[DrScientist]

> For most people, pro players are replaceable.

I'd argue that professional sport is the closest thing to a true meritocracy - doesn't matter who your Dad knows - you ability is there for all to see on the pitch.

And at the team level - if cosy cliques form, again - team performance doesn't lie - hard work, team work and talent is ultimately what delivers results on the pitch.

The other interesting part of professional sport is that the 'workers' have managed to capture more of the value than is traditionally the case - this is precisely because they are so hard to replace.

If you think professional footballers earn too much and are interchangable - feel free to try and get in the team.

[ttoinou]

I only said top scientists and top engineers deserve as much fame / respect / gossip as top football players yeah

[DrScientist]

Sadly most science and engineering is very capital intensive.

So take this scenario - I'd argue that if you want to make progress in the field of these particular ML models, then you are going to need resources ( compute/data etc ) that is beyond most individuals capability to muster. ie you have to join a company with resources ( or persuade somebody to give you them ).

Right now there is one of those scenarios where capital is chasing talent - and so talent, if they are so inclined, is able to make the most of that.

But in normal times that's typically not the case - most of the time scientists are chasing the capital ( directly or indirectly in the form of a job in a well resourced company ) in order to be able to science, rather than the other way around.

[ttoinou]

Having the whole world connected to top sports players also costs a lot of money, it doesn’t happen naturally

To become a good scientist you don’t need much classic capital, you need a good environment. And for ML you only need one computer for yourself or you can rent online

There are still big inefficiencies for those who have capital to discover good scientists / engineers. Lots of them are unknown.

But if there are top ones famous it will bring more people to study those fields