White House budget proposal could shatter the National Science Foundation

"This kind of cut would kill American science and boost China."

See full article...

 

[GWO123]

This is from 4 Feb. Just additional illustration for the far-reaching damage that is being caused.


View: https://bsky.app/profile/darbysaxbe.bsky.social/post/3lhcvn4hxwk2o


Further parts of the keyword list from the thread:

Spoiler

Double-plus ungood

 

[GreyAreaUK]

Once again I am sadly reminded that people who use 'woke' as a pejorative almost inevitably turn out to be garbage people.

Still, at least they self-identify.

 

[xcodemustdie]

Once again I am sadly reminded that people who use 'woke' as a pejorative almost inevitably turn out to be garbage people.

Still, at least they self-identify.

Like I've said for years I don't get what is so negative about 'woke'
Sounds like I good thing, yes
The opposite of woke is ignorant, dopey, asleep, dull etc. Since when did these become traits to aspire to?

 

[Zakalwe_Cheradenine]

It's a damn shame that more voters in America were not aware of Popper's Paradox of Tolerance.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance

It's too late now. You had your chance and you blew it. Trump should have been in prison for insurrection years ago.

 

[Efw100]

The NSF funds construction and operation of major astronomical telescopes, interferometers, and spectrometers. These research devices are on the cutting edge of technology and deserve to be fully funded.

Six billion dollars is chump change for Elon Musk. He should get off his dead ass and cover that shortfall. NSF gladly would put his name on any and all of the instruments and observatories that money would fund. If he could raise $44B to buy control of a frickin social media platform, certainly he should be able to find $6B

The terms that apply here are:

1. unilateral disarmament
2. inevitable brain drain
3. wasted resources

The last one will get no discussion from the GOP, but cuts like this essentially burn decades of investment in training, equipment, and infrastructure building, a sum vastly larger than the supposed savings. This is the sort of BS that MBAs bring to many a company, making the short term profit margin seem great while destroying institutional knowledge and long term earning potential. (Then they bail, taking their bonuses with them, and leaving a smoking hole where a viable business used to be.) Here I think the actual motivation is not money at all, but an effort by certain religious types to destroy science since it disagrees with their demonstrably incorrect model of the physical world, and by certain business types, because these pesky scientists keep pointing out the problems that those businesses cause are hazardous to society and health.

From experience, religious nuutters are okay with chemistry as it’s doesn’t directly contradict their creation myths but not astronomy, cosmology, biology, , biochemistry is borderline

 

[GreyAreaUK]

Like I've said for years I don't get what is so negative about 'woke'
Sounds like I good thing, yes

Oh, it's absolutely a good thing. It's just the people using it as a pejorative aren't good people. Every single one of them inevitably turns out to be any or all of racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, bigoted, etc etc.

Having empathy for people who are different is anathema to them, and actually funding stuff that would help them is wrong on every level to them.


Having a bit of a morning...

 

[The_Lamb]

You moron, learn to read!

Latest issue of New Scientist: quantum black holes might explain dark energy;

There is no energy of colour, only light energy - it's just a woke idea. And we all know God hates anything quantised smaller than an angel on a pinhead.

review of development of clothes and technology of neanderthals

Ethnic fashions and foreign technology is a about as woke as you can get.

and homo

Do I even need to?

sapiens; triassic dinosaur origins in Pangea;

Dinosaurs are just a woke conspiracy to make children question their sexual orientation.

exoplanet extreme weather.

Exo this, trans that, cis and meta the other. What's next, para and ortho? It all leads to syn.

All woke, yep!

How right you are, and the only way to combat it is by going back to slept!

 

[cerata]

The world was seven years into Nobel prizes before the US won one for science. - the prize in Physics in 1907. And another seven years before the next one for chemistry in 1914. There were a couple peace prizes in there that were important but not pertinent.

Perhaps the US was a relative backwater, but I don't think that's a strong argument.

In 1900 the US comprised an estimated 4.6% of the world's population, assuming this Wikipedia article is accurate. Of course, I'd assume the proportion was much larger if you only count wealthy, industrialised countries that were likely to produce Nobel winners, e.g. some 76 million lived in the contiguous US, compared to 56 million in Germany, 44 million in the U.K., 39 million in France, 5 million in the Netherlands, etc. On the other hand, that's treating each country's population as homogeneous, ignoring any urban/rural or state-by-state divide.

In my view, Biden should have declared Trump constitutionally ineligible to serve and thrown him in Guantanamo Bay for treason. But the defenders of democracy seem far less willing to adopt a "whatever it takes" attitude than those promoting authoritarianism, so authoritarianism has won.

Some events of the last three weeks are probably particular to Trump, e.g. the proposal to ethnically-cleanse Gaza and rebuilding it into the "Riviera of the Middle East" is the sort of thing a senile real-estate developer would think of.

But tossing him in Guantanamo Bay would likely only have aided the authoritarian takeover of the US. That's been decades in the making. Trump didn't write Project 2025, and plenty of Republicans fought over who would inherit the MAGA mantle should he drop out of the running.

I get it — Trump is never going to face justice, so a little part of me wishes that 20-year-old had just aimed at the goddamn centre of mass. But that wouldn't have helped either. Poor kid.

 

[SubWoofer2]

Center for Renewing America

Orwell would be proud. Newspeak and double-think

 

[migrena]

When I see republicans asking for help when they are struck down and struggling from the consequences of their votes in the future, I will have some internal debate because I want to help people, and set a good example, because a good person will help someone when he has the ability to do so.

But I'll also want to just say "no, fuck you, you voted for this and now you can reap the whirlwind"

think of it like this - if there is no consequences there is much less learning incentive. if people who voted for orange muppet dont feel the consequences themselves they might not learn.

 

[sunshineSap3]

You moron, learn to read!

Latest issue of New Scientist: quantum black holes might explain dark energy; review of development of clothes and technology of neanderthals and homo sapiens; triassic dinosaur origins in Pangea; exoplanet extreme weather.

All woke, yep!

Woke means enlightened in the vocabulary of morons.

 

[Midnitte]

When I see republicans asking for help when they are struck down and struggling from the consequences of their votes in the future, I will have some internal debate because I want to help people, and set a good example, because a good person will help someone when he has the ability to do so.

But I'll also want to just say "no, fuck you, you voted for this and now you can reap the whirlwind"

Wolves ate my face people tend to not be self aware enough to realize they made a mistake. They'll find something else to blame — probably China, Democracts, and whatever new social war issue they discover.

 

[FSTargetDrone]

When I see republicans asking for help when they are struck down and struggling from the consequences of their votes in the future, I will have some internal debate because I want to help people, and set a good example, because a good person will help someone when he has the ability to do so.

But I'll also want to just say "no, fuck you, you voted for this and now you can reap the whirlwind"

That is how I feel about Covid deniers/antivaxxers, particularly after the height of the pandemic.

I don’t care anymore and I doubt I ever will again. As far as I’m concerned such people are a threat to society.

 

[FSTargetDrone]

Just wait until you see what plans they have to gut higher education.

I cannot imagine that any foreign students who are allowed to come to this country to study would even be considering it anymore. It’s like I see on Reddit, foreigners asking where to live in the US after moving here. More and more I’m seeing, “don’t.”

 

[chateauarusi]

Science is really inconvenient.

Actually, I'd say science is now unnecessary. Whenever we have a question that would formerly have been investigated according to scientific methodologies, we can now simply ask the Great Orange Leader, who by his own assertion is the smartest man alive and the greatest expert on every conceivable subject, and he will generously supply us with the answer we should use. Anything else is just a waste of time and money.

(Insert the largest imaginable collection of "/s" caveats here.)

 

[Safranin O]

So in the view of these guys, the cutting edge hard science, research in biology, physics, materials science etc, that propelled America to prominence and leadership in nearly all industries globally, is now "woke ideology"?

Have these guys even read through the abstracts on the grants page? What the heck!?

 

[Safranin O]

This is from 4 Feb. Just additional illustration for the far-reaching damage that is being caused.


View: https://bsky.app/profile/darbysaxbe.bsky.social/post/3lhcvn4hxwk2o


Further parts of the keyword list from the thread:

Spoiler

There are ongoing studies to improve STEM career pathways for Black students in MD, students in primarily Native American communities, and Latino students in CA, for example. The NSF has funded amazing efforts to improve the experience of disabled students in STEM and create more opportunities for them. This deeply upsetting move will kill all of these noble efforts to improve equity in math and science education.

 

[trannic]

One of the, few, good things about the U.K. political system is that it has procedures in place to correct errors when they inevitably occur. A recent example was Liz Truss. She was given the job of PM by the Conservative party members. Fifty days later the Conservative MPs kicked her out for tanking the economy.

In the U.S. there does not appear to be any way to do that and errors become self perpetuating. In short you need to add some negative feedback systems to your politics to prevent the entire thing from thrashing around uncontrollably.

The difficult part of this is, of course, finding a way to do it. After all, few turkeys vote for Christmas!

 

[warr10r_za]

Why engage? They're just going to get defensive and reframe it as a win somehow.

This. So much this.

I'm South African so you'd think talking to other South Africans about Trump and US politics and what is going on it would be all neutral and fact-based? No. Oh, no no no. This guy has a YUGE fanbase over here (particularly with white South Africans that go to church regularly or work on farms). Everything he and DOGE are doing is apparently the greatest thing that ever happened. And wow he's so strong by standing up to Mexico and Canada and threatening them! And oooh those eeeevil Democrats are getting what's coming to them!

So when you try debate these actions on forums and things you get shutdown with tweets from Republican mouthpieces complete with paperwork with "corruption" highlighted in the documents and of course SO MANY WORDS TYPED OUT IN CAPITALS because this is how we communicate now apparently. And we all know that Republicans have a different definition of curruption than the entire rest of the world.

God damn. Due to the monstrous flood of false information it leaves me very very frustrated and you cannot actually rebuttle everything that comes in because it would literally be a full-time job to check facts (oh but fact-checkers are also eeeeevviiilll).

Do not engage, your blood will boil and your sanity will depart.

Also I'm really tempted to follow Canada's example and simply boycott everything American.

 

[papito10]

When I see republicans asking for help when they are struck down and struggling from the consequences of their votes in the future, I will have some internal debate because I want to help people, and set a good example, because a good person will help someone when he has the ability to do so.

But I'll also want to just say "no, fuck you, you voted for this and now you can reap the whirlwind"

Good parents let children struggle and figure it out on their own. Modern nanny civilization is way too lenient to morons.

 

[warr10r_za]

This is from 4 Feb. Just additional illustration for the far-reaching damage that is being caused.


View: https://bsky.app/profile/darbysaxbe.bsky.social/post/3lhcvn4hxwk2o


Further parts of the keyword list from the thread:

Spoiler

American dark ages have begun. Good luck you guys.

And don't sign-up for military duty because lord knows where his Trumpiness is going to start the next war (apparently everywhere)

 

[GreyAreaUK]

And don't sign-up for military duty because lord knows where his Trumpiness is going top start the next war (apparently everywhere)

Gaza. At least, "forcibly relocating people that don't want to" counts as 'military action', which is as close to war as makes no odds.

Would be nice to think that any and all decent folk in the armed forces will disobey that order if it's given, but probably not.

 

[TheColinous]

Gaza. At least, "forcibly relocating people that don't want to" counts as 'military action', which is as close to war as makes no odds.

Or Greenland. I can't imagine Iowan and Texan farmboys huddling around a campfire in the endless night of january, freezing their asses off, hungry and with much of the technology that would work in Iraq or Asia simply frozen and non-functioning. In Iraq you could go under a tree to get away from the heat of the sun. On Greenland there's no such remedy.

 

[mihail_pramatarov]

i don't know why frankly, but this bullshit is making me very angry. and it is not my country, but... i see big, very giant similarities between how soviet/russian communists are running russia and by analogy how our communist puppets are running my country. and this copy-paste from stalin rulebook. i may have some excuse (which i do not have), but americans are baffling me. do they voluntaliry gave up on their freedoms...

 

[Penforhire]

I have to admit to sudden brief apoplexy after reading this. I shouldn't be surprised but this fear-based pandering to their 'useful idiot' base is just so, so, far over the line of reason. Science is, by its nature, going to show or prove some uncomfortable truths. To just ignore those (or actively avoid them!), stick you head in the sand, and justify with "nuh uh, no woke stuff for me" is ... suicidal. Death cult indeed.

 

[warr10r_za]

Gaza. At least, "forcibly relocating people that don't want to" counts as 'military action', which is as close to war as makes no odds.

Would be nice to think that any and all decent folk in the armed forces will disobey that order if it's given, but probably not.

Or Panama to go take back that American canal.

But honestly who knows what other country will take his ire next month?

 

[Niles Gazic]

I look at the future, and this particular reality, and I can't help but think an unlikely scenario could be come real in the coming years.

It's been talked about many times before, and it's gaining some traction (though, admittedly not a lot - yet - mostly because the effects aren't being felt yet).

So with that preamble, I'll probably be looking forward to the future of my country (Pacifica) when the entire West Coast blockades every state east of Oregon, Washington and California and secedes from the Union (Taking roughly 20% of the federal fiscal budget between them away from the mooching red states who rely on federal programs to pay for things their states should be paying for instead).

And considering the disproportionately high veteran population in these states, along with the military capacity of the assets here that would be annexed and manned by those who want to avoid the shitstorm Trump is bringing to the rest of the country, we'd be well positioned to defend ourselves.

Not dissing those of us here at Ars who live in Red states, but between those three states, we'd have about the 4th largest economy in the world. And since CA is basically the nation's nutrition center for most healthy items bought at supermarkets nation-wide, we'd be fine with whatever tariffs or other economic terrorism Trump wants to throw at us. My guess is they'll be busy with other things because people starving and dying under the Trump regime are more likely to light some fires over their situation.

We don't want to take over the country. But we don't want Trump taking it over, either.

Like I said, this is barely in the talking stage. But it's being talked about at the grassroots level. Sufficient motivation to go from talk to action is still needed, and may never happen.

But it could, and that's... Well, I was about to say a bad thing, but I think a Trump regime will be much, much worse.

I have been pondering on your hypothetical future for years, and have been wishing that a blue (or at least purple) corridor could be established between Colorado and the West Coast. New Mexico is also a blue state, and Arizona seems kinda purple sometimes... here's hoping.

 

[M1k3-]

I hope that the real sciences are funded, and that he defunds the insane, demented-woke "sciences" that left scirnce behind.

Pick up a copy of the ( formerly respectable and now woked to nonsense ) New Scientist if you don't understand what I mean.

Yeah! Like the article "A better understanding of our hormones and sleep could improve both".

How dare they! Trying to understand the human body. Tsk tsk.

 

[gregraygun]

When I see republicans asking for help when they are struck down and struggling from the consequences of their votes in the future, I will have some internal debate because I want to help people, and set a good example, because a good person will help someone when he has the ability to do so.

But I'll also want to just say "no, fuck you, you voted for this and now you can reap the whirlwind"

You're better than me. I will laugh in their faces, and do anything I can to make it worse, it's the only way they learn. I fear it's going to take decades of pain for all, before they do any of that learning.

 

[passivesmoking]

Fuck Trump.

 

[zuccini]

The real winners of the election were Xi and Putin. They must be delirious by now! With Gaza and undermining the ICC serving to legitimize their own expansionist ideas, and the infiltration of the US financial system and cutting off scientific research, it must be beyond their wildest dreams! Even if they had planted their own agent as US president it is unlikely they would have achieved this much so quickly!

 

[passivesmoking]

I hope that the real sciences are funded, and that he defunds the insane, demented-woke "sciences" that left scirnce behind.

Pick up a copy of the ( formerly respectable and now woked to nonsense ) New Scientist if you don't understand what I mean.

OK, when you die of something that might have been treatable with the product of stem cell research I'll be sure to attend the funeral.

 

[passivesmoking]

Once again I am sadly reminded that people who use 'woke' as a pejorative almost inevitably turn out to be garbage people.

Still, at least they self-identify.

The opposite of "woke" is "sleeping"

And America just sleep-walked into a fucking dictatorship.

I take "woke" as a compliment, because I'd rather have an understanding of the world around me and how people in power hurt the most vulnerable for their own personal gain or just for the sake of being needlessly cruel than ignorant and apathetic.

 

[passivesmoking]

The opposite of woke is ignorant, dopey, asleep, dull etc. Since when did these become traits to aspire to?

Since anti-intellectualism became the norm.

In other words, for far too long.

 

[passivesmoking]

Oh, it's absolutely a good thing. It's just the people using it as a pejorative aren't good people. Every single one of them inevitably turns out to be any or all of racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, bigoted, etc etc.

Having empathy for people who are different is anathema to them, and actually funding stuff that would help them is wrong on every level to them.


Having a bit of a morning...

It's been, what, weeks? And I'm already frustrated, furious, and exhausted.

What's it going to be like in 2028 when Dear Leader Trump declares elections obsolete (assuming he doesn't die of a massive myocardial infraction first)?

 

[uesc_marathon]

We must cease permitting this careless Western science, and only spend our budget on glorious Soviet science.

 

[passivesmoking]

The real winners of the election were Xi and Putin.

They certainly got far more than their money's worth out of their disinformation campaigns and troll farms. Plus we all know Trump is a Russian asset.

 

[GreyAreaUK]

It's been, what, weeks? And I'm already frustrated, furious, and exhausted.

What's it going to be like in 2028 when Dear Leader Trump declares elections obsolete (assuming he doesn't die of a massive myocardial infraction first)?

Doubt he'll make it that long. He's about as close to literally insane as you can get. If he was in the UK he'd have been Sectioned by now (assuming that's still a thing).

 

[passivesmoking]

Doubt he'll make it that long. He's about as close to literally insane as you can get. If he was in the UK he's have been Sectioned by now (assuming that's still a thing).

He's not in the UK though.

Apparently insanity, criminality, and fucking TREASON aren't reasons to disqualify somebody from the white house.

When he leaves the white house, it will be feet first.

 

[Coriolanus]

This. So much this.

I'm South African so you'd think talking to other South Africans about Trump and US politics and what is going on it would be all neutral and fact-based? No. Oh, no no no. This guy has a YUGE fanbase over here (particularly with white South Africans that go to church regularly or work on farms). Everything he and DOGE are doing is apparently the greatest thing that ever happened. And wow he's so strong by standing up to Mexico and Canada and threatening them! And oooh those eeeevil Democrats are getting what's coming to them!

So when you try debate these actions on forums and things you get shutdown with tweets from Republican mouthpieces complete with paperwork with "corruption" highlighted in the documents and of course SO MANY WORDS TYPED OUT IN CAPITALS because this is how we communicate now apparently. And we all know that Republicans have a different definition of curruption than the entire rest of the world.

God damn. Due to the monstrous flood of false information it leaves me very very frustrated and you cannot actually rebuttle everything that comes in because it would literally be a full-time job to check facts (oh but fact-checkers are also eeeeevviiilll).

Do not engage, your blood will boil and your sanity will depart.

Also I'm really tempted to follow Canada's example and simply boycott everything American.

I don't even mean not engaging to maintain your sanity.

If people feel attacked and they get defensive, they will create justifications for why they were actually right or why it wasn't really their fault. That's just human nature.

Give them time to think through any impact on them from their actions. Validate their feelings of frustration if you want. They may ultimately realize that they were wrong or they may not. But the chances of them realizing they were wrong is going to be higher than if they were made to feel defensive and under attack.

Schadenfreude is totally fine, though.