The unimportant news thread

[Iota]

Scientists in a race to discover why the Universe exists

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjwvgevjjl6o



Neutrino experiments looking at why matter and antimatter created at the beginning of the Universe didn't cancel each other out leaving nothing but energy. So unimportant to most people .

Extraordinary stuff!  The experiments are almost as mind-boggling as the science of neutrinos and matter/antimatter itself. Thanks for posting.

[Florestan]

The centrist liberal mayor of Bucharest, staunchly pro-EU and pro-NATO, wins Romanian presidential elections with 54% of the votes, a spectacular come back from 21% in the first leg. Eventually reason, common-sense and decency prevailed. The Russian assault on our democracy has been repelled. I am greatly relieved.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Denmark to raise retirement age to highest in Europe.


https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvg71v533q6o

[Kalevala]

Denmark to raise retirement age to highest in Europe.


https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvg71v533q6o

Kermit the Frog gives commencement address; "Leap together". 

https://www.bbc.com/news/videos/c14ke5gg3v6o

K

[Florestan]

How legal is it for the US government to interfere with the academic policies of a private university?

[JBS]

How legal is it for the US government to interfere with the academic policies of a private university?

It's both highly unconstitutional and thoroughly legal, depending on the mechanusm.

Government can not tell schools "do not teach about widgets" or "do not punish people advocating the abolition of widgets". But it can say "we are no longer going to give you the government funding you use to teach about widgets" or "your treatment of widget abolitionists violates the rules connected to the government funding you receive, so no funding until you fix that problem."

The Trump administration is trying to use both approaches at the same time.

[Florestan]

It's both highly unconstitutional and thoroughly legal, depending on the mechanusm.

Government can not tell schools "do not teach about widgets" or "do not punish people advocating the abolition of widgets". But it can say "we are no longer going to give you the government funding you use to teach about widgets" or "your treatment of widget abolitionists violates the rules connected to the government funding you receive, so no funding until you fix that problem."

The Trump administration is trying to use both approaches at the same time.

Thanks. Still, defunding is one thing, and prohibiting the enrolment of foreign students is quite another. "We will not pay for your foreign students" is very different from "we forbid you to have any foreign students". To me the latter is simply mindboggling.

[JBS]

Thanks. Still, defunding is one thing, and prohibiting the enrolment of foreign students is quite another. "We will not pay for your foreign students" is very different from "we forbid you to have any foreign students". To me the latter is simply mindboggling.

That bit is more clearcut. Government can not directly tell Harvard to not enroll foreign students, but it is under no obligation to grant students visa just because Harvard chooses to enroll them.

[Florestan]

That bit is more clearcut. Government can not directly tell Harvard to not enroll foreign students, but it is under no obligation to grant students visa just because Harvard chooses to enroll them.

The latter part I have no objection to.

[ritter]

Then again, not granting visas to students just because Harvard chooses to enroll them, looks like a classic act of prevarication...

[DavidW]

I always have problems with authoritarianism, no matter the political party, especially in the case of Big Brother trying to influence political discourse directly. What I see here is a way to violate the spirit of the First Amendment.

[Florestan]

I always have problems with authoritarianism, no matter the political party, especially in the case of Big Brother trying to influence political discourse directly. What I see here is a way to violate the spirit of the First Amendment.

What I see here is totalitarianism plain and simple: "whoever is not with us is against us".

[Spotted Horses]

The funding cut to Harvard is shocking. Of course the government can decline to fund activities at Harvard, or any other University at any time. At least 90% of funding requests are declined, because the granting of scientific funding is highly competitive. But the bulk of finding at Harvard is not sought by Harvard itself. It is sought by individual researchers who propose specific lines of research. It is granted to those individuals who are at Harvard. Being at Harvard is a big help because somewhere in the request they can mention that they have access to the best research facilities in the world and a body of the best students from every corner of the globe.

What they have done is cut off funding to the greatest cohort of research faculty in the world because they don't like Harvard's political leaning, halting essentially all research at Harvard and disrupting the education of the best students and early career researchers. The people who applied for and received that funding have no connection to the pro-Palestinian demonstrations or "woke" policy at Harvard. In demonstrates how ruthless the administration is, and how much damage it is willing to do the United States to spite their perceived enemies. Harvard and similar institutions are of enormous value to the United States. To give just one example, Moderna, which produced the mRNA Covid-19 vaccine, is a company started by a group of mostly Harvard professors to commercialize their NIH supported research discoveries. Research Universities and scientific research institutions are a major source of the wealth of the United States and they are bring destroyed. And destroying something is much easier and faster than building or rebuilding.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

What I see here is totalitarianism plain and simple: "whoever is not with us is against us".

That's authoritarianism.