Very few of us actually understand the full consequences of our own actions in the limited areas in which we operate. That someone, such as Musk, with so little introspection has apparently been given the keys to the kingdom, so to speak, is more than frightening, and the outcome is likely to be destructive, and beyond deadly, devastation in some areas.
This brings up the age old question: What then must we do?
Great resistance was encountered by his sleuths seeking access to the Treasury payments system, not to interrupt payments, just to look over the list of payables.
Try telling your company's outside auditors to pound sand when they come looking for financial information, particularly the kind where money leaves the company's accounts.
Anyway, Musk seems to have an excellent bulls*it detector. That scares some people. Who it scares seems like an excellent leading indicator.
Seriously Gary. Agree and have agreed with your take on deep learning and Gen AI and agents which have been spot on. But you need to get out of your derangement echo chamber with President Trump and look at the sheer amount of corruption that has been and is being exposed in the US government. The sheer, ethical implications of what the US government has been up to with our tax money is horrific. Need to stop slinging political mud and come around with constructive suggestion. Your voice carries weight, and it would be good if you drop your biases and look at this holistically.
OK, but are R01 research grants to scientific researchers the best example of corruption? Obviously not. Getting an NIH grant requires a lifetime of dedication, it doesn't make the recipient wealthy, and it does produce a wealth of public knowledge and training that enhances the US and the global economy.
So why attack the one thing that isn't especially corrupt first? What about government defense contracts? Those DO enrich the recipients, to the tune of millions in their personal bank accounts. Are defence contractors suddenly going to have their funds cut due to corruption? I'm guessing not. Yet they are actually the ones who put tax dollars in their pockets, rather the using the funds for the public good.
It is bullshit. This information is publicly available but you have to put in some work to research it and consider it. Trump is betting you won't.
But they are indirect costs that were payable as part of those grants. That money will suddenly vanish. I'm guessing quite a bit of it was indeed spent on maintaining lab space even if the admin in US universities is famously bloated. Anyway, we're about to find out.
On one hand you insist the accounting is opaque, and on the other you're making firm claims about how the money is spent. Those seem like incompatible claims.
I don't at all doubt that Harvard is exploiting NIH funding, although most likely well within the law. But I also don't doubt that in the US a very large amount of this money is used by institution as it was intended. Like I say, I think this is a terrible way to reform a system, that might well completely break it. But we'll see. Part of me is pleased to see change, but the adult in me knows this is going to end badly. Probably for me as well as you, since the effects will be felt globally.
I don't think it's opaque in the sense that a serious inquiry couldn't get the details after the fact (see e.g. Mark's example about Stanford below). But, it is initially intentionally left unaccounted _to the federal govt_ - the funds are given without need for itemization of costs up front.
What does 'exploiting NIH funding' mean? Not conducting research as contracted? Charging more than the research should cost? Do you know what it should cost? Do you have any evidence at all for something which 'you don't doubt at all'?
Seriously Puneet, you need to come up with real evidence on your claim of corruption and not just repeat russian propaganda otherwise you can go back on X
You have of course links to a detailed, independent and credible account of the corruption you refer to? One with numbers attached? Numbers that are meaningful in relation to the size of the US budget?
Stop being an argumentative troll. If you have no intellectual integrity get off the part of the Internet where the adults discuss serious matters.
You are alleging massive corruption, sufficient to excuse a massive and highly illegal intervention by Musk and the executive branch. There is no massive corruption.
Still waiting for the requested links btw.
There are existing processes and institutions to deal with corruption. Inspectors general, whistle-blower protections, the DoJ, Congressional oversight. All sidelined or neutered by the Trump administration or Republican Congress btw. Perhaps you have something to contribute on that subject?
You might want to keep in mind that the public associates Covid and gain-of-function research with the NIH. Then the CDC buddied up with the Teacher's Union, invented the 6 foot rule and generally censored any public discussion with the help of the administration.
You need to recognize the damage this has done the reputation of the NIH and CDC, as well as science in general.
You can blame Trump and Musk, but there is some significant repair work that needs to be done, or science research could be in for a winter.
I really like this chain of thought. Set aside the personas. There may be some over reach, but the pendulum is so far out of center a lot of us will take the bad with the good.
Upon closer inspection, the things Musk has exposed as "corruption" or "fraud" turn out not to be corruption at all but clerical errors or, most likely, Musk's errors, of which there are many. For example, just because the "death field" in the Social Security database is off (person not dead) for a person who's 150 years old, it doesn't mean corruption or fraud or anything other than the database now uses other fields to decide whether to pay benefits. It might show that the SS database needs updating or maybe modernization. Read Philip Bump's article in today's Washington Post (3/3), "Can Elon Musk Find Any Fraud Before Trump's Base Notices the Con?"
Don't believe the right wing talking points. The political balance of Europe has pretty much consistently been 7-8 left of centre, 7-8 centrist, and 10-12 right of center governments for decades. Plus ca change...
A neat mirrored claim, as folks on either side of the political spectrum will agree with it, firm in their belief that it is the other side that politicized science.
Pretty positive this is the only comment on this post that both Gary and I have “liked”.
Don't enough about the US to comment on the nature of the problem.
What is notable from outside, however, is how staggeringly small these life-changing budget cuts are compared to what OpenAI/Microsoft and co burn through in a given quarter. That $1B is probably the yearly rainbow sticky note budget at Google...and yet we are burning all that on stupid freaking Chatbots.
Close tax loopholes abused by billionaires and millionaires and you save $4 trillion in the US budget right there.
Clearly they're not actually interested in fixing the budget crisis. It's all performative non-sense for their supporters. Like jingling keys in front of a baby to distract it from throwing a tantrum.
He actually knows exactly what he's doing! This is pre-meditated part of the Butterfly Revolution / Project 2025 / neoreactionary playbook... to create an overwhelmingly powerful executive branch. Universities are part of the 'cathedral' and must be undermined.
Gary, Trump and Musk have only one aim, personal self enrichment at any cost. The lunatics have taken over the asylum and their core support will be taking a financial battering. Someone will also be profiting, from the share price movements from all the wild policy pronouncements.
Trump has taken a spectacular personal wealth hit in all of this. If his plan was to get richer, staying out of DC and continuing to be a Democrat would have been much better strategy.
Musk just keeps funding and succeeding at various unimaginably challenging business startups. He's almost put NASA and the Euro Space Agency out of the launch business and even looks likely to flush Boeing. Americans - the ones making a productive contribution - like results. Musk is synonymous with successes. Attacking him just makes Dems look like they are trying to prop up losers.
Enough with this myth that Trump has taken a wealth hit! This is total BS. Trump was floundering as a failed businessman until 2016 when he learned the grift of being a for-profit President: completely ignoring emoluments law and profiting from his position with a long list of scams. Now in his 2nd term he is stealing money directly from his supporters through his own memecoin, even Melania has one! So please spare us the tired lie that he's earning only $1 as a President or whatever. He's completely fooled you.
“Trump and Musk have only one aim, personal self enrichment at any cost.”
Wow. Just wow.
That Gary Marcus “liked” this comment means he has officially forfeited almost all of his credibility.
That you can claim to know anyone’s *only* aim is beyond absurd.
And the idea that Musk in particular is doing what he is doing with the government on DOGE solely for his own personal enrichment - and as his sole aim, no less - shows TDS and now MDS of the highest order.
While never agreeing with all of it, I used to take what Gary wrote about AI seriously and with some credibility. Now I no longer can.
Sad that he has chosen to throw away so much of his credibility by fixating on political views far out of his expertise and lacking any sense of rationality in their extremity.
Since 2016 Trump has proven that he is only in the WH for self enrichment. Where have you been? He broke emoluments law, opened up a hotel for diplomats for personal profit, his campaign was found guilty of stealing donations from voters like you, and now he and Melania are peddling their own meme coins that, again, are stealing the life savings from their own voters! He also has Truth Social which is a public company floating on the stock market. He's raking in cash, mostly from his supporters. Meanwhile you all think he's a saint. Stunning mental gymnastics.
Hey Gary. I used to enjoy your posts but I believe you should stick to being an expert on AI and stay out of politics. We can read about politicians on other medians. You are losing your credibility with your overbearing skepticism, which seems very personal lately.
I’ll stick around to see your obvious biased comments. Was your post back in October on how you were sure that Trump has dementia based on science as well? Of course it was. How’d that work out for you? Curious how you didn’t do one of those about the last president? Perhaps if that was pointed out, you would have had a real candidate to go up against Trump and we wouldn’t have to listen to your whining about Trump and Musk — along with anyone else, or any company who actually might agree or be aligned with anything that they are doing — for the next 4 years…
Unlike normal dementia, which is characterized by forgetting names or words, Trump repeatedly since 2017 shows something very different: confusion about reality.
Hitler himself suffered from dementia. He attacked the Soviet Union, that eventually proved to be his downfall. His decision-making grew continually worse and, by 1945, he was a delusionary old man isolated in a Berlin bunker and moving imaginary troops around in final battles.
To quote Gandhi - "There may be tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they may seem invincible, but in the end, they always fail. Always."
Stay out of politics? Why shouldn't he comment on an attack by Trump and Musk on his profession. What a bizarre comment. It leads me to think you are fully signed up Maga worshipper
Sorry to disappoint but that’s not me. If I want to hear about crying about Trump and Musk I can turn on the news. Recently all I read about in this post is whining about OpenAI, Google, and anyone else who aligns themselves with the current president. Go post this political trash to Facebook.
I just asked deepseek what you should do if you don't like Gary discussing politics in his blogs here is the reply. If you find yourself disagreeing with Gary Marcus's political views on his blog, here are some constructive steps you can take:
1. **Disengage Respectfully**
If the content upsets you, consider stepping away. You can stop following the blog, unsubscribe, or mute notifications. Prioritizing your mental well-being is valid.
2. **Engage Constructively (If Appropriate)**
If the platform allows respectful dialogue, share your perspective in a calm, evidence-based manner. Focus on ideas rather than personal attacks. However, avoid heated debates if they’re unlikely to be productive.
3. **Analyze Critically**
Reflect on *why* you disagree. Are there biases or assumptions (yours or the author’s) influencing the disagreement? Use this as an opportunity to refine your own views or deepen your understanding of the topic.
4. **Seek Diverse Perspectives**
Balance your intake by exploring other sources. Follow thinkers with differing political stances to challenge or complement your views. Critical thinking thrives on exposure to multiple angles.
5. **Compartmentalize (If You Value Other Content)**
If you appreciate Marcus’s work in AI or science but dislike his politics, focus on those areas. Many public figures blend professional expertise with personal opinions—consume what aligns with your interests.
6. **Reflect on Boundaries**
Ask yourself whether engaging with opposing views is healthy for you. It’s okay to set boundaries; not every disagreement needs to be addressed.
7. **Avoid Amplification**
If the content feels harmful or misleading, refrain from sharing it, even in critique. Silence can sometimes be more impactful than engagement.
8. **Report (If Necessary)**
If the content violates platform policies (e.g., hate speech, harassment), report it. Otherwise, respect free expression even when you disagree.
Ultimately, how you respond depends on your goals: fostering dialogue, protecting your peace, or expanding your understanding. Prioritize actions that align with your values and emotional needs.
He's an experienced scientist talking about federal grants, of which he's very likely been a recipient. So am I. You can look up the grants he's received if you like, there's a public database.
I too am a recipient of US NSF grants, and IMO the overhead ("indirect costs") that went to my university was FAR more than was ever spent on supporting costs, including what it would have cost to rent equivalent space on the open market. Grant recipients are not provided with any accounting of how overhead is spent, it just disappears into the university's general budget.
"Indirect costs" have evolved into a backdoor method for the federal government to provide general funding for universities. This may be a good thing, but it is highly opaque, almost certainly inequitable on a campus v campus basis, and it needs to be made transparent.
Because the entire US govt is on an unsustainable spending path that, left unchecked, will almost certainly ultimately result in some far worse catastrophe (eg collapse of the value of the US dollar against the Chinese yuan) than merely defunding university DEI officers and the $900K salary for plagiarist Claudine Gay and overbuilt gymnasiums and stadiums and "learning centers" with fancy AV equipment but only mixed-sex toilets, which is the sort of thing US universities are currently spending those "indirect costs" on.
Sorry, what does this have to do with the price of tea in China?
Be very clear, I am WITH you on the idea that the reform is mostly or entirely good.
Perhaps your “This may be a good thing” was merely poor wording / communication on your part; I took it to mean that you were suggesting that it *might* be a good thing to have opaque indirect costs funding general university programs - which is what the immediate prior sentence said.
If you in fact meant the opposite, as now appears then you and I are on the same page.
If not, then let me humbly suggest that you are making the perfect be the enemy of the good. Whether or not you would make this an early item to tackle if you were Trump plus Musk is quite irrelevant.
Nothing you’ve written *actually* suggests the status quo on this subject is a good thing, and as you yourself know better than I do, most of what you wrote explains why the status quo is bad.
Yes, poor wording on my part. By "this may be a good thing", I meant direct federal support for universities, which every other country in the world does, but the US does by a crazy-ass method (actually several crazy-ass methods, indirect costs being only one). Then I misinterpreted your comment as favoring continuing the crazy-ass method (which Gary and most other commenters here do actually seem to favor continuing).
I couldn’t agree more. Comment on what you want (1st amendment), but your credibility suffers having such a strong opinion when Trump hasn’t been in office long and still waiting for his appointees to be confirmed. Musk is doing his job, he doesn’t make the decisions. This wouldn’t even be necessary if congress was doing their job.
As I have told my kids when they get ahead of their skis , “take a breath and chill”.
Have you considered that maybe politics has real world consequences on the subjects Gary writes about and has experience with? And him not writing about it would be ignoring the elephant in the room?
Musk and Trump are working towards a neofeudal society with themselves as royalty. As part of that work they want to restore the medieval superstition that science refuted, so that their opinions will be accepted universally ex cathedra, with no credible pushback.
You'll get no argument from me. I don't know if Europe will gain, it's not like our funding is slated to increase. Maybe postdocs will be easier to find. But maybe they'll just take one look at all this and leave science. They are smart after all. It's already tough to sell as a career to young people who increasingly just want to own a house.
Unlike your car air conditioning metaphor, a discrete system with easily identified symptomology and accessible components, Trump is in charge of a giant interrelated mechanism with problems nearly everywhere and with the hood mostly welded shut.
He's just put it on a diet and is watching for what parts scream and how valid their need actually is. I think the US Government is not unreasonable in putting the brakes on university grants that, because money is fungible, effectively subsidize another lazy river attraction in the student union.
For years Dems have asked the rest of us to live on less - fossil fuels, water in the toilet, etc. What's good for the goose...
I find it odd that the post and the comments are wound up with questions of the impacts and advisability of these specific refusals to disburse Congressionally allocated funds (they're not 'cuts', cuts are made to a budget, which only Congress can produce). Isn't the overwhelming aspect of this their plain and egregious illegality?
If you crash a plane into the Pentagon because you think their budget is too big or there is waste in procurement, yes you will decrease expenditures a bit for awhile. But isn't the thing we should focus on that, you know, it's kind of illegal to do that?
He's not doing it cluelessly, he's a traitor who fully aligned himself with Putin, Xi, and the Saudi dictators years ago. He's doing it intentionally. Resist or perish, America!
Are universities in the US less efficient than private sector corporations? Is the government less efficient? Are there any useful definitions of 'efficiency' in human enterprises, any definition that would permit meaningfull comparison between the very different institutions of goverment, the private sector, academia? Is there any data on that? Are US institutions, public or private, less 'efficient' than comparable ones in other developed countries?
Seems to me that since corporations, usually assumed to be inherently superior at 'efficiency, go bust or get bought up all the time, perhaps they aren't in fact generally optimally efficient, or even 'more efficient'. Perhaps 'inefficiency' is a general state of things when dealing with actual human beings and the systems they set up and work in.
Could all this loose talk about 'inefficiency' be nothing but a tornado of received wisdom, things 'everybody knows', politically inflected slogans, and other nonsense weaponized by the usual suspects for the usual ends?
These are good questions without easy answers. There are, in fact, definitions of "efficiency" which you can look at on wikipedia. It is often assumed, especially on the right, that private enterprise will be more efficient than public because they have to turn a profit. Individual companies that are inefficient die, as you point out. But even if that is true, does being efficient at making money mean the same thing as being efficient at doing science or engineering? Or maintaining public health? The libertarian perspective is that it does mean the same thing. But it clearly doesn't. Private enterprise on its own doesn't efficiently provide basic scientific knowledge, or public health, or roads, or the police. So we have a public sector.
The left tend to emphasise the positive role of this public sector, however governments require heavy regulation to avoid government workers walking off with the money. Bureaucracies also tend to grow uncontrollably, and have done several times in the past for example in 19th century Prussia. That's clearly not efficient either.
So there is no answer, just a judgement to be made in a particular time and place.
Those were rhetorical questions. You can surely guess my answers.
Government, academia, private enterprise are obviously different things with different criteria to evaluate their success.
Certain common-sense and obvious understandings of 'efficiency' are applicable to all human enterprises. For example not spending entire workdays reading blogs online when one should be working. There are btw the usual managerial tools available to address this everyday kind of efficiency, and outcome-related incentives to use the tools, in all government activities and in academic ones where outcomes are measured. To elevate 'efficiency' to an abstract quality of organizations is to fall into the trap of rightwing framing.
The usual rightwing or libertarian use of 'efficiency' and its weaponization to attack the public sector has nothing to do with any respectable tradition of thought and no thinking person should have anything to do with it. Don't play their silly pseudo-intellectual games. Until they can answer all those rhetorical questions with reference to peer-reviewed, broadly accepted research, 'efficiency' is just a cudgel they use to destroy the public sector.
Don't believe I mentioned anything about leftwing ideas, much less them being good.
I did indeed claim politicized and simplistic rightwing framing of things like 'efficiency' is bad. Because it's simplistic and politicized.
Don't know what you're on about with your appeal to 'the history of ideas' to bolster your slipshod thinking.
While we're on the topic of history, you might want to delve a bit deeper into the history of Prussian bureaucracy. I believe the concensus is that it's development was key to the modernization of the Prussian state and the development of its industry and military. Which in turn delivered economic, social and military achievements which made Prussia impressively successful. Until it wasn't anymore, of course. Fascinating stuff. But I've never heard that blamed on excessive bureaucratization. Perhaps your reading will uncover such a claim.
I'm glad to hear you are serving on a syllabus committee and contributing something useful to society. I'd hate to think you were just spending your time being right on the Internet.
Very few of us actually understand the full consequences of our own actions in the limited areas in which we operate. That someone, such as Musk, with so little introspection has apparently been given the keys to the kingdom, so to speak, is more than frightening, and the outcome is likely to be destructive, and beyond deadly, devastation in some areas.
This brings up the age old question: What then must we do?
Great resistance was encountered by his sleuths seeking access to the Treasury payments system, not to interrupt payments, just to look over the list of payables.
Try telling your company's outside auditors to pound sand when they come looking for financial information, particularly the kind where money leaves the company's accounts.
Anyway, Musk seems to have an excellent bulls*it detector. That scares some people. Who it scares seems like an excellent leading indicator.
Seriously Gary. Agree and have agreed with your take on deep learning and Gen AI and agents which have been spot on. But you need to get out of your derangement echo chamber with President Trump and look at the sheer amount of corruption that has been and is being exposed in the US government. The sheer, ethical implications of what the US government has been up to with our tax money is horrific. Need to stop slinging political mud and come around with constructive suggestion. Your voice carries weight, and it would be good if you drop your biases and look at this holistically.
You give no specifics; I pointed to Aslin’s detailed analysis and stand by what I said.
OK, but are R01 research grants to scientific researchers the best example of corruption? Obviously not. Getting an NIH grant requires a lifetime of dedication, it doesn't make the recipient wealthy, and it does produce a wealth of public knowledge and training that enhances the US and the global economy.
So why attack the one thing that isn't especially corrupt first? What about government defense contracts? Those DO enrich the recipients, to the tune of millions in their personal bank accounts. Are defence contractors suddenly going to have their funds cut due to corruption? I'm guessing not. Yet they are actually the ones who put tax dollars in their pockets, rather the using the funds for the public good.
It is bullshit. This information is publicly available but you have to put in some work to research it and consider it. Trump is betting you won't.
Musk is NOT attacking the grants themselves, only the "indirect costs", which are NOT accounted in any serious way.
But they are indirect costs that were payable as part of those grants. That money will suddenly vanish. I'm guessing quite a bit of it was indeed spent on maintaining lab space even if the admin in US universities is famously bloated. Anyway, we're about to find out.
Quite a bit was NOT spent on maintaining lab space, see my main-thread comment.
On one hand you insist the accounting is opaque, and on the other you're making firm claims about how the money is spent. Those seem like incompatible claims.
I don't at all doubt that Harvard is exploiting NIH funding, although most likely well within the law. But I also don't doubt that in the US a very large amount of this money is used by institution as it was intended. Like I say, I think this is a terrible way to reform a system, that might well completely break it. But we'll see. Part of me is pleased to see change, but the adult in me knows this is going to end badly. Probably for me as well as you, since the effects will be felt globally.
I don't think it's opaque in the sense that a serious inquiry couldn't get the details after the fact (see e.g. Mark's example about Stanford below). But, it is initially intentionally left unaccounted _to the federal govt_ - the funds are given without need for itemization of costs up front.
What does 'exploiting NIH funding' mean? Not conducting research as contracted? Charging more than the research should cost? Do you know what it should cost? Do you have any evidence at all for something which 'you don't doubt at all'?
Seriously Puneet, you need to come up with real evidence on your claim of corruption and not just repeat russian propaganda otherwise you can go back on X
You have of course links to a detailed, independent and credible account of the corruption you refer to? One with numbers attached? Numbers that are meaningful in relation to the size of the US budget?
“ Numbers that are meaningful in relation to the size of the US budget?”
So according to you corruption is perfectly fine so long as the numbers aren’t meaningful relative to the size of the entire U.S. budget?!?
Wow. Just wow…
Stop being an argumentative troll. If you have no intellectual integrity get off the part of the Internet where the adults discuss serious matters.
You are alleging massive corruption, sufficient to excuse a massive and highly illegal intervention by Musk and the executive branch. There is no massive corruption.
Still waiting for the requested links btw.
There are existing processes and institutions to deal with corruption. Inspectors general, whistle-blower protections, the DoJ, Congressional oversight. All sidelined or neutered by the Trump administration or Republican Congress btw. Perhaps you have something to contribute on that subject?
You might want to keep in mind that the public associates Covid and gain-of-function research with the NIH. Then the CDC buddied up with the Teacher's Union, invented the 6 foot rule and generally censored any public discussion with the help of the administration.
You need to recognize the damage this has done the reputation of the NIH and CDC, as well as science in general.
You can blame Trump and Musk, but there is some significant repair work that needs to be done, or science research could be in for a winter.
I really like this chain of thought. Set aside the personas. There may be some over reach, but the pendulum is so far out of center a lot of us will take the bad with the good.
Upon closer inspection, the things Musk has exposed as "corruption" or "fraud" turn out not to be corruption at all but clerical errors or, most likely, Musk's errors, of which there are many. For example, just because the "death field" in the Social Security database is off (person not dead) for a person who's 150 years old, it doesn't mean corruption or fraud or anything other than the database now uses other fields to decide whether to pay benefits. It might show that the SS database needs updating or maybe modernization. Read Philip Bump's article in today's Washington Post (3/3), "Can Elon Musk Find Any Fraud Before Trump's Base Notices the Con?"
“Asia and Europe will profit.”
With European right-wing ascending, and since this ascension mirrors what is happening in America, I think Asia will end up benefiting the most.
Don't believe the right wing talking points. The political balance of Europe has pretty much consistently been 7-8 left of centre, 7-8 centrist, and 10-12 right of center governments for decades. Plus ca change...
Science became a political and ideological battleground. The collateral damage will be immense.
Fires don't neatly contain themselves.
A neat mirrored claim, as folks on either side of the political spectrum will agree with it, firm in their belief that it is the other side that politicized science.
Pretty positive this is the only comment on this post that both Gary and I have “liked”.
Don't enough about the US to comment on the nature of the problem.
What is notable from outside, however, is how staggeringly small these life-changing budget cuts are compared to what OpenAI/Microsoft and co burn through in a given quarter. That $1B is probably the yearly rainbow sticky note budget at Google...and yet we are burning all that on stupid freaking Chatbots.
Close tax loopholes abused by billionaires and millionaires and you save $4 trillion in the US budget right there.
Clearly they're not actually interested in fixing the budget crisis. It's all performative non-sense for their supporters. Like jingling keys in front of a baby to distract it from throwing a tantrum.
He actually knows exactly what he's doing! This is pre-meditated part of the Butterfly Revolution / Project 2025 / neoreactionary playbook... to create an overwhelmingly powerful executive branch. Universities are part of the 'cathedral' and must be undermined.
Weird how I only hear about these spooky cabals from paranoid lefties
Gary, Trump and Musk have only one aim, personal self enrichment at any cost. The lunatics have taken over the asylum and their core support will be taking a financial battering. Someone will also be profiting, from the share price movements from all the wild policy pronouncements.
Trump has taken a spectacular personal wealth hit in all of this. If his plan was to get richer, staying out of DC and continuing to be a Democrat would have been much better strategy.
Musk just keeps funding and succeeding at various unimaginably challenging business startups. He's almost put NASA and the Euro Space Agency out of the launch business and even looks likely to flush Boeing. Americans - the ones making a productive contribution - like results. Musk is synonymous with successes. Attacking him just makes Dems look like they are trying to prop up losers.
Enough with this myth that Trump has taken a wealth hit! This is total BS. Trump was floundering as a failed businessman until 2016 when he learned the grift of being a for-profit President: completely ignoring emoluments law and profiting from his position with a long list of scams. Now in his 2nd term he is stealing money directly from his supporters through his own memecoin, even Melania has one! So please spare us the tired lie that he's earning only $1 as a President or whatever. He's completely fooled you.
“Trump and Musk have only one aim, personal self enrichment at any cost.”
Wow. Just wow.
That Gary Marcus “liked” this comment means he has officially forfeited almost all of his credibility.
That you can claim to know anyone’s *only* aim is beyond absurd.
And the idea that Musk in particular is doing what he is doing with the government on DOGE solely for his own personal enrichment - and as his sole aim, no less - shows TDS and now MDS of the highest order.
While never agreeing with all of it, I used to take what Gary wrote about AI seriously and with some credibility. Now I no longer can.
Sad that he has chosen to throw away so much of his credibility by fixating on political views far out of his expertise and lacking any sense of rationality in their extremity.
Since 2016 Trump has proven that he is only in the WH for self enrichment. Where have you been? He broke emoluments law, opened up a hotel for diplomats for personal profit, his campaign was found guilty of stealing donations from voters like you, and now he and Melania are peddling their own meme coins that, again, are stealing the life savings from their own voters! He also has Truth Social which is a public company floating on the stock market. He's raking in cash, mostly from his supporters. Meanwhile you all think he's a saint. Stunning mental gymnastics.
Wow, talk about deflection / change of subject.
I never said Trump was a saint.
I didn’t even say that a part of his motivation might not be personal financial self-enrichment.
I did not, and have not, defended every one of his behaviors, in or out of office (though surely on *many* of your claims I’d disagree with you).
I said the idea you can be sure of what two other people’s SOLE motivations are is absurd.
But I understand that TDS afflicts the minds of many.
Andy, I am going to be generous and put your comment down to incredible naivety.
That anyone can be sure of another’s motives is highly questionable.
That anyone can know that someone else has one and only *one* motive for their actions is beyond ridiculous.
But I will be generous and put your comment down to incredible naivety...
Hey Gary. I used to enjoy your posts but I believe you should stick to being an expert on AI and stay out of politics. We can read about politicians on other medians. You are losing your credibility with your overbearing skepticism, which seems very personal lately.
Sir, I comment on science, and this is a direct attack on science.
Feel free to unsubscribe.
I’ll stick around to see your obvious biased comments. Was your post back in October on how you were sure that Trump has dementia based on science as well? Of course it was. How’d that work out for you? Curious how you didn’t do one of those about the last president? Perhaps if that was pointed out, you would have had a real candidate to go up against Trump and we wouldn’t have to listen to your whining about Trump and Musk — along with anyone else, or any company who actually might agree or be aligned with anything that they are doing — for the next 4 years…
Unlike normal dementia, which is characterized by forgetting names or words, Trump repeatedly since 2017 shows something very different: confusion about reality.
Hitler himself suffered from dementia. He attacked the Soviet Union, that eventually proved to be his downfall. His decision-making grew continually worse and, by 1945, he was a delusionary old man isolated in a Berlin bunker and moving imaginary troops around in final battles.
To quote Gandhi - "There may be tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they may seem invincible, but in the end, they always fail. Always."
Stay out of politics? Why shouldn't he comment on an attack by Trump and Musk on his profession. What a bizarre comment. It leads me to think you are fully signed up Maga worshipper
Sorry to disappoint but that’s not me. If I want to hear about crying about Trump and Musk I can turn on the news. Recently all I read about in this post is whining about OpenAI, Google, and anyone else who aligns themselves with the current president. Go post this political trash to Facebook.
Gary's articles are not compulsory reading as far as I know.
Yeah - it's kinda like abortion, if you don't want one then don't get it. Don't go around forcing others to not to...
You are correct in that statement. I subscribed to Marcus on AI, not Marcus on Politics — which can easily be deleted or unsubscribed from.
I just asked deepseek what you should do if you don't like Gary discussing politics in his blogs here is the reply. If you find yourself disagreeing with Gary Marcus's political views on his blog, here are some constructive steps you can take:
1. **Disengage Respectfully**
If the content upsets you, consider stepping away. You can stop following the blog, unsubscribe, or mute notifications. Prioritizing your mental well-being is valid.
2. **Engage Constructively (If Appropriate)**
If the platform allows respectful dialogue, share your perspective in a calm, evidence-based manner. Focus on ideas rather than personal attacks. However, avoid heated debates if they’re unlikely to be productive.
3. **Analyze Critically**
Reflect on *why* you disagree. Are there biases or assumptions (yours or the author’s) influencing the disagreement? Use this as an opportunity to refine your own views or deepen your understanding of the topic.
4. **Seek Diverse Perspectives**
Balance your intake by exploring other sources. Follow thinkers with differing political stances to challenge or complement your views. Critical thinking thrives on exposure to multiple angles.
5. **Compartmentalize (If You Value Other Content)**
If you appreciate Marcus’s work in AI or science but dislike his politics, focus on those areas. Many public figures blend professional expertise with personal opinions—consume what aligns with your interests.
6. **Reflect on Boundaries**
Ask yourself whether engaging with opposing views is healthy for you. It’s okay to set boundaries; not every disagreement needs to be addressed.
7. **Avoid Amplification**
If the content feels harmful or misleading, refrain from sharing it, even in critique. Silence can sometimes be more impactful than engagement.
8. **Report (If Necessary)**
If the content violates platform policies (e.g., hate speech, harassment), report it. Otherwise, respect free expression even when you disagree.
Ultimately, how you respond depends on your goals: fostering dialogue, protecting your peace, or expanding your understanding. Prioritize actions that align with your values and emotional needs.
Joys of freedom to unsubscribe. For limited time only for the citizens of the US of A.
He's an experienced scientist talking about federal grants, of which he's very likely been a recipient. So am I. You can look up the grants he's received if you like, there's a public database.
You should just listen.
correct
I too am a recipient of US NSF grants, and IMO the overhead ("indirect costs") that went to my university was FAR more than was ever spent on supporting costs, including what it would have cost to rent equivalent space on the open market. Grant recipients are not provided with any accounting of how overhead is spent, it just disappears into the university's general budget.
"Indirect costs" have evolved into a backdoor method for the federal government to provide general funding for universities. This may be a good thing, but it is highly opaque, almost certainly inequitable on a campus v campus basis, and it needs to be made transparent.
Agree with most of the rest, but how you can claim “This may be a good thing” is baffling.
Because the entire US govt is on an unsustainable spending path that, left unchecked, will almost certainly ultimately result in some far worse catastrophe (eg collapse of the value of the US dollar against the Chinese yuan) than merely defunding university DEI officers and the $900K salary for plagiarist Claudine Gay and overbuilt gymnasiums and stadiums and "learning centers" with fancy AV equipment but only mixed-sex toilets, which is the sort of thing US universities are currently spending those "indirect costs" on.
Sorry, what does this have to do with the price of tea in China?
Be very clear, I am WITH you on the idea that the reform is mostly or entirely good.
Perhaps your “This may be a good thing” was merely poor wording / communication on your part; I took it to mean that you were suggesting that it *might* be a good thing to have opaque indirect costs funding general university programs - which is what the immediate prior sentence said.
If you in fact meant the opposite, as now appears then you and I are on the same page.
If not, then let me humbly suggest that you are making the perfect be the enemy of the good. Whether or not you would make this an early item to tackle if you were Trump plus Musk is quite irrelevant.
Nothing you’ve written *actually* suggests the status quo on this subject is a good thing, and as you yourself know better than I do, most of what you wrote explains why the status quo is bad.
Yes, poor wording on my part. By "this may be a good thing", I meant direct federal support for universities, which every other country in the world does, but the US does by a crazy-ass method (actually several crazy-ass methods, indirect costs being only one). Then I misinterpreted your comment as favoring continuing the crazy-ass method (which Gary and most other commenters here do actually seem to favor continuing).
Research grants are a mess of obfuscation and gaming the system.
DOGE was never about efficiency and was always about ideological capture and punishing wrongthink.
Two different things can be true.
I entirely agree. It's not for nothing that non-government funders are more careful. But suddenly cutting all the funds seems like a terrible plan.
I couldn’t agree more. Comment on what you want (1st amendment), but your credibility suffers having such a strong opinion when Trump hasn’t been in office long and still waiting for his appointees to be confirmed. Musk is doing his job, he doesn’t make the decisions. This wouldn’t even be necessary if congress was doing their job.
As I have told my kids when they get ahead of their skis , “take a breath and chill”.
Or as Aaron Rodgers once famously said a bit more concisely:
“R-E-L-A-X!”
Have you considered that maybe politics has real world consequences on the subjects Gary writes about and has experience with? And him not writing about it would be ignoring the elephant in the room?
Musk and Trump are working towards a neofeudal society with themselves as royalty. As part of that work they want to restore the medieval superstition that science refuted, so that their opinions will be accepted universally ex cathedra, with no credible pushback.
You'll get no argument from me. I don't know if Europe will gain, it's not like our funding is slated to increase. Maybe postdocs will be easier to find. But maybe they'll just take one look at all this and leave science. They are smart after all. It's already tough to sell as a career to young people who increasingly just want to own a house.
I don't think Musk cares. Watch the world burn; just break it. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/what-elon-musk-wants/id1548604447?i=1000689921765
Unlike your car air conditioning metaphor, a discrete system with easily identified symptomology and accessible components, Trump is in charge of a giant interrelated mechanism with problems nearly everywhere and with the hood mostly welded shut.
He's just put it on a diet and is watching for what parts scream and how valid their need actually is. I think the US Government is not unreasonable in putting the brakes on university grants that, because money is fungible, effectively subsidize another lazy river attraction in the student union.
For years Dems have asked the rest of us to live on less - fossil fuels, water in the toilet, etc. What's good for the goose...
I find it odd that the post and the comments are wound up with questions of the impacts and advisability of these specific refusals to disburse Congressionally allocated funds (they're not 'cuts', cuts are made to a budget, which only Congress can produce). Isn't the overwhelming aspect of this their plain and egregious illegality?
If you crash a plane into the Pentagon because you think their budget is too big or there is waste in procurement, yes you will decrease expenditures a bit for awhile. But isn't the thing we should focus on that, you know, it's kind of illegal to do that?
He's not doing it cluelessly, he's a traitor who fully aligned himself with Putin, Xi, and the Saudi dictators years ago. He's doing it intentionally. Resist or perish, America!
WTF 😆
Found Biden's alt.
Gary, stick to what you know please. I appreciate your insights regarding AI. Politics is not your strong suit it appears.
Are universities in the US less efficient than private sector corporations? Is the government less efficient? Are there any useful definitions of 'efficiency' in human enterprises, any definition that would permit meaningfull comparison between the very different institutions of goverment, the private sector, academia? Is there any data on that? Are US institutions, public or private, less 'efficient' than comparable ones in other developed countries?
Seems to me that since corporations, usually assumed to be inherently superior at 'efficiency, go bust or get bought up all the time, perhaps they aren't in fact generally optimally efficient, or even 'more efficient'. Perhaps 'inefficiency' is a general state of things when dealing with actual human beings and the systems they set up and work in.
Could all this loose talk about 'inefficiency' be nothing but a tornado of received wisdom, things 'everybody knows', politically inflected slogans, and other nonsense weaponized by the usual suspects for the usual ends?
These are good questions without easy answers. There are, in fact, definitions of "efficiency" which you can look at on wikipedia. It is often assumed, especially on the right, that private enterprise will be more efficient than public because they have to turn a profit. Individual companies that are inefficient die, as you point out. But even if that is true, does being efficient at making money mean the same thing as being efficient at doing science or engineering? Or maintaining public health? The libertarian perspective is that it does mean the same thing. But it clearly doesn't. Private enterprise on its own doesn't efficiently provide basic scientific knowledge, or public health, or roads, or the police. So we have a public sector.
The left tend to emphasise the positive role of this public sector, however governments require heavy regulation to avoid government workers walking off with the money. Bureaucracies also tend to grow uncontrollably, and have done several times in the past for example in 19th century Prussia. That's clearly not efficient either.
So there is no answer, just a judgement to be made in a particular time and place.
Those were rhetorical questions. You can surely guess my answers.
Government, academia, private enterprise are obviously different things with different criteria to evaluate their success.
Certain common-sense and obvious understandings of 'efficiency' are applicable to all human enterprises. For example not spending entire workdays reading blogs online when one should be working. There are btw the usual managerial tools available to address this everyday kind of efficiency, and outcome-related incentives to use the tools, in all government activities and in academic ones where outcomes are measured. To elevate 'efficiency' to an abstract quality of organizations is to fall into the trap of rightwing framing.
The usual rightwing or libertarian use of 'efficiency' and its weaponization to attack the public sector has nothing to do with any respectable tradition of thought and no thinking person should have anything to do with it. Don't play their silly pseudo-intellectual games. Until they can answer all those rhetorical questions with reference to peer-reviewed, broadly accepted research, 'efficiency' is just a cudgel they use to destroy the public sector.
OK, left good, right bad, history of ideas = bunk. Got it, thanks, I'll report back to the syllabus committee.
Don't believe I mentioned anything about leftwing ideas, much less them being good.
I did indeed claim politicized and simplistic rightwing framing of things like 'efficiency' is bad. Because it's simplistic and politicized.
Don't know what you're on about with your appeal to 'the history of ideas' to bolster your slipshod thinking.
While we're on the topic of history, you might want to delve a bit deeper into the history of Prussian bureaucracy. I believe the concensus is that it's development was key to the modernization of the Prussian state and the development of its industry and military. Which in turn delivered economic, social and military achievements which made Prussia impressively successful. Until it wasn't anymore, of course. Fascinating stuff. But I've never heard that blamed on excessive bureaucratization. Perhaps your reading will uncover such a claim.
I'm glad to hear you are serving on a syllabus committee and contributing something useful to society. I'd hate to think you were just spending your time being right on the Internet.
My god. Stop.