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by kj4211cash
368 days ago
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So much of academic life revolves around bringing in grant money. This is particularly true in STEM fields and at the best research schools. There are ever increasing administrative hoops to jump through to bring in that grant money. And grants nowadays are often given out for research on very specific topics often chosen by bureaucrats. These topics are, almost by definition, not innovative. The NSF is an exception but there are very few NSF grants given out, relative to the number of researchers. My assessment is that the most famous, most published researchers can still afford to explore, if they have the time and inclination, but the rest cannot. |
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But grants have been annoying for long. Even decades ago the common wisdom, in fields like biology, was to write grant applications promising things you've already done recently, then spend the money on doing something new. But this doesn't work in super fast moving fields like AI/ML where a grant length is an eternity relative to change in the field.
Also the bureaucrats want something sexy at the end, so academics overpromise, then there's a bitter taste among the funders that the super fancy thing didn't materialize, high impact factor publications can sweeten this bitterness somewhat, as can awards etc. Also a rising tide lifts all boats so just by keeping up with SOTA, they can woo the bureaucrats.