I am an MIT ugrad alum from the 90s. The place was evil then, and many of its administrative actions have been evil before and since.
But at least at the time, it was evil at the admin level, and the evil was directed at the students and researchers because the students and researchers were busy mocking the elite or otherwise declaring the had no clothes.
The evil trickled down to a prof here or there, but mostly it was at the dean and up level.
What's so clear here is it's trickled down now to the entire enterprise.
The whole ethos of MIT (whether myth or reality) was a bunch of nerds who happily showed up the vaunted "elites", whether you the road or just up a floor or two.
That's gone. They used to be the black cats, using data to skewer politics. Now they're just what they used to mock.
I really admire people who are willing to take a stand against group think and thought police. Unfortunately a lot of what presents itself as “science” these days is just an appeal to authority, and the ridiculously exploitative and hierarchical way that academia is set up makes it very difficult to go against the consensus.
The problem is always when science becomes political, which is exactly what happened with COVID and why I think you got banned. There’s just too much at stake for the people in power and they always have that trump card of implying that you’re anti science or anti vaccinations just for thinking critically.
My personal experience with this is from intelligent design, which is obviously extremely political and almost equal to flat-earthism in some circles. But it suffers from the same forces of censorship, misrepresentation, and lack of engagement as these other examples even though the core beliefs are absolutely defensible: that life has too much information content to spontaneously emerge from non life. You should check out the history of the movement, the more you know the more your blood boils. https://evolutionnews.org/category/science/intelligent-design/
Ah well, that didn't take long. I just got suspended by Twitter (took about 2 minutes) for posting about the link between Langer, Moderna, Gates, MIT and the vaccine tattoo tech (with refs to sources in 'Scientific American', 'Business Insider', & Futurism). I'm appealing. Should be entertaining.
I must admit that when I saw the subtitle "It was never a fair fight" I assumed your conclusion was that the 'cathedral' had won -- since it... obviously has.
And yet in the narrowest sense, 'team reality' has won. This is clear to anyone competent and interested enough to perform their own examination, but as (Kaschuta?) put it, it's "a voting bloc the size of a city block."
Is it really winning if there was no agreed upon ruleset and win condition? "But there is a universal ruleset!", you might say. "Truth is universal!" Is it the only universal?
Why didn't the Climategate emails matter? Is it even possible to imagine a "COVIDgate" today? What would the damning leaked emails contain? "We lied on purpose so people would go along." Oh wait Fauci already said that.
Yes. There is another universal. It's the one that can lie and get away with it.
"public health is not where top flight thinkers and analysts wind up. it's the scupper that catches the folks washing out of research and development and sucking them into bureaucracy and politics."
It's so true. Many who wash out of the tenure process from the Ivy League go to the NIH and other outfits. Someone I know who's a National Academy of Science member has gone down to the NIH to help with hiring. They were struck by the emphasis on the candidate supporting diversity vs the merits of the candidate's research. The problem is that these top flight people don't, as a result of their experience, speak out about this and the potential of problems. So you have the losers rating the winners regarding grants. How can they not see this problem?
In the past, many of the best did go into public service but, now, with the emphasis on making money, many have eschewed public service with the result that our infrastructure and social capital is greatly eroding. My theory, as a late Baby Boomer, is that there was less competition for everything in the 1950s/1960s because the population ratio compared to land was favorable for the buyers. Immigrant households could buy land in affluent neighborhoods then because it was still cheap. When population increases, the demand skyrockets and becomes unaffordable. It becomes a story of supply and demand.
"so, of course they will fight to the last bullet, play dirty, and try to keep the game going until they can claim it worked. of course they will disparage and seek to silence those who disagree. what else can they do?"
Here we are almost a year after this was posted...and we have Trudeau. I mean...what are the odds?
I am an MIT ugrad alum from the 90s. The place was evil then, and many of its administrative actions have been evil before and since.
But at least at the time, it was evil at the admin level, and the evil was directed at the students and researchers because the students and researchers were busy mocking the elite or otherwise declaring the had no clothes.
The evil trickled down to a prof here or there, but mostly it was at the dean and up level.
What's so clear here is it's trickled down now to the entire enterprise.
The whole ethos of MIT (whether myth or reality) was a bunch of nerds who happily showed up the vaunted "elites", whether you the road or just up a floor or two.
That's gone. They used to be the black cats, using data to skewer politics. Now they're just what they used to mock.
I LOVE YOU KITTY!!!
Always worth reading your commentaries. Please keep it up. Thanks for what you do.
I really admire people who are willing to take a stand against group think and thought police. Unfortunately a lot of what presents itself as “science” these days is just an appeal to authority, and the ridiculously exploitative and hierarchical way that academia is set up makes it very difficult to go against the consensus.
The problem is always when science becomes political, which is exactly what happened with COVID and why I think you got banned. There’s just too much at stake for the people in power and they always have that trump card of implying that you’re anti science or anti vaccinations just for thinking critically.
My personal experience with this is from intelligent design, which is obviously extremely political and almost equal to flat-earthism in some circles. But it suffers from the same forces of censorship, misrepresentation, and lack of engagement as these other examples even though the core beliefs are absolutely defensible: that life has too much information content to spontaneously emerge from non life. You should check out the history of the movement, the more you know the more your blood boils. https://evolutionnews.org/category/science/intelligent-design/
Ah well, that didn't take long. I just got suspended by Twitter (took about 2 minutes) for posting about the link between Langer, Moderna, Gates, MIT and the vaccine tattoo tech (with refs to sources in 'Scientific American', 'Business Insider', & Futurism). I'm appealing. Should be entertaining.
You stand tall mighty feline, on rational and intemporal ground, so I'll read your last lines in the future tense, built on the past.
I must admit that when I saw the subtitle "It was never a fair fight" I assumed your conclusion was that the 'cathedral' had won -- since it... obviously has.
And yet in the narrowest sense, 'team reality' has won. This is clear to anyone competent and interested enough to perform their own examination, but as (Kaschuta?) put it, it's "a voting bloc the size of a city block."
Is it really winning if there was no agreed upon ruleset and win condition? "But there is a universal ruleset!", you might say. "Truth is universal!" Is it the only universal?
Why didn't the Climategate emails matter? Is it even possible to imagine a "COVIDgate" today? What would the damning leaked emails contain? "We lied on purpose so people would go along." Oh wait Fauci already said that.
Yes. There is another universal. It's the one that can lie and get away with it.
I can’t tell you how much I appreciate you and ‘team reality’. I’m delighted you’re on Substack. Keep up the good work, and thank you.
"public health is not where top flight thinkers and analysts wind up. it's the scupper that catches the folks washing out of research and development and sucking them into bureaucracy and politics."
It's so true. Many who wash out of the tenure process from the Ivy League go to the NIH and other outfits. Someone I know who's a National Academy of Science member has gone down to the NIH to help with hiring. They were struck by the emphasis on the candidate supporting diversity vs the merits of the candidate's research. The problem is that these top flight people don't, as a result of their experience, speak out about this and the potential of problems. So you have the losers rating the winners regarding grants. How can they not see this problem?
In the past, many of the best did go into public service but, now, with the emphasis on making money, many have eschewed public service with the result that our infrastructure and social capital is greatly eroding. My theory, as a late Baby Boomer, is that there was less competition for everything in the 1950s/1960s because the population ratio compared to land was favorable for the buyers. Immigrant households could buy land in affluent neighborhoods then because it was still cheap. When population increases, the demand skyrockets and becomes unaffordable. It becomes a story of supply and demand.
Bien dicho
may be that some of my friends will find the link to this page here, in my whatsapp status or on my still active twitter account ;)
Glad you're back!
Gato, do you have a link to your very post twitter deplatform substack? Im trying to find! Thank you.
"so, of course they will fight to the last bullet, play dirty, and try to keep the game going until they can claim it worked. of course they will disparage and seek to silence those who disagree. what else can they do?"
Here we are almost a year after this was posted...and we have Trudeau. I mean...what are the odds?
I so hope you're right about logic winning out.
I was going to quote back to you all the examples of ad hominem you yourself used - but I ended up quoting the whole article.