Astral Codex Ten

NSF

5 min read

NSF

Article

NSF is a recurring organization in the Astral Codex Ten archive, appearing 4 times across 4 issues between February 09, 2022 and February 16, 2025. The archive places it in contexts such as “when she’s head of the NSF one day you can ask a favor of her”; “When the NSF started pouring money into universities”; “The NSF was founded c. 1952”. It most often appears alongside ACX, Harvard, Harvard.

Metadata

  • Category: Organizations
  • Mention count: 4
  • Issue count: 4
  • First seen: February 09, 2022
  • Last seen: February 16, 2025

Appears In

Source Context

Recovered passages from the original issue text. When the raw archive preserved outbound links inside the source passage, they are listed directly under the quote.

So You Want To Run A Microgrants Program
February 09, 2022 · Original source
Or suppose some promising young college kid asks you for a grant to pursue their cool project. Realistically the project won’t accomplish much, but she’ll learn a lot from it. And she seems like the sort of person who could be really impressive when she gets older. Is it worth giving her a token amount to “encourage her”? (my impression is that Tyler Cowen would say “Hell yes!” and that this is central to his philosophy of grantmaking). What about buying the right to boast “I was the first person to spot this young talent!” thirty years later when she wins her Nobel, which brings glory to your grants program down the line? What about buying her goodwill, so that when she’s head of the NSF one day you can ask a favor of her? Doesn’t that promote your values better than just giving money to some cool project?
Highlights From The Comments On Bobos In Paradise
December 09, 2022 · Original source
The other factor in terms of the changing of the elite guard was the space race. When the NSF started pouring money into universities in order to land a man on the moon before the Soviets, academia became a viable career for ambitious smart people rather than a calling for well-heeled boffins; the old dollar-a-year men started getting outcompeted for tenure track jobs by people who saw an academic position as both a cozy sinecure and an activist bully pulpit (and, crucially, needed the money, not being old money themselves). This changed the character of academia entirely, led to the full democratization of education, caused credential escalation across the board (the reason you need a degree for an entry level job), and created both the activist class, and I'd argue, the PMC.
Highlights From The Comments On The Academic Job Market
June 06, 2023 · Original source
Some of what's going on is historical, going back to about 1950, when the Feds started throwing money at universities to do research. The NSF was founded c. 1952 b/c everyone realized that science had won WW II thus needed serious funding. The question was HOW, and we got a bastard version of the German system and our old tradition of colleges being for educating elite youth. Remember that many of the important scientists of WW II were German. There, all universities were research universities--there was no UG education as such--and their goal was to produce research and prepare scholars/scientists. They were supported by the German state, and departments were given budgets they could spend as they chose (and there was, basically, just 1 fully tenured "Ordinary Professor" per department, and he ran it, often like a fief. That was what US scientists envisioned after the war--fund the best scientists directly to produce the best science. But this met howls of protest from most US colleges & universities who feared all the money would go to the usual suspects, Harvard, Yale, Illinois (go Illini!), etc. And it was unAmerican. States urged the money go to states for allocation to their schools. The scientists howled -- nobodies at places like the Southern University of North Dakota at Hoople would get, and waste, scientific research dollars. Bad Science would be done!! The compromise is what we have today is the result, anyone, even a nobody at SND@H, could submit a grant, and if it was, in fact Best Science, it would be funded. So, virtually every school in the US tries to be a research oriented school, not just for the prestige, but because of the sweet overhead money that comes in, helping fund student-attracting facilities like salt water pools and paying big money to sports coaches.
Open Thread 369
February 16, 2025 · Original source
No direct inline source block was recovered for this mention.