Tag Archives: research funding

Should ‘geniuses’ be paid extra?

Posted on July 17, 2022 by

A newsletter named Ideas Sleep Furiously had an essay propounding a “genius basic income” on May 28. Here are the first two paragraphs that capture a not-insignificant portion of the essay’s message: Professor Martin Hairer is one of the world’s most gifted mathematicians. … Continue reading →

Posted in Analysis, Science | Tagged basic income, David Graeber, genius, gifted children, research funding, school reform | Comments Off

Science prizes, wealth location and social signals

Posted on December 3, 2020 by

One count on which I almost always find myself to be an outlier in India is my opinion that the Nobel Prizes and their derivatives belong in the gutter. But while many people in other countries share this opinion of … Continue reading →

Posted in Analysis, Op-eds, Science | Tagged Arindam Ghosh, Infosys Foundation, Infosys Prizes, Nobel Prizes, Prachi Deshpande, privilege, Rajan Sankaranarayanan, research funding, Social Sciences, SS Bhatnagar Award, Swarnajayanti Fellowships, wealth signalling | Comments Off

Would you take Epstein’s money to fund your research?

Posted on August 10, 2019 by

Note: Jeffrey Epstein was found dead in his cell on August 10, 2019. The following post was written before news of his death emerged. In 2016, I attended a talk by a not-unknown environmental activist in Chennai (not Nityanand Jayaraman, before … Continue reading →

Posted in Op-eds, Science | Tagged BuzzFeed, Central Pollution Control Board, Crohn's disease, ethics, Jeffrey Epstein, melanoma, National green Tribunal, nationalism, research funding, Volkswagen | Comments Off

Research funding in India

Posted on October 31, 2015 by

After Vidya Krishnan of The Hindu broke the news of the ‘Dehradun Declaration‘, which imposed a startling funding restriction on the Centres for Scientific and Industrial Research, multiple perspectives on the issue came to light for me. One was about the … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Department of Biotechnology, Department of Science and Technology, grant proposals, research funding, research metrics | Comments Off