Also some discussion about this on r/labrats if anyone wants to go over to the forbidden site:

I went. It was a mistake. Most comments were about how this post was written by ChatGPT followby how they'd love to have 34 publications. There were a couple taking about what you wrote, but I think your comment captures the best of it.

Hah wow. Thanks for putting that into context.

Thanks for posting the comment I was looking for

I think we also need to be careful about what we consider low-quality clones of other work.

Reproduction of research is extremely important. It isn't glamorous, but it's how we verify shit.

Yes—academic publishing has become a quantity engine—endlessly churning out papers that echo one another—more about survival than discovery. Many PhDs write for the CV, not the cosmos—speculating, recycling, or rephrasing ideas to stay afloat in the “publish or perish” tide—where innovation drowns quietly beneath the noise. /gpt

Imagine how much worse it’s going to get as more and more is ai slop like the above.

Honestly if I see someone who publishes like 200+ papers I would just be wondering.... What the hell did they contribute? They're churning shit out the door so either they weren't involved much and did the bare minimum to put their name on the paper or it was mostly inconsequential and non-impressive shit that you could churn out in a few weeks.

I sometimes see videos of Hossenfelder on my feed and have watched a couple. Would you mind adding some context? What are "anti-science grifters"? Sry if i'm a bit out of the loop here.

I find that people high up in academics tend to lose touch with reality.

I remember in college one professor ranting and raving about how students worry about grades too much and that we should all focus on actually retaining the material.

It's like yeah that's a pretty thought but 70% of the class was there on scholarship so if we don't make the grade we don't finish and have a mountain of debt.

On a separate occasion the dean of engineering wasted 2 full lectures of ethics class ranting about how we should give to the alumni association and how "it's a privilege to be here so we need to pay it back."

There were over 100 people in that room who were in at least $60k of debt to the school and we still had another semester left before graduation.

These people have brains the size of planets but couldn't comprehend in the slightest how reality gets in the way of their pretty little egalitarian ideals.

Don't worry, that system is currently being completely fucked by AI as well.

The idea is that if you focus on the work, all of that would/should follow...

I have read a few anecdotes from scholars basically confirming this: they were doing "everything right" and getting nowhere but the moment they decided to just do the work that makes them happy, all the titles and positions followed.

I believe Patricia Ryan Madson is one such story although not in a scientific branch. IIRC, she could not get permanent positions in any university even though she had a "perfect resume" but then decided to follow her passion and her career just took off.

I know this is idealistic, but I still wish this were how the world works

yea, if you see how hard is it to get a faculty position you will see. while i was in college, i was in a TALK where the presentor said the phd that was coming to present his research was writing DOZENS of papers just to get noticed by a university for hiring. and people have been complaining how some of these papers are often low quality. its quantity of quality.

There absolutely is. Academia is completely fucked.

The analytics are overblown, and coaches need to get back to the big picture. Stanford traded Hollins at the deadline for Wu, but picked up the player option on Candell for the 4th year. The performance bonus if they make the all-star team should provide enough motivation to ensure they don't get saddled with a mid-career ball hog. Team chemistry will be key, hopefully during the preseason they can get it together and not have any niggling injuries interrupt. There is concern about the defensive strategy on set plays, their specialist Franco just had their contract waived and stretched under the current contract, so the team may look to the transfer market mid season when it opens, or potentially to move up in the spring draft to fill needs. Still can't believe they traded Simpson and pay 2.7 per year for Johnson.

Universities run by MBAs and academics operating like sports franchises.Meanwhile, they're arresting students in campus for protesting genocide and fascism.

Seems legit.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H-index