How the fallout from Trump's travel ban is reshaping science

a reply to: Byrd

I honestly understand many of your points. I'm a professional engineer (licensed) and have a minor in mathematics alongside my engineering BS. I saw the fact that my university's math department was heavily represented with international students, the graduate program even moreso.

I have some concerns over your assault by firearm statistic because I don't understand how it can be in any way accurate. www.cdc.gov... 10.7 out of 100,000 is a 1 in 10,000 chance of dying by a firearm (all categories, assault, defense, accidental, and suicide), which is a far cry from 1 in 356. If you purely take the murder component, then it goes to a 3.4 in 100,000 chance (or a 1 in 29,418 chance) www.cdc.gov...

Here's where I'm at on this... I'm a closed borders guy. I don't think the ban goes far enough, but it was at least a step in the right direction. Stats are great when you're looking to apply statistical analysis to things, BUT life is all about precedent and doesn't follow a statistical model except when taken across the greatest possible extents of time and sample size. Tell the families of those killed on 9/11 that "At least after 9/11 Americans will only have a 1 in 3.64 Billion chance of being killed by foreign born terrorists!" and see what the reaction is. Now imagine making that same statement to each of those travelers and first responders on 9/10/2001... the reaction would have been a lot more receptive to the ideology of statistical analysis of a global population with 7.5 Billion living, breathing, variables.

On a tangential note, WHY are there fewer and fewer American high schoolers turning to science fields in college? My position is that it is a collective failure of America's shifted education system combined with artificial importance being placed on non-science studies. Decades ago, for example, kids didn't get student loans or scholarships from most state universities for degrees in non science, NON MONEY GENERATING fields. If you wanted a degree in art appreciation or hospitality, you paid for either yourself or with daddy's money. Now it's wide open. Kids are taking out $100,000 in student loans to graduate with a degree in advertising that will see you a 99% chance of flipping burgers at McDonalds long before you ever use anything you learned for that $100k debt. The shift in public school away from prioritizing the "3 R's" is another component at play. Reading, writing, and math... those are what should be the absolute focal point of public schooling, PERIOD. Instead schools are more focused on the intangibles that don't provide one iota of monetary or useful return on investment... the arts, domesticality, sports, mandatory foreign language, social studies (let's get back to history as a subject taught to all), etc are contributing to production of high school graduates with a toolbox full of flat head screwdrivers heading out into a world of Phillips and hex head screws.

originally posted by: Devino
a reply to: Byrd
It's sad that so many here on ATS lack the intelligence to understand the logic in your thread. Lately I feel that we are going backwards scientifically speaking.

Right, what would Spock do?

lol.

Fascinating!

originally posted by: crazyewok
a reply to: burdman30ott6

Well by libral logic then if the USA had free travel to North Korea we would have cured cancer, have warp drive and robot slaves by now

North Korean peasants are not robots !!!!!11

Hell Even a 40+ something white Aussie can't get a 3 month holiday there.

and I like science.

Your borders are the worst condom.. tight, unpleasant, and still prone to letting little infiltrators come shooting.

:/

originally posted by: dukeofjive696969
Good op, the stupid trump ban has more than stoped people from the 7 evilest countries that the trump ban was supposed to affect.

Its a failure just like trump is, and is fans.

Durp durp murika great again.

Man you should write a book. That was gold.

Could call it "How I durr, fink about fings"

Best seller, hand them out signed at a clinton university.

a reply to: Byrd

No those are exactly the countrys i am thinking of.


They are aggressive dangrous countrys and known sponsors of terrorism.

I would love to see the world isolate them and retard there growth like the world has done to north korea.

originally posted by: Annee
Some people just can't see beyond their own porch.

We're on a rock in the middle of a huge universe.

Isolationism is stupid.

Well a lot of people disagree with you so suck it up.

Mankind is not ready yet. If you push so hard and so fast you are not going to get anyway.

The reason you have a idiot president and the EU is collapsing is because the left tried too much too fast.

Slow it down or you will just have to accept its over for you lot...

a reply to: Byrd

Thanks for being a candle in a demon-haunted world.

All I took from this was...
That people place their freedom to galavant around the globe and dig up dusty pottery over that of protecting human life. That is essentially what all this is eluding to. I honestly don't care about all these scientists kushy ivory tower lifestyle being interrupted by this travel ban that was put in place because of necessity not racism.

All this does is confirm to me that most academics and scientists only care about one thing...
SELF

originally posted by: JAY1980
All I took from this was...
That people place their freedom to galavant around the globe and dig up dusty pottery over that of protecting human life. That is essentially what all this is eluding to.

Well, no. I mention Egyptology because I'm getting a degree in it. I can speak more authoritatively about that than I can chemistry or biomedicine or physics or sociology or engineering or any number of other disciplines and paleontology's kind of a hard sell. It's being affected, too, but trying to explain why it's important is a really uphill battle.

I thought about talking about the impact for biologists, but that always seems to start a fight.

I honestly don't care about all these scientists kushy ivory tower lifestyle being interrupted by this travel ban that was put in place because of necessity not racism.

All this does is confirm to me that most academics and scientists only care about one thing...
SELF

I hope you get to meet some researchers and work with them someday. I think it would change your mind. (of course, with my luck, you'd pick some of the jerks with a project that's so out there that it looks ridiculous to the average person.)

originally posted by: crazyewok
a reply to: Byrd

No those are exactly the countrys i am thinking of.

How odd. As I understand it, the military and the intelligence community doesn't think they're as much a threat as some other countries.

..but that's a discussion for a different thread, I think.

...meant to get back to this part of your comment...

originally posted by: burdman30ott6
a reply to: Byrd
On a tangential note, WHY are there fewer and fewer American high schoolers turning to science fields in college? My position is that it is a collective failure of America's shifted education system combined with artificial importance being placed on non-science studies.

Yeah, that's another thing that's been bothering scientists and part of why there will be "teach-in" booths at Washington and similar outreach science at other marches (at least at the one in Oklahoma City.)

Here, again, Trump's policy will have an impact.

DeVoss wants to move toward charter schools. That will shift funds (shades of the 1950's) to private and wealthy area schools at the expense of the rest of the schools in the nation. A good education with good, highly paid teachers will again become a privilege of the elite. Rural schools everywhere will lose, as will schools in modest and poor neighborhoods. Without funds, they can't hire the best and they sure can't afford the equipment or even the maintenance fees for simple things (like air conditioning here in Dallas. I've taught in a science classroom where they couldn't get a plumber (no money) for the lab sinks and where there was no air conditioning.

On a university level, having international scholars barred from your country means that your top students don't get contact with (and possibly mentored by) the best in the world - not only science, here, but other disciplines including history.

a reply to: Byrd

Obama had travel restrictions as well. Did it destroy science then as well?

ETA: I am not a fan of how Trump rolled it out, but I find the reaction quite over the top.

a reply to: Byrd

DeVos wants to try something new. You, yourself are admitting that what we've been doing is not working... DeVos ideas may work, they may not... but I'd argue they won't make matters any worse than the trends we've been on already.

Also, as I already said, I have serious doubts that America is losing anything of benefit in disallowing visitors from those 6 well- behind the US countries on the ban... maybe #7, Iran, is a little different, but that ban has been a frequently utilized one, predating this administration's policies.