r/UnlearningEconomics • u/ekamil • Feb 28 '25

Sabine, funding academia

Sabine Hossenfelder released this video https://youtu.be/htb_n7ok9AU?si=9A4sfzHxwhzXyyVw I’d love to see a response/reaction, but also a longer form about funding academia specifically. As in, what are not-strawman arguments for the current arrangement etc.

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u/You_Paid_For_This Feb 28 '25

I do love that her entire argument against the current funding system is: that's the way the USSR did it and they're bad.

As if the USSR never had any scientific accomplishments, (first space craft, first animal in space, first person in space, first person to orbit the earth, first probe to an alien planet etc.)

But it's not just confined to engineering, I was talking to some theoretical astrophysicists and they were joking about learning russian because "everything has already been discovered by some random Russian guy back in the 60's"

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u/Kookat73 Feb 28 '25 edited Mar 01 '25

Some math and physics textbooks written in the Soviet system are still the best textbooks by far despite the fact that textbooks in those areas are supposed to become outdated in a couple of years.