Sometimes when people hear obvious arguments regarding emotive topics, they just tentatively accept the conclusion instead of defending against it until they find some half satisfactory reason to dismiss it. Eliezer Yudkowsky
I think the Eliezer Yudkowsky is just fine, as komponisto suggested. Though for me it's a lot more benign than suggested. It just seems like standard blogging practice, or at least standard on the ones I read. And I read both LW and OB :)
Googling "scientist salary" yields this as the first result: http://www.indeed.com/salary/S... stating an average American salary of $78,000/year.That's considered upper-middle class by most definitions. The breakdown by specialty is instructive, ranging from $45K for lab scientist to $79K for senior food scientist.
Comparatively, high school teacher:http://www.indeed.com/salar......ranges from $22K for teaching associate to $117K for high school principal, though the fact that said search also yields results such as "video gamer" makes me suspicious of the criteria that site uses for its analyses. It also gives $57K for instrumental music teacher which, unless things have changed dramatically since my mother (a trained concert pianist and music major) taught piano, is rather optimistic. I also wonder how much of their data is pulled from public vs. private sector employment. That said, thank you for bringing hard data to bear.
So, "teacher" covers a wider range bracketing "scientist". My own job as an assistant professor at a major public university places me in the low $40K's, though I can look forward to the low $70K's later in my career judging by my more senior colleagues. I could probably make more in the private sector, but I enjoy teaching.
Googling "scientist salary" yields this as the first result: http://www.indeed.com/salar...stating an average American salary of $78,000/year.That's considered upper-middle class by most definitions.
Do you contend that scientists working for academic institutions or private research enterprises typically earn a upper-middle class or upper class salary? In my experience as an academic, it depends greatly on the institution or private enterprise, publishing record, paid lectures, books deals, and other elements of which no practicing scientist is assured. Clearly there are some upper-class earning scientists, many middle-class, and some that struggle to feed their families (notably those in the earlier stages of their career and some who find employment as underpaid public-sector researchers. NASA and CERN pump most of that substantial fraction of GDP into equipment and overhead, not salaries. If I'd wanted governments to pad my wallet, I'd have become an investment banker, not a physicist.
My point was that, while scientists no doubt fall into both economic brackets cited by Army1987 and yourself, any assertion as to demographics is speculation without hard numbers. If you're going to call Army1987 on it, be prepared to be called on it yourself.
Indeed. I would like references from both you and Army1987to back up your claims.
Do you contend that scientists working for academic institutions or private research enterprises typically earn a upper-middle class or upper class salary?
Sometimes when people hearobvious arguments regarding emotive topics, they just tentatively accept the conclusion instead of defending against it until they find some half satisfactory reason to dismiss it. Eliezer calls this ‘clicking’, and wants to know what causes it: Or they just tentatively dismiss it if their emotive reaction is negative. It works both ways. Rationality requires skepticism about one’s own doubts, not merely the claims of others.
One example is the question as to whether something humanswould recognize as intelligent played any part in the origin of existence or atleast our particular universe. Our limited understanding regarding what for now remains the purview of philosophers renders agnosticism the only logical stancetoward the question. Yet, in no small part because of the baggage associatedwith such a concept due to the historical role of unscientific concepts of “god”,some people find it unacceptable to acknowledge that ignorance, and so jump toa conclusion based on what they wish to be true.
@ Michael Vassar
Scientists are massivelyself deluded about both how high status the public considers them. Presumably, it's lower than a detective's or kid's wouldn't be told 'ascientist is like a detective' as they often are. Also, they are mistakenabout both the typical level of seeking understanding of scientists, as opposedto famous scientists. Finally, the public largely associates them withauthoritative opinions, not with seeking understanding. That’squite a haul of grand generalized statements about sweeping categories of human beings. Without hard data or at least anecdotal evidence, I’m inclined to suspect you may simply be stating your own preconceptions. People, scientistsor otherwise, are rarely so cut and dried. And yes, that is my own experientialbias; others might or might not share it.
@ VV
References?Indeed. I would like references from both you and Army1987to back up your claims.
@ dmytryl
And the reaction to such is,well, someone who expects to understand something very complex with very littleeffort is almost always just a person in need of attitude adjustment. On the contrary. I have no need to expending effort “adjusting” their attitudes. I am quite capable of leaving them to their own choices. Railing against human nature is an inefficient use of energy.
So it is entirely possible that someone'slong and detailed reasoning can be correctly dismissed with little effort. Except, of course, that the validity of a chain of reasoning depends on the accuracyof the premises, which may not always be well-understood by anyone, let alonethe individual doing the dismissing. Logic is only as clear as the data towhich it’s applied.Apologies for the fragmented formatting. My internet is tethered to my phone and likes to drop an inconvenient points while composing messages, leaving me to cut and paste from a non-browser text editor. :-/
I surely do not expect to form an understanding of (for example) cryonics without spending very significant time on relevant research, looking not just into the summaries prepared by cryonics advocated but learning multiple scientific fields as to form an intuition as of whenever to e.g. expect that the cryoprotectant would reach all of the brain and prevent immense shredding and squishing by the growing ice crystals (and to form an understanding as of how much the stuff gets mixed up together in the not-yet-solidified water during freezing; I know that impurities end up pushed into increasingly saline brine that is the last to freeze, squishing up a lot of structures into small space and possibly 'stirring and shaking' it beyond any possibility of data recovery). I know that a lot of effort is required because I often have to form an understanding of a software system or an algorithm or the like, in my line of work.
Do you expect to understand cryonics without expending such effort? If you do, you are either a cryobiology expert, which you are not, an alien superintelligence, which you are not, or simply a person with poor understanding of what it takes to understand, which is actually very common.
And the reaction to such is, well, someone who expects to understand something very complex with very little effort is almost always just a person in need of attitude adjustment. (For select few topics very smart people may be able to form an understanding with comparatively little effort; messy applied physics, chemistry, biology, neurology, futurology, etc. of cryogenic brain preservation is very clearly not such a topic)
edit: also the explanation above is basically what I feel when people just go ahead and expect to understand something with little real effort (and then believe they understood something with little real effort). Note also that there is an important exception to the above: chains of reasoning can be found invalid with much lower effort than it takes to find valid answer (a very dumb proof checker can find a flaw in a theorem). So it is entirely possible that someone's long and detailed reasoning can be correctly dismissed with little effort.
There is no universal rule; the effort depends to situation; dismissal requires to find one flaw, but confirmation requires that all the assumptions and all the logic is verified; subsequently people can very rapidly make valid dismissal of nonsense but to conclude that theory is true would take a lot more work.
Actually, just "Eliezer Yudkowsky" (instead of "Eliezer") would probably quell such complaints. It isn't about accessibility; rather, it's about the implication of familiarity: "I object to the suggestion that I, a reader of Overcoming Bias, am also a member of the Less Wrong tribe!"
You mean like 'Eliezer Yudkowsky at LessWrong calls this...' ? Actually it wasn't that I thought LessWrong was so well read here - I just usually give a minimal citation with a link. Happy to change if it makes for inaccessibility.
Many scientists earn an upper-middle class or high-class salary, often from a public funded institution. In most developed countries, a significant amount of GDP goes into scientific research, even pure research that has no immediately foreseeable technological applications (the LHC, for instance)
Scientists are massively self deluded about both how high status the public considers them. Presumably, it's lower than a detective's or kid's wouldn't be told 'a scientist is like a detective' as they often are. Also, they are mistaken about both the typical level of seeking understanding of scientists, as opposed to famous scientists. Finally, the public largely associates them with authoritative opinions, not with seeking understanding.
Look into internal vs external locus of control. It gives a whole constellation of keywords to drop into google scholar on this subject.
I think the Eliezer Yudkowsky is just fine, as komponisto suggested. Though for me it's a lot more benign than suggested. It just seems like standard blogging practice, or at least standard on the ones I read. And I read both LW and OB :)
@ V V
Have to continue this discussion in a new thread.
Googling "scientist salary" yields this as the first result: http://www.indeed.com/salary/S... stating an average American salary of $78,000/year.That's considered upper-middle class by most definitions. The breakdown by specialty is instructive, ranging from $45K for lab scientist to $79K for senior food scientist.
Comparatively, high school teacher:http://www.indeed.com/salar......ranges from $22K for teaching associate to $117K for high school principal, though the fact that said search also yields results such as "video gamer" makes me suspicious of the criteria that site uses for its analyses. It also gives $57K for instrumental music teacher which, unless things have changed dramatically since my mother (a trained concert pianist and music major) taught piano, is rather optimistic. I also wonder how much of their data is pulled from public vs. private sector employment. That said, thank you for bringing hard data to bear.
So, "teacher" covers a wider range bracketing "scientist". My own job as an assistant professor at a major public university places me in the low $40K's, though I can look forward to the low $70K's later in my career judging by my more senior colleagues. I could probably make more in the private sector, but I enjoy teaching.
Googling "scientist salary" yields this as the first result: http://www.indeed.com/salar...stating an average American salary of $78,000/year.That's considered upper-middle class by most definitions.
Do you contend that scientists working for academic institutions or private research enterprises typically earn a upper-middle class or upper class salary? In my experience as an academic, it depends greatly on the institution or private enterprise, publishing record, paid lectures, books deals, and other elements of which no practicing scientist is assured. Clearly there are some upper-class earning scientists, many middle-class, and some that struggle to feed their families (notably those in the earlier stages of their career and some who find employment as underpaid public-sector researchers. NASA and CERN pump most of that substantial fraction of GDP into equipment and overhead, not salaries. If I'd wanted governments to pad my wallet, I'd have become an investment banker, not a physicist.
My point was that, while scientists no doubt fall into both economic brackets cited by Army1987 and yourself, any assertion as to demographics is speculation without hard numbers. If you're going to call Army1987 on it, be prepared to be called on it yourself.
Indeed. I would like references from both you and Army1987to back up your claims.
Do you contend that scientists working for academic institutions or private research enterprises typically earn a upper-middle class or upper class salary?
@ Katja Grace
Sometimes when people hearobvious arguments regarding emotive topics, they just tentatively accept the conclusion instead of defending against it until they find some half satisfactory reason to dismiss it. Eliezer calls this ‘clicking’, and wants to know what causes it: Or they just tentatively dismiss it if their emotive reaction is negative. It works both ways. Rationality requires skepticism about one’s own doubts, not merely the claims of others.
One example is the question as to whether something humanswould recognize as intelligent played any part in the origin of existence or atleast our particular universe. Our limited understanding regarding what for now remains the purview of philosophers renders agnosticism the only logical stancetoward the question. Yet, in no small part because of the baggage associatedwith such a concept due to the historical role of unscientific concepts of “god”,some people find it unacceptable to acknowledge that ignorance, and so jump toa conclusion based on what they wish to be true.
@ Michael Vassar
Scientists are massivelyself deluded about both how high status the public considers them. Presumably, it's lower than a detective's or kid's wouldn't be told 'ascientist is like a detective' as they often are. Also, they are mistakenabout both the typical level of seeking understanding of scientists, as opposedto famous scientists. Finally, the public largely associates them withauthoritative opinions, not with seeking understanding. That’squite a haul of grand generalized statements about sweeping categories of human beings. Without hard data or at least anecdotal evidence, I’m inclined to suspect you may simply be stating your own preconceptions. People, scientistsor otherwise, are rarely so cut and dried. And yes, that is my own experientialbias; others might or might not share it.
@ VV
References?Indeed. I would like references from both you and Army1987to back up your claims.
@ dmytryl
And the reaction to such is,well, someone who expects to understand something very complex with very littleeffort is almost always just a person in need of attitude adjustment. On the contrary. I have no need to expending effort “adjusting” their attitudes. I am quite capable of leaving them to their own choices. Railing against human nature is an inefficient use of energy.
So it is entirely possible that someone'slong and detailed reasoning can be correctly dismissed with little effort. Except, of course, that the validity of a chain of reasoning depends on the accuracyof the premises, which may not always be well-understood by anyone, let alonethe individual doing the dismissing. Logic is only as clear as the data towhich it’s applied.Apologies for the fragmented formatting. My internet is tethered to my phone and likes to drop an inconvenient points while composing messages, leaving me to cut and paste from a non-browser text editor. :-/
or simply a person with poor understanding of what it takes to understand, which is actually very common.
Indeed: http://en.wikipedia.org/wik...
> people do not expect to understand things.
I surely do not expect to form an understanding of (for example) cryonics without spending very significant time on relevant research, looking not just into the summaries prepared by cryonics advocated but learning multiple scientific fields as to form an intuition as of whenever to e.g. expect that the cryoprotectant would reach all of the brain and prevent immense shredding and squishing by the growing ice crystals (and to form an understanding as of how much the stuff gets mixed up together in the not-yet-solidified water during freezing; I know that impurities end up pushed into increasingly saline brine that is the last to freeze, squishing up a lot of structures into small space and possibly 'stirring and shaking' it beyond any possibility of data recovery). I know that a lot of effort is required because I often have to form an understanding of a software system or an algorithm or the like, in my line of work.
Do you expect to understand cryonics without expending such effort? If you do, you are either a cryobiology expert, which you are not, an alien superintelligence, which you are not, or simply a person with poor understanding of what it takes to understand, which is actually very common.
And the reaction to such is, well, someone who expects to understand something very complex with very little effort is almost always just a person in need of attitude adjustment. (For select few topics very smart people may be able to form an understanding with comparatively little effort; messy applied physics, chemistry, biology, neurology, futurology, etc. of cryogenic brain preservation is very clearly not such a topic)
edit: also the explanation above is basically what I feel when people just go ahead and expect to understand something with little real effort (and then believe they understood something with little real effort). Note also that there is an important exception to the above: chains of reasoning can be found invalid with much lower effort than it takes to find valid answer (a very dumb proof checker can find a flaw in a theorem). So it is entirely possible that someone's long and detailed reasoning can be correctly dismissed with little effort.
There is no universal rule; the effort depends to situation; dismissal requires to find one flaw, but confirmation requires that all the assumptions and all the logic is verified; subsequently people can very rapidly make valid dismissal of nonsense but to conclude that theory is true would take a lot more work.
References?
Eliezer loves you anyway XD
Many scientists earn an upper-middle class or high-class salary, often from a public funded institution.
And many more earn as little as a high-school teacher.
Actually, just "Eliezer Yudkowsky" (instead of "Eliezer") would probably quell such complaints. It isn't about accessibility; rather, it's about the implication of familiarity: "I object to the suggestion that I, a reader of Overcoming Bias, am also a member of the Less Wrong tribe!"
You mean like 'Eliezer Yudkowsky at LessWrong calls this...' ? Actually it wasn't that I thought LessWrong was so well read here - I just usually give a minimal citation with a link. Happy to change if it makes for inaccessibility.
Many scientists earn an upper-middle class or high-class salary, often from a public funded institution. In most developed countries, a significant amount of GDP goes into scientific research, even pure research that has no immediately foreseeable technological applications (the LHC, for instance)
Some scientists effectively become celebrities.
How many famous detectives do you know?
Scientists are massively self deluded about both how high status the public considers them. Presumably, it's lower than a detective's or kid's wouldn't be told 'a scientist is like a detective' as they often are. Also, they are mistaken about both the typical level of seeking understanding of scientists, as opposed to famous scientists. Finally, the public largely associates them with authoritative opinions, not with seeking understanding.