"I want to make the world a better place at no real benefit to myself"
"Ok, but only if you beg us for the money"
Modern academia in a nutshell
this post was submitted on 25 Jan 2026
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Yeah, in a lot of fields it simply would pay more to go private lmao
Still, it feels more rewarding to contribute to the scientific body than to just make someone else rich
So, if your field appears instantly/imminently monetisable, then the private sector is an option. However, the wider benefits of your research are VERY unlikely to reach the wider public in your lifetime. Yes, you will basically be working to make someone else rich. However, this kind of grant is very likely to succeed in academic settings as universities love patents.
If you're doing abstract or fundamental research, you're pretty much out of luck - the private sector does not want anything to do with this. However, it's little better in the academic sector because you have to spend almost all your time chasing grants, or teaching topics outside your expertise (i.e. the ones industry sees immediate value in) to survive.
In short, there is a lot of options to finish things (because everyone loves intellectual property as an asset), but very few to develop them (no-one likes to pay for the groundwork).
"Capitalism breeds innovation"
Sir, this is fascism
There has to be a better way.
Medicine is already this better way (in countries with social healthcare systems). A body of highly trained specialists who constantly update their knowledge through research, conferences and reading the last scientific advancements, and don't necessarily earn extremely high salaries but have a comfortable life and a stable employment. We could expand this model to all sciences.
What country would that be in? Because where I live (Germany), medical researchers face pretty much the same challenges as researchers in other fields.
I meant medical physicians, not particularly researchers. My point is we could apply the healthcare model, i.e. a body of highly trained professionals working on exchange for a wage without the need for constant evaluation of metrics, relying on social value of medicine instead of grants as motivation.
I know, but there isn’t. Capitalism is the only best thing we’ve tried, certainly the best no other way to do it, please don’t try the socialism thing. 😔
UBI is the least we can do, but more is necessary. It makes job searching way less painful
Ooh, just wait til it becomes ‘not publishing or speaking about something that will get you labelled a communist and publicly shot’.
That one is coming soon.
Honestly, to this guy, why bother staying in the States?
As much as I absolutely hate China, at least there they respect science and research and are actually and actively recruiting foreigners and poaching immigrant Americans. Also European countries are recruiting too.
As an American, escape while you can.
This makes two of us. I'm unlikely to be deported, still...
This is from before the election. They're probably LONG gone by now.
This is why I work for the army (not the US!). They offered me a permanent contract. I've been fighting for funding for the past 30 years and it's become pretty much impossible. My last job was supposed to become permanent and the government cut funding after 2 years instead.
Not doing anything explodey, by the way, just researching how to deal with mass emergency events.
Something something disaster capitalism. You have my sympathy, I sometimes fill on Natural Disaster classes.
artists making commercial stuff just to survive be like: first time?
Why didn't we just have people that apply for grants, then people who work on research. Of course the person that applies for the grant should be familiar with the capabilities, and verify the proposal is sound before applying.
This is also how county government works, and part of why the US road system is a mess.