Robert, thanks for the reply. I think Members rely on CRS, but CRS has to play it carefully and doesnt get too far out in front of the consensus. and some of their economic work has been biased by a neoclassical econ focus. Not sure on who a policy maker would be. There certainly are some.
We live in the information age, where the knowledge market is overflowing with low-value information products generated by the academic sector. Economics professors, more than others, are caught up in the growing vortex of producing new concepts and explanatory schemes demanded of them by the public and the media. Useful knowledge is drowning in a sea of pseudo-knowledge, which is growing exponentially due to the growth of the research infrastructure. The latter has received such a powerful ally as artificial intelligence, allowing professors to rapidly compose new research works. It's like the transition from the age of rifles to the age of automatic weapons (the Maxim machine gun) in military science. And scientific objectivity is becoming indistinguishable in the growing flood of pseudo-knowledge. How can we escape this madness? Perhaps life itself will provide the answer.
Once again, Robert, you’ve tackled a complicated problem and distilled it into what is likely the key issue when you write, “As in so many other areas of American life where norms and constraints have broken down, too much of academia is now fame-seeking.”
And, no, you are not delusional. I’m trying to hold the monopoly on that, thank you from here in Taiwan, the ROC.
This is not a criticism of the internet or social media, either, which one could argue feeds those academics’ desire to spend their down time searching for ways to sound like they are an authority on whatever topic they decide to write about when they get up each morning.
And it gives me no pleasure to criticize academics; I got most of my core degrees “back in the day,” and was fortunate to have the same kind of educators you appeared to have, save one or two, including one that swore at a student not more than an hour after he lectured another one to remember they were in an academic setting and to therefore not use profanity during their Q&A.
Apparently, many academics are more insecure now than they were years ago, for many understandable and also unfortunate reasons. Information and the “answers” are now much more readily available to anyone with an internet connection rather than by purchasing a seat in a classroom. One can make a lot of money, as you say, speaking like an authority at some high-paying conferences. Educators fear what AI will do to them so they are getting while the getting’s good. And, of course, they are putting their emotions and biases before their responsibilities as doctoral degree holders.
The concern to me, of course, is problems like these in our academic system and culture have the potential to do long-term, serious damage to many things important to all. We have the potential to build a Lamborghini (no, not a shameless plug as the brand fits well the point I am making) in terms how fast humanity can move into the future. Yet with a problematic academic system, that vehicle will be fitted with four old, nearly bald tires lacking enough air in them to drive properly.
Why do I write this much here? Partly to make a point to those educators: having a keyboard and a connection to the net can indeed bring fame and even fortune. However, it is not making a better world unless they follow a few simple ideals that you have written about here. They are not helping elevate their status as educators by trying to be popular rather than objective - just the opposite. For that reason, I am glad you chose to “go back to university” during your “retirement” at Georgetown. Perhaps you can not just teach the students a thing or two, but your fellow educators as well. Thanks.
Rob, I'm curious to know if you can't point to a modern-day policy maker who is sufficiently and demonstrably attentive and intelligent to challenge prevailing, albeit wobbly, narratives. Also, to what extent do MCs rely on the Congressional Research Service of the LOC? More or less than in earlier times? And is that supposed repository of wisdom as infected with groupthink as academia seems to increasingly be? The world is in sore need of objective prognostications about the fast-approaching impacts of A.I. on employment and other socio-economic fronts. I enjoy your posts.
Robert, thanks for the reply. I think Members rely on CRS, but CRS has to play it carefully and doesnt get too far out in front of the consensus. and some of their economic work has been biased by a neoclassical econ focus. Not sure on who a policy maker would be. There certainly are some.
We live in the information age, where the knowledge market is overflowing with low-value information products generated by the academic sector. Economics professors, more than others, are caught up in the growing vortex of producing new concepts and explanatory schemes demanded of them by the public and the media. Useful knowledge is drowning in a sea of pseudo-knowledge, which is growing exponentially due to the growth of the research infrastructure. The latter has received such a powerful ally as artificial intelligence, allowing professors to rapidly compose new research works. It's like the transition from the age of rifles to the age of automatic weapons (the Maxim machine gun) in military science. And scientific objectivity is becoming indistinguishable in the growing flood of pseudo-knowledge. How can we escape this madness? Perhaps life itself will provide the answer.
Once again, Robert, you’ve tackled a complicated problem and distilled it into what is likely the key issue when you write, “As in so many other areas of American life where norms and constraints have broken down, too much of academia is now fame-seeking.”
And, no, you are not delusional. I’m trying to hold the monopoly on that, thank you from here in Taiwan, the ROC.
This is not a criticism of the internet or social media, either, which one could argue feeds those academics’ desire to spend their down time searching for ways to sound like they are an authority on whatever topic they decide to write about when they get up each morning.
And it gives me no pleasure to criticize academics; I got most of my core degrees “back in the day,” and was fortunate to have the same kind of educators you appeared to have, save one or two, including one that swore at a student not more than an hour after he lectured another one to remember they were in an academic setting and to therefore not use profanity during their Q&A.
Apparently, many academics are more insecure now than they were years ago, for many understandable and also unfortunate reasons. Information and the “answers” are now much more readily available to anyone with an internet connection rather than by purchasing a seat in a classroom. One can make a lot of money, as you say, speaking like an authority at some high-paying conferences. Educators fear what AI will do to them so they are getting while the getting’s good. And, of course, they are putting their emotions and biases before their responsibilities as doctoral degree holders.
The concern to me, of course, is problems like these in our academic system and culture have the potential to do long-term, serious damage to many things important to all. We have the potential to build a Lamborghini (no, not a shameless plug as the brand fits well the point I am making) in terms how fast humanity can move into the future. Yet with a problematic academic system, that vehicle will be fitted with four old, nearly bald tires lacking enough air in them to drive properly.
Why do I write this much here? Partly to make a point to those educators: having a keyboard and a connection to the net can indeed bring fame and even fortune. However, it is not making a better world unless they follow a few simple ideals that you have written about here. They are not helping elevate their status as educators by trying to be popular rather than objective - just the opposite. For that reason, I am glad you chose to “go back to university” during your “retirement” at Georgetown. Perhaps you can not just teach the students a thing or two, but your fellow educators as well. Thanks.
Rob, I'm curious to know if you can't point to a modern-day policy maker who is sufficiently and demonstrably attentive and intelligent to challenge prevailing, albeit wobbly, narratives. Also, to what extent do MCs rely on the Congressional Research Service of the LOC? More or less than in earlier times? And is that supposed repository of wisdom as infected with groupthink as academia seems to increasingly be? The world is in sore need of objective prognostications about the fast-approaching impacts of A.I. on employment and other socio-economic fronts. I enjoy your posts.
In the 70s, my professor got his PhD at UNC too. When I asked him what he thought about academia, he just looks defeated.
Yeah. Sad and really troubling. Academics always had some bias. But now we can no longer rely on them for objectivity