Guest Opinion: Dr. Tim Ball
The corruption of climate science by some misguided individuals in the quest to “save the planet” is the most egregious example of the larger problems facing science in general. The problems are causing rapid erosion of credibility in science and environmental issues. Some are talking about the growing problems, but few even want to acknowledge them until it directly impinges their work and career. The public is becoming increasingly aware and angry about the intellectual and political elitism that is the source of the decline in standards and values. A central theme to the Brexit vote in the UK and the rise of Donald Trump is the rejection of the elite trio of the financial, political, and academic enclaves that are destroying people’s lives.
After 40 years of working, watching, and dealing with the misuse of climate science; studying the history of science; working to improve education at all levels, and dealing with real world issues, I developed a sensitivity and much wider awareness. I also adopted George Washington’s slightly less cynical than Machiavelli’s observation that
“We must take human nature as we find it, perfection falls not to the share of mortals.”
From personal experience and involvement with the education system from Kindergarten to post-secondary, I know the problems of science are entwined with and amplified by the failures of academia. The ivory tower of the University of East Anglia and the lesser ivory tower (minaret) of the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) are examples of the problem. Read the leaked emails and see how they worked together to hide the truth. In most cases of academic malfeasance, the administration, mostly comprised of academics, cover up obfuscate and fail to hold the miscreants to account. I stopped going to department meetings when it was discovered that a colleague had taken a student’s term paper and used 97 percent of it word for word as the basis for a research study for which he received payment from the government. Over my protests they did nothing except to say unless the student made an accusation, there was nothing they could do. I spoke to the student who said he was not going to become known as the student who ‘fingered’ a professor because he wanted to go to graduate school. I fully understood having gone through that political exercise (fiasco).
I know from my experience and discussion with others that such stories are endemic throughout academia.
The major problem is the always present, but widening disconnect between universities and the real world. The Ivory Tower has divided into discreet specialized towers not able to communicate with each other but collectively inured against examination from the real world. They won the town and gown fight centuries ago, particularly at the Battle of St. Scholastica Day in Oxford on February 10, 1355, and haven’t been back to town since, except to demand more money or impose unrealistic theories and unworkable ideas. The public is increasingly resentful of institutions that promote illogical, unrealistic, theories that negatively affect their lives, including costing many lives.
There are a widespread malaise and loss of direction in western society promulgated by bizarre ideas and theories produced by completely unaccountable academics. How can anyone promote ideas that were so wrong and did so much damage, like Paul Ehrlich, yet continue to practice? Most non-academics know they would lose their jobs immediately. Of course, academics wrote the rules on tenure so they cannot be held accountable. It is another of those anachronistic ideas from the Middle Ages. As Prince Philip said, universities are the only truly incestuous systems in our society. Sadly, and devastatingly, all these academic ideas permeate and undermine society, and virtually none add to the greater good, including preparing young people for the real world. In every other phase of education, the person must be trained and qualified to teach, but not at the universities. They are hired on the basis of a research degree, which requires a level of introspection and character that is generally the antithesis of good teaching. Most pass off the teaching to more unqualified graduate students and a majority do very little research in the time made available. I know first hand how little most of them do. Even if they teach, it involves a few hours a week for about one-third of the year.
Lack of accountability is endemic among the financial, political, and academic elite trio. It is no wonder that the modern attitude, especially among the young, is that you only broke the law if you got caught. Even then, it is most likely nothing will happen to you or anyone who benefits from your absolution if you are in the elite trio. So the malfeasance expands as the practices and false rewards continue.
A misguided article titled “The 7 biggest problems facing science, according to 270 scientists” begs a multitude of questions that speak to the wider problems. They begin with a quote from neurosurgeon Paul Kalanthi.
“Science, I had come to learn, is as political, competitive, and fierce a career as you can find, full of the temptation to find easy paths.”
The article lists the seven problems. (My comments in regular font.)
1. Academia has a huge money problem.
No it doesn’t.
2. Too many studies are poorly designed.
True.
3. Replicating results is crucial – and rare.
True.
4. Peer review is broken.
True.
5. Too much science is locked behind paywalls.
True.
6. Science is poorly communicated.
True
7. Life as a young academic is incredibly stressful.
False.
The authors fail to note that most of these problems are self-inflicted. All these problems and much more exist in climate science. Remarkably, the authors conclude that “Science is not doomed,” which tells you what is wrong with academia and science.
Three of the issues, 2, 3, and 4 are so fundamental that unless they are corrected science is doomed. Also, they are not the only problems. A partial list would include;
· the use of science for political agendas;
· the willingness of scientists to produce science to support those agendas;
· the willingness of scientists to let their political bias color their science and their public activities – there is no better example than James Hansen;
· the willingness of scientists to participate in scientific research primarily to advance their career;
· the willingness of scientists to remain silent when they must, or should know that what the public is told is incorrect – I am unaware of any government or Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) scientist who challenged Al Gore’s movie and especially his claims about sea level rise;
· they mention poor communication of science to the public but fail to mention the constant stream of contradictions on almost every topic;
· they fail to mention the role and bias of the media or how some scientists exploit that bias;
· they fail to mention the failure to follow the scientific method of asking a question, carrying out a review of the literature, constructing a hypothesis, testing the hypothesis by gathering evidence, analyzing the data and reaching a conclusion;
· they appear to consider only the opinions of academic scientists when much of the damage is done by bureaucratic scientists
Items 1 and 7 mention funding and academia. In the article, they explain,
Their gripe isn’t just with the quantity, which, in many fields, is shrinking. It’s the way money is handed out that puts pressure on labs to publish a lot of papers, breeds conflicts of interest, and encourages scientists to overhype their work.
Today, many tenured scientists and research labs depend on small armies of graduate students and postdoctoral researchers to perform their experiments and conduct data analysis.
These grad students and postdocs are often the primary authors on many studies. In a number of fields, such as the biomedical sciences, a postdoc position is a prerequisite before a researcher can get a faculty-level position at a university.
These outlines the feudal system that exists in universities. You have patrician tenured faculty, most doing very little work. I know because I was there for 25 years. They use “graduate students and postdoctoral researchers” as feudal serfs. This is all confirmed at graduation ceremonies when they appear in their Elizabethan finery.
There is no shortage of money in academia in the US. One graph in the article illustrates the point by showing a steady increase since 1970 (Figure 1).
Figure 1
The problem is not adequate funding. It is too many people getting too much money for useless projects because there are too many people in universities. It is too many people going to university. The blunt truth is that for the majority of students it is a socially acceptable form of unemployment. Students getting less than a B average should not even be in university; for them, it is simply Grades 13, 14, 15, and (16). Some of this over attendance is because immigrant or newly successful middle-class families want their children to attend university. How many times do we here of graduates saying they are the first in their family to attend university? This creates the mentality that every child that enters Kindergarten is going to end up in university. Inherently, this makes any that don’t get there, failures.
One of many incorrect assumptions made in education is that it can increase a person’s Intelligence Quotient (IQ). The difference is between nature (IQ) and nurture (education). Aristotle defined the issue when he pointed out that you can have a mathematical genius of five years old, but you will never have a five-year-old philosophical genius. Aristotle’s point was that most of the subjects’ students study in school require life experience, which they don’t and can’t have.
A. E. Wiggan explained,
Intelligence appears to be the thing that enables man to get along without education. Education appears to be the thing that enables a man to get along without the use of his intelligence.
The academics also convinced the public that only their narrow definition of IQ is relevant. It is intelligence that has little or nothing to do with the real world. Most academic research is done purely to get degrees, promotion, and tenure. Most add nothing other than volume to the cacophony of incomprehensible data. The article quotes Michael Burel, Ph.D. student, New York University School of Medicine.”
“Far too often, there are less than 10 people on this planet who can fully comprehend a single scientist’s research.”
And that is the problem, but it is the problem of Burel and science, not society. The inability of science to explain their work is the scientist’s problem. However, one of the reasons most people don’t “comprehend” is because most of science is of no consequence to people. If science wants the public to continue funding and prevent political exploitation the onus is with science to show the relevance of their work; and there it is, that dreaded word, “relevance.” The failure of academia is exposed by their argument that they don’t have to show how their work is relevant. Most of the science that benefits people is produced by business and industry.
The give away in the entire climate debacle were the actions taken before and after the emails were leaked. The resort to denial of freedom of information requests for data, use of intellectual property claims to prevent other scientists replicating results. The examples in climate science appear to be extreme. The list of seven indicates it is simply an exposed example of a widespread failure in academia, promoted and protected by the financial and political elite. This does not mean it is restricted to a particular political belief; it is equally problematic in institutions of the rich and poor, left and right because it is a complete society breakdown. Ironically, it was Osama bin Laden who said the West had lost its moral direction. He was right. The problem is I don’t want his moral system either.
We can solve many of our problems quickly by closing down 75 percent of our universities. Recognize that there are a multitude of skills and abilities far more important than those pursued by academia. Make those who remain in academia show the value and relevance of their work.
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I’ve said it before & I’ll say it again: If you want to fix what has gone wrong with academic research you must eliminate government funding of research. As long as the overwhelming majority of research funding is from government you will get politicized science and science whose conclusions always support the policy needs of the government. The point of government funded research is to provide “evidence” in support of established policy goals. Honest research is not possible when government is the major supplier of research money.
I don’t necessarily disagree with you …… but.
Private interest money any different?
Such as drug pharmaceuticals.
Just being the devil’s advocate.
Hans
No, treat science as an ART pursued by those who are sure it is their vocation, and will spend THEIR OWN money to fund their research. Nothing funded by a third party should be taken seriously.
There are already devil’s advocates after the pharmaceutical industry called lawyers. When a drug company releases a drug that isn’t up to snuff or is based on data which have been manipulated, you can be sure that trial lawyers will be after them, whether it is justified or not.
Who fulfills the same role for government funded junk science?
Hans
Your question: Private interest money any different?
My answer: it depends on the motivation of the research. IBM, Apple (and others) have great research motivated by some dimension of “profitability” (profit, market share, commercial viability, first to market). Research motivated by political correctness, personal aggrandizement, political cliques, depend more on “marketing” than “profit”. Disciplines (psychology comes to mind) having a tenuous relationships with ‘profit” are left to the mercy of government (“aka: political) funding.
Chris, Most of the rich have little interest in money. Traditionally, scientists relied on the support of a noble patron. However, the number of sufficiently wealthy patrons are few and far between. If I made a few billion, I might support some research.
Some big ticket items, such as CERN, the Hubble telescope, or the majority of large observatories, would be impossible to do without governmental support as they have no tangible benefit in the foreseeable future, and are beyond the means of even the Gates to fund.
While eliminating government funds to remove bias sounds good in principle, astronomy and experimental physics would reach dead ends very quickly, and many other branches would be stifled.
Correction. “Most of the rich have very little interest in science, and those with interest in science have little money”. Somehow the middle part of that sentence got omitted.
@Ben Klijn of Houston – actually the first comment was not too far from the truth either. 😉
Private interest money any different?
Absolutely:
1) comes from multiple sources which nullifies any private prejudices
2) would not finance silly and irrelevant research
3) And most importantly: does not waste other people’s money!!
The difference is, with private sector money, the government can act as an overseer, in order to police corruption. There is no such body to act as such for the government.
Moving from private sector to government funding is a ‘frying pan into the fire’ scenario. All the same corruption, no corrective mechanisms, and access to money without having to ask or explain.
Obviously, the quote from Dr. Ray Stantz applies:
There are too many scientists for it still to be science. There just aren’t that many people in the world who care what is true.
Taphonomic
There are already devil’s advocates after the pharmaceutical industry called lawyers.
Actually the ambulance-chaser lawyers are vultures pecking a dead carvass. Thanks to them, real drug development has stopped. Except for some end of life / late cancer indications where pharma at least has a sporting chance against the chasers. No pharma company in the USA is likely ever again to develop a drug for a disease of childhood. This is the legacy the lawyers have left their lawyerlets.
I agree. I think government-funded research — as does government-funded education, in general — violates the First Amendment. The government has no business deciding which are or are not acceptable ideas in any area of life, most especially in education. Not to mention that there is no enumerated power/delegated authority in the Constitution for the feds to be involved in these areas in the first place.
I am baffled — well, not really… — why this is so difficult for so many people to understand. Just as with religion, we need a complete separation of government and education.
“Just as with religion, we need a complete separation of government and education”. True. But for education, as in “separation of powers” (legislature, executive, judiciary) government funding is still needed. Separation of powers is rarely done well (legislature and executive usually too tightly linked), so no matter what model is used there will be problems.
This is further proof of loss of credibility https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gh-DNNIUjKU
If you summarised what it says, I might watch it.
But you could not bother, so I will not bother.
R
Tom
100percent agree
Well…
Little if any of the global warming government funding is usable.
Lying about butterflies, or thin shelled sea animals, or forest fires, or weather, or polar ice that isn’t melting, or mis-modeling the future really doesn’t need funding. 3/4ths of global warming climate science funding goes to mismodeling the future.
There is some science relative to weather prediction that was and is government funded. The rest of it can be dropped. This applies to psychology and a number of other pseudo-science fields that get government grants.
The lawyer function is still needed. Peer review, or at least serious peer review, should be an independent function done by non-scientists who can debar the sloppy or dishonest and grade the scientists eligibility for future grants. This would take a lot of the careerism out of the field.
But congress should ban by law any grant RFP that has the words “global warming” or “climate change”.and require a job action against any bureaucrat that writes one. It is settled science and undeserving of any future funding.
I agree Tom.
Other countries should be pushing the limits of humanity’s knowledge forward, because they are better equipped, their education is more inclusive, and they have better intellectual resources.
China has the world’s best 2 computers now: Tianhe-2 is twice as fast as the USA’s best, and Sunway TaihuLight is five times as fast. There’s very little point in wasting money trying to do green-field research that the Chinese could do in 20% of the time.
Seth,
Agree – provided that the Chinese whizzo-machines will do the sort of green-field research in – say – climate, weather, and forecasting. we’d all like that, especially if there was no political bias at all [and even better, if there is access to imperfect but unadjusted weather records].
An alternative, of course, may be a field more congenial to the funders [the Chinese state, I guess] – such as – oh, imagine it’s creating performance-enhancing drugs that are easily detected in Slavic athletes.
Me – I’m just saying.
Now, maybe you could think of other fields.
Auto, careful to be careful – as that nice Mr. Putin, philanthropist, might know where I live.
I wouldn’t want him to drop half a ton of gold on me.
I’m sure they’ll be used for a wide range of projects.
The Chinese government and high powered computing being what they are, some of their time will probably be spend on cryptography.
Perhaps, the problem in not type of funding but rather its very competitive nature. The decision of what proposed research to fund is made by some body of “peers” in both government and private organizations that fund science. In particular, this committee of “peers” choosing research that will provide “broad impact”. How do they know? They don’t and, therefore, the funding goes to either shyster who lies the best or to a “well known” or “established” scientists or to the buddies of the committee members. I would suggest that public funding of scientific research should be based on quota going to the government labs and public universities based on some established number of researches. And let these scientists do whatever they chose to do.
TomB: I have used that quote a hundred times! Thank you!
Tom, the majority of money spent in research is from “special interests” either directly, or is directed tax money through their influence on the folks that dole out tax money. An immense amount of funds spent in science comes through just a few sectors: commerce, defense and medicine. The Commerce Department is soundly in the pockets of whoever can offer the best issues for campaigning and medicine is a close second. Defense has a wonderful world full of nasties and all they have to do is point toward the Middle East and say, “DAESH, we need more money.” Of course now, thanks to Putin, we can also look to eastern Europe and a growing threat of sophisticated Russian war tech like the Sukhoi PAK FA.
We can solve many of our problems quickly by closing down 75 percent of our universities. Recognize that there are a multitude of skills and abilities far more important than those pursued by academia. Make those who remain in academia show the value and relevance of their work.
I disagree with the idea of closing down universities because that would create the problem of determining which to shut down. T ome a much better idea is for the US government to stop guaranteeing student loans, which would shut off quite a bit of the spigot, particularly to those that are going just for the social aspect.
With the money spigot shut off, universities would have to begin competing for students and as a free market guy I think that would be a beautiful thing. Choices would have to be made that would be for the benefit of the students and not faculty and administrators. The schools that compete the best would be the most successful; schools that fail would then be shut down.
“a much better idea is for the US government to stop guaranteeing student loans, which would shut off quite a bit of the spigot, particularly to those that are going just for the social aspect.”
No only the social aspect, but the money aspect. Student loans are just like a guaranteed four-year job. Works out real good during those four years. Afterwards, It becomes a financial burden, and the student has to live with his/her parents while trying to repay the loan.
The vast majority of jobs today could easily be filled by specialists from 2-year certificate programs, dare I say “trade schools,” as opposed to those with academic degrees. The ability to do research, and field a broad exposure to “liberal arts” is not relevant to being an x-ray technician, a code writer, a fiber-optic cable installer, a vet tech or a hairdresser. College traditionally was for the upper 6% of society, not anyone they can drag in there, qualified or not. The percentage worthy of an education in the hard sciences, with true scientific integrity, is even lower. We need to also get rid of the junk courses that are cranking out “social experiments” aka “special snowflakes.” I wouldn’t hire one of THEM to muck out stalls!
I think the best change in that situation would be that facilities would consider cost in their actions. The building spree on so many campuses to keep up with the Jones’s has caused huge, unnecessary facilities to be built to attract students who are separated from their bills by government guarantees and the assumption that the size of their student loan debt is unimportant.
“How many times do we here of graduates saying…”
Hear?
Could be “How many times to we here have graduates saying…”
This problem started to emerge i the late 1970’s when universities changed undergraduate science requirements for non-scientists to one temr of lab science, two of elective science and ONE TERM OF SCIENCE AND SOCIETY taught be professors in sociology, english, philosophy, history and other nonscientific fields.
George Devries Klein, PhD, PG, FSA
These days that class would be taught by Professor Naomi Oreskes.
An excellent essay Dr. Ball. Thank you for sharing it. As the son of an arrogant, communist college professor I watched the broken system flourish all through his professional life. In his final decade he and his superiors created a whole new curriculum for him to Chair, simply so he could have increased earnings and power in his final years.
I fear our federal government in the United States has become much like our universities and much like the British Royalty. The halls of Congress have become palatial with the elected royalty acting like monarchs.
Yes, the Trump movement is powered by citizens who resent the entrenched power structure that controls their lives. And, Universities have become so financially burdensome that young people live their post grad lives in demeaning debt. While at the Universities the research funding draws the most knowledgeable teachers out of the class rooms.
And this system also keeps we global warming skeptics unable to gain entrance in the hallowed halls on campus or in the capital.
The greatest generation has been replaced by the powerless generation..
The problem goes much deeper than a stagnant, self-serving academic community. It’s the moral decline of our society.
I’ve been watching for months now as apologists for Ms Clinton come up with euphemisms for holding your nose and voting. Here are the citizens of the most powerful nation in the world deciding which of two moraly repugnant individuals should be at the nation’s helm.
Being born unamerican is an undisputed disqualification for this position, but lying is just fine…What do you expect of a poor academic then, who’s never had the slightest hope of accumulating 126 million dollars, let alone a billion, no matter how many lectures he gives?
Can you blame him or her for lying and cheating to get the tenure and grants needed to stay, even tenuously, in the top ten percent income bracket? And surely you can’t expect such pathetic creatures to produce great scientific discoveries as well?
I remember when youngsters were still taught that “the end doesn’t justify the means”. What happened to that? Nowadays the end justifies just about anything, starting with deceit and not stopping at murder. Many people openly applaud that, and very few protest it. So we have moral obscenities such as Guantanamo, and allies such as the Turks and the Saudis.
For anyone who can rationalize that, faking climate change has to be an ethical walk in the park…
It’s the taxdollars. They corrupt everything they touch.
Some people just do not value a seach for truth, just affirmation of what they already believe. There does seem to be a parallel with government funding of both religion and science, with a strong tendency towards corruption of either.
More than some flatter themselves by thinking they are truth-seekers, when what they really seek (and easily find) is affirmation for their prejudices. Even the smart and educated can indulge in such pseudo-intellectual fantasy. Especially the smart and educated, because they’ll consider themselves above such irrationality, which ironically makes them more vulnerable to it.
Of course, another deflection tactic in academia is to indignantly sputter that it’s not the truth(s) that matter, but the SEARCH for them. Teaching HOW to think, not what, etc. Trying to distract you from the reality that this noble-sounding venture is naught but a snipe hunt.
“Seeking truth, eh? What will you do with it when you find it?”
This is a disturbing report. Our institutions need reform.
In a time when we were less democratic, science was funded by the government. Science was independent and the development of science (and technology) helped nations (and so their governments) to become mighty.
In more democratic times (I mean: right now), government is also funding research. But, the position of the government is changed(!) Voters decide about the continuation of the present administration. And government is taking positions, for example in the long term investment in renewables. Therefore government doesn’t want to be corrected by reality (in this case: no dangerous warming at all, beneficial effects of a moderate warming and CO2) and/or science. In case of the climate, government stopped with learning from science and government is even dictating the results science has to produce.
As the climate controversy shows: a very dangerous road, away from reality, away from science and away from the scientific method. Governments just want one thing: to continue as long as possible on the present road, wrong or not.
Good night, voters, it will take a lot of time before you realize that you are tricked by the system, a system no one dares to criticize, if it was only because we don’t have a better alternative. But, in case of science there is enough reason to make science independent again, independent from the confirmation carousel. An independent science with the scientific method as the leading principle.
Because only that will be beneficial for society. As it was in the past. And sorry government, you have to adapt to reality and to the insights of real science. And not the other way around.
Climate science is only one area; another is the constant flood of junk epidemiology. Every day, thousands of words spewed like keyboard diarrhea about “Eat this, not that!” when in point of fact data proving ANY “diet” is superior over another is totally ungettable–you would have to lock a couple of hundred thousand people up for life like lab rats, and feed them only the experimental substance while controlling behavior 24/7. A true randomized, controlled trial is impossible to accomplish. The laughable alternative, “self-reported” food intake estimates over years and decades, such as the over-trawled Nurses’ Health Study, is the best example I know of “garbage in, garbage out.” And yet the media shovel the same stuff, different day to a gullible public who actually believe each new “breakthrough!”
Probably splitting-hairs a bit, but I think #7 is “true.” I consider the serfs you described to be “young academics.”
When I was a grad student, my advisor was going for tenure. There was a committee that set the requirements she had to achieve for consideration. Nobody on that committee had achieved in their career what she had to.
And it has been true for almost 20 years now that it is very difficult to get a tenure-track faculty position in most science and engineering fields at elite US universities without a post-doc. And until you get tenure, all bets are off.
Some universities don’t have tenure anymore. They have specified number of years contracts.
“Some”?
Evidence?
What percentage?
What percentage of public vs private universities?
What percentage of STEM profs vs. liberal (heh) arts?
Well that’s radical. Unfortunately radical has come to mean conventionally political. For the academics, this means progressive, since any direct mention of Marxist/socialist premises (axiomatic in academe) is now out of fashion.
But wouldn’t it be great if the mind destroying general education practices of today could be wiped away? Anarchy would be a relative improvement. It happened to scholasticism. Why not here and now? The pretentious, phony shell of erudition needs to be punctured.
Self education by following ones current interests and reading widely while writing at length about this work for one’s own benefit needs to be celebrated.
It’s just part of the new progressive science, Dr. B – you get a notion that attracts the “what’s happenin’ now” crowd, and then do lucrative research to prove your fancy is reality. You must also first be appointed “an authority” (which gives you immunity from defending your findings or even making your data and calculations public, so your science is reproducible). The new science is power for those who have the gall to excercise it.
“The corruption of climate science by some misguided individuals in the quest to “save the planet””
Some misguided individuals and also a well guided United Nations which has figured out how to use this device to serve its own bureaucratic agenda.
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2794991
Where is the United Nations when they could be doing their supposed JOB and creating and maintaining neutral-zone repatriation camps for all the refugees that are clawing and drowning their way to an over-burdened Europe? THAT’s what they were formed to do–ostensibly, keep “world peace” or at least blunt the sharper edges of civilian disruption caused by war. NOWHERE is energy and monetary policy or “saving the planet” mentioned in their charter.
Well Tim, you kind of hit the nail on the head when you wrote that there are too many people in universities.
As far as really good science goes, the ones that actually can do the jaw dropping stuff are few and far between and it’s my opinion that you can’t really LEARN to be a gifted scientist. You can develop a preexisting rare talent for it, yes, but although most enrolled in science classes are learning something, abd they may accidentally actually use it in life, it’s not anything they will be very good at.
If you manage to graduate with a science degree and the government gives you :gifts”, I guess that makes you a “gifted scientist”. (Paging Michael Mann.)
every thing the government touches turns to s#*t. Education is a prime example from kindergarten on.
The Midas Touch in reverse?
Good article. Frustrated about the grammar and spelling errors that keep me from passing this along to those who could otherwise benefit from the information presented.
Students getting less than a B average should not even be in university…
..but they, and everyone, are told, without a college degree they can’t get a job
and we have to import illegals to do the jobs we won’t do
or something like that
As W.M. Briggs (Statistician to the Stars) says (quoting the line from “Aliens”), “Nuke them from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.”
Professors stealing student’s work, well it beats doing it yourself !
Dear Mr Ball, Thankyou for your essay. I think what you say can be extended to non-science disciplines at Universities. As far as tenure goes, a retired economics professor friend of mine, asserts that a lack of tenure is leading to a drop in teaching standards because all efforts has to go into publications – basically publish or perish – because that is the overriding measure used to assess performance and hence determine funding. He also acknowledges that tenure has its downside! My conclusion from our regular discussions is that a new set of KPIs is required to assess a University’s performance. The new metrics clearly have to be different from the current ones and must be hard nosed and measurable – not soft or subjectively vague. Things that come to mind to me are employment rates of graduates, time for a graduate to get a job, percentage of initial enrolments that graduate, govt dollars required to achieve an employed graduate (qualified by relevance of degree to the job), plus products and quotients of these simple measures (e.g. there is no point in passing everyone if they never get a job compared with graduates from competing unis getting jobs, etc.), percentage of graduates that reach executive level in private enterprise (moderated to the size of the various institutions), percentage of research papers that are eventually debunked, percentage of graduates that reach board level in relevant professional societies. These metrics would require a period of time to acquire for satisfactory application but doing this might force a university (not just a professor) to take a longer term view about its modus operandi. A lot of university Vice Chancellors (I’m in Australia) may not like tight demanding metrics but, really, if the university does not do well on the above measures why on earth have it and then why fund it with taxpayer dollars. In Oz VCs now receive million $ salaries so they should be subject to serious scrutiny.
Couldn’t agree more Dr Ball. I’ve been arguing many of these points with teachers and university types for years, especially regarding the fact that not going to university equals failure. In fact of all my friends who were extremely successful in life none ever went to university.
There used to be an old saying, “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach”.
There have been many instances where those who can do and have done decide to teach. The problem these days is that when capable teachers are mandated to teach ideology in place of skills, they quit the profession.
And those who can’t teach, teach teachers. Those who can’t even teach teachers become politicians.
“We can solve many of our problems quickly by closing down 75 percent of our universities. ”
This quote will be shocking to many, but….Bravo!!! It had to be said.
We say of certain people (or of ourselves), “He (or I) doesn’t (or don’t) get out enough.”
The simple fact of the matter is that often The School Of Hard Knocks is the best college. It pays to get out into the cruel world.
It is also said, (in the Eagle’s song “Lyin’ Eyes”) that, “every form of refuge has its price.” Although that song is about a trophy wife, it just as well could be about a gigolo, or a frightened youth hiding in his mother’s basement, or many, many people in academia. (Also about people with certain “government jobs.”)
The problem with hiding and paying the price for a “form of refuge” is that you live in a sort of ingrown and virtual reality, that increasingly strays from the cold winds of real reality. The scientists, usually interns, who do the actual field work are the ones who are closest to the Truth. The old, embittered professors who ossify in armchairs and deem themselves smart (and deem interns naive chumps), are the ones who have drifted, seduced by their own fear and laziness, from the Truth.
Why do people settle for such a low existence? Why would anyone become a trophy wife, or a gigolo, or live in their mother’s basement, or in an academia that mocks Truth? Well, as a man who once retreated and hid in my Mom’s basement, I’d say part of the reason is fear, and being gutless. However another part involves not seeing a better way. One has tried to be a Boy Scout, but has run up against the slimebags, the corrupt, the liars, and so on and so forth. One not only loses faith in their fellow man; one also loses faith in oneself. What is there left to have faith in?
Have faith in the Truth. The Truth doesn’t need us, to remain True. A lie may run around the world before Truth has put on it’s shoes. However after a lie has done all that running, what does it find? Truth remains as True as It ever was. Truth stands unscathed even if every man on earth denies it. It is a power worth cozying up to, for if you stand by the Truth, then Truth will stand by you.
Those involved in engineering know Truth is important, because if they allow Murphy’s Law to stray them too far, things can come crashing down. What is less obvious is that the exact same principles apply to pseudoscience as well. That is why scriptures talk about “houses built on sand”, and how they cannot stand.
I would like to congratulate Dr. Tim Ball for taking his stand, for it seems founded on Truth. We are going to need others like him, because some “in power” have built upon sand, and when their engineering comes crashing down, they will be utterly useless, because they have been strangers to Truth and don’t know what to do when Truth happens.
You other climate scientists, and you politicians building on sand, this song’s for you:
““We can solve many of our problems quickly by closing down 75 percent of our universities. ”
Going by the British experience, we don’t need to close them down, we need to turn them back into what they were before the insane policy of dishing out degrees to all and sundry according to the logic that as people with degrees earned more than people without, then if everyone had a degree, then everyone would earn more money (I actually heard a Minister of Education proclaim that). so they turned all the old technical colleges, polytechs and colleges of further education into “universities” teaching all sorts of ersatz subjects such as “ethnic dance with black lesbian dwarf issues” and more ‘ologies’ than you can shake a stick at, thus overnight degrading degrees to effective worthlessness and stopping the training of necessary tradesmen such as plumbers, mechanics, builders and a myriad of other trades far more useful than the vast majority of ivory tower academics will ever be.
So we need to change the percentage of students who go to university back to 5% of the population and resurrect the technical colleges and apprenticeships with night classes and day release to go back to producing useful, employable members of society.
Poor undertanding of research methodology and statistical analysis along with money seeking specific results as well as political agendas are rampant in research, even, or should I say particularly, in the medical field. Excellent article.
It seems there has been a change in the response to climate change scare articles in the MSM. The WaPo article “Two Middle East locations hit 129 degrees, hottest ever in Eastern Hemisphere, maybe the world” drew a lot of critical comments.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2016/07/22/two-middle-east-locations-hit-129-degrees-hottest-ever-in-eastern-hemisphere-maybe-the-world/
Don’t worry. They will simply disable comments, just like BBC.
WaPo usually relies on trolls to bury negative comments. That doesn’t seem to have worked in this case.
So Tim, who made you a scientist? Did they show the relevance of their work, or did they hope that putting the work into making you a scientist would advance knowledge and the human condition?
You really need to watch it with the “relevance” demands. It’s almost impossible to tell winners from losers…. useful understanding from mere data. It’s that way in most areas of human endeavour. Talking like an accountant is a precursor to making unreasonable demands and then shutting down a program. So, who made you the boss that gets to decide what’s relevant?
And just for the sake of clarity, *all* of the science that makes money is performed by business. Did making you a scientist make money for your university? If so, congratulations, you are a commodity, a product of the science business, & you have relevance, income, and your own approval. Don’t you see how justifying science by making money rather than making knowledge leads down a dark path? Fraud makes far more money than knowledge, and it is considered highly relevant at the time. Think about it.