of his presence. He held no academic position in the years afterwards when he was working on his theory. I think it’s quite reasonable to classify this as amateur.
So from reading this Wikipedia summary it looks like the situation was actually more complicated than either of us realized (although definitely closer to your summary):
FitzRoy had found a need for expert advice on geology during the first voyage, and had resolved that if on a similar expedition, he would “endeavour to carry out a person qualified to examine the land; while the officers, and myself, would attend to hydrography… he asked his friend and superior, Captain Francis Beaufort, to seek a gentleman naturalist as a self-financing passenger who would give him company during the voyage. A sequence of inquiries led to Charles Darwin, a young gentleman on his way to becoming a rural clergyman, joining the voyage
So yes, he was self-financed. But the primary issue is that he was given support by the crew and the entire existence of an exploration ship (which if anything seems pretty similar to the space program you’ve criticized). Would you call someone who does work without pay now using data from NASA an amateur? If so, then the term “amateur” isn’t very relevant to capturing the most important detail- where the resources for their work comes from.
Incidentally, the success rate of fundamental research for a given finite time horizon k is an untestable quantity.
How exactly do you measure “success” in this case ? As for me, I find myself hard-pressed to think of any examples of fundamental research that weren’t ultimately beneficial—except perhaps for instances of outright fraud or gross incompetence.
Even if a scientist spent five years and a million dollars trying to discover, say, the link between gene X and phenotype Y, and found no such link, then the work was still not in vain. Firstly, we can now be more certain that gene X does not cause Y; secondly, we can most likely gain a lot of collateral benefits from the work, leading to an increased rate of discovery in the future.
I don’t know anything about interventionist causality, and Objectivism seems like a waste of time. The rest all seem to have produced worthwhile results.
But this is costless analysis! Of course if you buy lots of lottery tickets, and look only at the winners, then buying lottery tickets looks worthwhile. You have to consider the opportunity costs, not just of these research projects, but also of every other similarly situated research project. And you also have to do time-discounting. Bombelli discovering complex numbers in 1572 looks like a waste, when they weren’t useful for 200 years or more.
Moreover, I don’t know why “corporations” is the comparison. The comparison is the private sector generally. Huge amounts of scientific work are done, and continue to be done, by enthusiastic amateurs, and the charitable sector. I am not making the claim that in an ideal world all government academics should be fired (although I do think that would be a big improvement on the current situation). I merely claimed that, on the margin, we are hugely oversupplied with academics, and undersupplied with businessmen.
Ok. So, helpful fundamental research, as it is currently produced: (a) imposes a heavy opportunity cost, (b) has a low success rate, (c) is generally discovered “too early,” leading to waste. What is your proposal for doing better? Can you give me some examples of things like complex numbers discovered in the private sector, by charities, or ‘enthusiastic amateurs’?
Incidentally, the success rate of fundamental research for a given finite time horizon k is an untestable quantity. Thus, (b) is a weak complaint. (a) is hard to argue also, because you need to construct counterfactual scenarios that people will believe.
Examples that fit Salemicus’s narrative in this context aren’t non-existent. For example, Fermat was a lawyer by profession and did math as a hobby in his free time. There are many similar examples prior to the 19th century or so. And some major charities have helped fund successful research- one sees a lot of this with a variety of diseases.
Sure. For a start, complex numbers themselves—Bombelli was in the private sector himself. Some others, taken at random:
For-profit: Lightbulb (Edison, 1881), Propranolol and Cimetedine (Black, 1960s), Fractals (Mandelbrot, 1975)
Amateurs: Evolutionary Theory (Darwin, 1830s-50s), Photoelectric effect, Brownian Motion, Special Relativity, Matter-Energy (Einstein, 1905), Linear B (Ventris, 1951),
Actually, if the success rate of this spending is as unknowable and untestable as you say it is, that’s an excellent argument to stop forcing unwilling people to pay for it. But note that although I’m happy to fight you on your strongest ground (pure scientific research), surely you must then concede that the rest of the battlefield is mine, and that all government spending on academia that can’t be justified in these terms (e.g. arts, humanities, medicine, space exploration, etc) should be eliminated. I’m not doctrinaire—I’d settle for that compromise.
EDIT: I’d truly be fascinated to know why was this voted down.
I don’t know precisely why your comment was voted down, but one obvious guess is factual issues:
Darwin got most of his ideas from his time working the survey/exploration ship the HMS Beagle. As you may gather from the “HMS” in front, this was a ship in the British navy which had specific funding to hire and provide support to a naturalist.
This is why I suspect you are getting downvoted. First, it shows a confused notion of what is “pure scientific research”- a large part of space exploration and medical research counts as pure research for purposes of the arguments being made by IlyaShpitser and others in this context. Moreover, you seem to be wanting a “compromise” as if the truth must be somehow negotiable. The key of discussion is to understand what is likely to be actually true. Settling for a compromise isn’t how one reaches truth (and no, Aumann’s agreement theorem doesn’t apply here).
I will not argue with your post as although I disagree with some things you stated, I requested comments on why downvoted. However, I think the following correction is necessary:
Darwin was a “gentleman naturalist,” held no official post on the Beagle, received no salary, and in fact had to pay to go on the journey. The ship was going for surveying purposes, and would have gone on its journey regardless of his presence. He held no academic position in the years afterwards when he was working on his theory. I think it’s quite reasonable to classify this as amateur.
So from reading this Wikipedia summary it looks like the situation was actually more complicated than either of us realized (although definitely closer to your summary):
So yes, he was self-financed. But the primary issue is that he was given support by the crew and the entire existence of an exploration ship (which if anything seems pretty similar to the space program you’ve criticized). Would you call someone who does work without pay now using data from NASA an amateur? If so, then the term “amateur” isn’t very relevant to capturing the most important detail- where the resources for their work comes from.
How exactly do you measure “success” in this case ? As for me, I find myself hard-pressed to think of any examples of fundamental research that weren’t ultimately beneficial—except perhaps for instances of outright fraud or gross incompetence.
Even if a scientist spent five years and a million dollars trying to discover, say, the link between gene X and phenotype Y, and found no such link, then the work was still not in vain. Firstly, we can now be more certain that gene X does not cause Y; secondly, we can most likely gain a lot of collateral benefits from the work, leading to an increased rate of discovery in the future.