[asats]

Well, that's what I mean, a million of the 20-40 age group of a certain socioeconomic class, with relevant skills, a lot of ambition and not many dependents. Those are the exact group to start new things and do a lot of good, and my point was that maybe the world is better off with them in the more productive countries vs even the pre-war Russia.

[ghostwriter]

You’re conflating a group of pro-western enterprise software developers - with little to no adulthood responsibilities aside their work, due to their age - with a group of the brightest folks.

[asats]

Software developers make up maybe a third of that wave, if that. There's also artists, scientists, teachers, journalists, political activists and all kinds of other folks that simply don't see the future in the country. A lot of them are families with kids, so it's often not the lack of responsibilities but a higher willingness to take the risk.

[ghostwriter]

Political activists and journalists are hardly the brightest group of people either, so you’re just assigning the opposition group that you prefer to align with, with a token of “the brightest” because it makes you feel good about it. How about you look at the rest of the society who couldn’t or weren’t willing to leave the country and who still run projects in Russia despite the sanctions. Are they not the brightest because they work and associate their career within - let’s say for the sake of the argument - Rosatom? That’s just one hard science sector of the vast energy industry of the country, for starters.

[asats]

There's lot of smart people left, that's no doubt, but there is an obvious filter that the ones left behind are on average less risk taking, more conservative, often older, often the ones with the national motto of "от нас ничего не зависит/there's nothing I can do", and the next google or the next scientific breakthrough is much more likely to come out of the young risk taking ones now living in a functional country and not from the aging engineers living in a dictatorship and working at a bureaucratic rosatom making "up to $720 a month" (actual number, I looked up their open engineering vacancies).

[ghostwriter]

> but there is an obvious filter that the ones left behind are on average less risk taking

Where’s that clarity come from? The opposite could be argued as well: those who’ve left are seeking safety and safety isn’t associated with risk taking. There are fewer risks in leaving Russia than in staying in.

> breakthrough is much more likely to come out of the young risk taking ones now living in a functional country and not from the aging engineers living in a dictatorship and working at a bureaucratic rosatom making "up to $720 a month" (actual number, I looked up their open engineering vacancies).

Here, you did it again: “those who work at <this company> are less likely to make a breakthrough, because I don’t align with them, and therefore I assume that only aging engineers uncapable of breakthroughs would consider staying and working there. Look, even salaries prove that they are less likely to have it.”

[asats]

>Where’s that clarity come from? The opposite could be argued as well: those who’ve left are seeking safety and safety isn’t associated with risk taking. There are fewer risks in leaving Russia than in stayin in.

It's not about safety, it's about agency. Because action > inaction. Staying put does not require anything, just making excuses why nothing can be done to either change things or move.

The ones that stayed and are trying to change things might be the brightest and bravest of all, but they are few and might not even survive that decision. Most other ones simply lack any agency and float down towards some not very bright future they have no control over, making excuses why nothing can be done and hoping to lay low and "авось пронесет". Those are less likely to accomplish much.

[ymolodtsov]

How many emigrations have you done? Because if the answer is "zero" I'm not sure your opinion counts. Taking your entire life, your family, kids, urgently moving to another country at a time when your bank card don't work internationally, you can't reliably wire money out, and there are visa restriction placed on you even when you have a visa. Then learning how to live in a different country, where you understand nothing: from how to pay taxes to using their version of self-checkout kiosks.

Emigration is the ultimate risk-taking.

I now have friends who have a position ready for them in the US, in business and academia, yet they were put on administrative check and have spent almost a year just waiting for their visa. They put most people with technical education on this check.

[ivan_gammel]

People who left the country are not just software developers. We have seen the exodus of musicians, scientists etc, which after some very painful decision process just packed their things and took next flight anywhere. Many took their families.

[ghostwriter]

Software engineers were a simple example of the conflation point. Those who left and those who’re the brightest aren’t the same group.

[lostmsu]

As a MSU CS alumni I can tell you, it is pretty clear the brighter, the more likely to leave.

Among my peers most left, even the ones that used to be relatively pro Puilo for whatever reasons.

[ghostwriter]

> As a MSU CS alumni I can tell you, it is pretty clear the brighter, the more likely to leave.

How does your alumni status’ anecdotal evidence bring clarity on the matter of the predominant intellectual capacity of those who’re leaving Russia? Aren’t there any other MSU graduates who consider themselves as bright as your CS peers and yourself, and who are staying in? What’s the respective left/stayed ratio among them?

[ivan_gammel]

I can add one more data point to it as MIPT graduate. Number of people among MIPT, MSU and HSE graduates I know personally who emigrated in the past 12 months is remarkable. It’s somewhat similar to early 1990s when whole labs were relocating to the West.

[lostmsu]

Basically everyone (that would be 10+ people) I know who was still staying back left after Russia unleashed full scale war with the exception of the ones that have to care for very old relatives. There are two people who stayed for other reasons, and they aren't brighter than average peers.

Prior to the war maybe slightly under 50% stayed. Now it is under 10%.

[ivan_gammel]

The groups are indeed not identical but what matters is that their intersection is big.

[hdjjhhvvhga]

> pro-western

What does being pro- or anti-West has to do with the topic? There are many Russian expats in Germany who openly manifest their support for Putin's war on the streets of Berlin. You can be anti-Western and at the same time pragmatically leave Russia to avoid draft and being killed for basically no reason.

[ghostwriter]

That’s a fair point. I was trying to exemplify the conflation point between two groups with the assigned traits (“the brightest” vs “rest of them”) with bringing my own selection of people everyone would clearly disagree with to be a valid representation.