The unimportant news thread

[AnotherSpin]

https://www.facebook.com/reel/1438656576782559

[Todd]

From NBC News: Surgeon general wants tobacco-style warning applied to social media platforms

[ritter]

From NBC News: Surgeon general wants tobacco-style warning applied to social media platforms

Would that also apply to classical music forums?

[steve ridgway]

Would that also apply to classical music forums?

No, classical music strengthens the mind .

[Todd]

Would that also apply to classical music forums?

That depends on the zealousness of the people compiling any list or lists of "platforms" subject to such warnings.  Arbitrary and capricious rules are the best.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Pope Francis is the first pope to attend a G7 summit.


https://www.cbsnews.com/news/pope-francis-g7-biden-nato-leaders-ai/

[Todd]

From CNBC: Nvidia passes Microsoft in market cap to become most valuable public company

From Fortune: Nvidia rally continues as analyst projects chipmaker to reach $5 trillion valuation

Not a bubble.

[Karl Henning]

"Sean Foley, curator of herpetology at the Riverbanks Zoo & Garden in Columbia, said the reptile is a harmless watersnake, "most likely" a brown watersnake, The State reported."

Well, who knew water snakes grew that big?

https://www.wftv.com/news/trending/what-beast-huge-snake-found-by-hiker-near-south-carolina-creek/MHQLESN6VJFRFJVHYSJ7SD2FLA/

[DavidW]

From CNBC: Nvidia passes Microsoft in market cap to become most valuable public company

From Fortune: Nvidia rally continues as analyst projects chipmaker to reach $5 trillion valuation

Not a bubble.

Nvidia planned well when they jumped into machine learning and hardware AI before it exploded. They've positioned themselves very well.

[Karl Henning]

"Sean Foley, curator of herpetology at the Riverbanks Zoo & Garden in Columbia, said the reptile is a harmless watersnake, "most likely" a brown watersnake, The State reported."

Well, who knew water snakes grew that big?

https://www.wftv.com/news/trending/what-beast-huge-snake-found-by-hiker-near-south-carolina-creek/MHQLESN6VJFRFJVHYSJ7SD2FLA/

Sean Foley says it's harmless, but what's a water snake that large feeding on? The water snakes I've seen eat crickets and guppies. I don't see this feller settling for such a diet.

[Todd]

Nvidia planned well when they jumped into machine learning and hardware AI before it exploded. They've positioned themselves very well.

Being positioned well is one thing; having a market cap over fifty times gross revenue with a PE ratio of eighty is another.  These types of stock runs have occurred before.  They all end the same way.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Considering it. CNN: This $50 shiatsu massager is like a massage therapist for my neck and shoulders.


https://www.cnn.com/cnn-underscored/reviews/mo-cuishle-shiatsu-massager

[Todd]

From The Economist: China has become a scientific superpower

[DavidW]

I'm tempted to put it down to a culture of out of control publish or perish mentality in US higher ed. It has gotten to the point where profs are churning out several papers a year working on trivial problems without much time to be thoughtful nor groundbreaking.

But it could just be a larger quantity and better financial support in China. More papers mean more important papers as well.

[Todd]

But it could just be a larger quantity and better financial support in China. More papers mean more important papers as well.

Evidently, China cranks out a lot of lower quality papers as well, but the important story is that it has basically reached parity with the west qualitatively.  Some people will be uncomfortable with that for various reasons.

One of the more interesting tidbits to me was the relative emphasis that China places on agricultural science.  It makes sense from not only a strategic standpoint, but also an ecological adaptation standpoint.  Greenhouse gas emissions ain't goin' nowhere soon, and climatic changes and resulting shifts in land productivity along with factors such as crop disease virulence necessitate more comprehensive food production strategies. My cheeseburgers gotta come from somewhere, so researchers gotta solve that problem.  I don't care if the solutions come from Haidian or Ithaca.

[Spotted Horses]

I'm tempted to put it down to a culture of out of control publish or perish mentality in US higher ed. It has gotten to the point where profs are churning out several papers a year working on trivial problems without much time to be thoughtful nor groundbreaking.

But it could just be a larger quantity and better financial support in China. More papers mean more important papers as well.

It is about funding, not just the level of funding, but the requirements and hoops that must be jumped through. Historically U.S. funding for science and technology research grew faster than the economy, then it grew but not as fast as the economy, then it grew, but not faster than inflation, then it actually shrunk when the Great Recession hit. I'm not sure where it is now.

Then the funding mechanisms changed. A university based researcher will typically have to spend 100% of his or her time applying or supporting grant proposals. The proposals are required to specify in detail what will be discovered and how it will be economically beneficial. It makes it extremely difficult to fund anything that deviates from scientific consensus. Only a small group of superstar researcher get big foundation grants (Howard Hughes Institute, etc) which allow them to bypass this. This has eviscerated scientific research efforts in the U.S.

[Florestan]

The proposals are required to specify in detail what will be discovered and how it will be economically beneficial.

IOW, Kepler, Galilei and Newton would have been denied any grant whatsoever. 

[Todd]

This has eviscerated scientific research efforts in the U.S.

From the NCSES: U.S. R&D Increased by $72 Billion in 2021 to $789 Billion; Estimate for 2022 Indicates Further Increase to $886 Billion

From The White House: The 2024 Budget provides $101.2 billion for basic and applied research, an increase of $3.5  billion above the 2023 enacted level

[Spotted Horses]

From the NCSES: U.S. R&D Increased by $72 Billion in 2021 to $789 Billion; Estimate for 2022 Indicates Further Increase to $886 Billion

From The White House: The 2024 Budget provides $101.2 billion for basic and applied research, an increase of $3.5  billion above the 2023 enacted level

The second, basic research funding, seems to reflect an increase not keeping pace with inflation. Healthy funding growth would keep pace with gdp growth.

[Todd]

The second, basic research funding, seems to reflect an increase not keeping pace with inflation. Healthy funding growth would keep pace with gdp growth.

Not really.  A portion of basic research is funded by the private sector as well, and always has been.

Also, "keeping pace with inflation" is not the same as "eviscerated".

As with everything else, more money is always needed