jcschultz.bsky.social
Plant biologist, entomologist, chemical/molecular ecologist, current interest focused on plant galls. Mostly-retired guitarist
183 posts
206 followers
120 following
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Exactly. This picture says a lot. He’d rather get back to golfing at the McPalace.
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Got a useful alternative to "we're all just 🤷♂️"?
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This is not a "study". It is a review and opinion piece. Many of the studies cited were done in vitro and are unlikely to relate to functions in vivo.
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Over a 40 year career (in science) my students and I, after evaluating new publications in a lab meeting, found many that shouldn't have been published, and it's worse now. Weak editing and reviewing are partly to blame.
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Will TA lines be an adequate safety net? Not true in many departments and institutions. Not to mention if fellowships and training grants get cut, rolled back, or reduced.
It's one thing to not let new people in a pipeline, but another to wonder how many will be spit out. #AcademicSky 🧪
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I have no skin in this game. I'm retired. But after 40 years advising and leading, I also don't want to see grad students ripped off.
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That's fine, as long as you can support every student for the full 5 or 6 years is takes to get a PhD. Many schools can't.
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Plus, in some fields graduate student birth control is long overdue. Universities keep promoting production of more, who wind up circling, looking for real jobs, for decades.
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Having gone into administration after 30 years as faculty, I am familiar with both sides of this guesswork. And that's exactly what it is.
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Not necessarily. It's speculation by faculty who have no knowledge of the university's budgeting.
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It's because all or part of graduate student support comes from grants. Taking on new students when there may be no support would be irresponsible. It's not saving $$, it's dealing with realities.
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Having researched and taught scientists how to communicate with the public, I can say that younger researchers get this, but many older ones don't. It'll take generational turnover to make this work. And avenues are limited. In the meantime, visit the Science Communication Bluesky feed.
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The author seems surprisingly ill-informed about academic life. I won't defend this, but the reason citations have become so important in academia is that hiring committees and administrators - who can't evaluate 'quality' - need a metric, and use that. This produces abuse, of course.
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Another: "The role of academic publishing was once to distribute knowledge from research to the public at large." To the best of my knowledge, this has never been true.
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One example: "What do all these authors do? Not a lot." The author can't possibly support this assertion, which is - in my 40-yr experience - false. Science is a team sport and sometimes requires big teams.
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Not if the aphid transmits disease.
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Many aphids transmit plant diseases.
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If the grant is in hand, and summer salary was in the budget, then the institution signed a legal document specifying that use of the money and by law can't change that.
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This is an invitation, not an assignment. And do you really think the university profits from these?
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There's a lot wrong with this analysis. It appears to be ill-informed.
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Like us, the tree is made up of billions of cells.
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Unsurprisingly, it depends. The vine isn't a parasite. It simply needs something to climb. The tree's cells are programmed to respond to pressure, and in so doing engulf the vine. As long as water and food transport up and down in the trunk is intact, the tree will be okay.
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Indeed albeit very very slow
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While I agree in principle, in reality he represents so-called ‘wokeness’ more than most, and may be seen as less trustworthy than some.