Holiday Cheer for this Time of Year

Once upon a time, long, long ago, there were universities in which a number of original thinkers pondered the nature of the universe, and all that is in it.  They did research to unlock secrets of Nature to gain glimpses never seen before.  They strove for knowledge, pure knowledge, for the satisfaction of understanding, and then to use that understanding to relieve some of the ills of the world around them.  The search for this knowledge was called science, and the searchers scientists. 

Scientists were few, but were highly respected.  They may have looked rather disheveled and ragged, or acted a bit oddly, perhaps dribbling food at the dinner-table; and most of them were not rich or privileged--except for the privilege of being able to probe Nature’s nature.  They were rather disinterested in the material things of the world, because their minds were preoccupied with the quest for understanding and knowledge.

But then things changed.  It became necessary for their jobs--their survival--for them to join the choruses, chanting safe slogans du jour, because they had to sing for their very supper: universities realized they could ‘hire’ them without promising a salary, but only an office--like a storefront--from which they could hustle their daily bread, using the purported prestige of their job titles as leverage.

The Pied Piper leads the mice into oblivion (figure taken from the web)

And so, chanting “Me too!  Me too!” the scientists followed a Piper into the ‘Omical Forest.  Only a scraggly few were ever heard from again.  Reports circulated that they had been unable to get enough grants to keep from being sucked deeper into the forest, while the Piper and a few friends reveled in endless gilded feasts. 

When this mass disappearance of scientists was reported, investigators wanted to find out how such presumably intelligent people could have been lured into the darkness. The idea was to publish an analysis of the reasons, so future scientists would not also be lured away.  The analysis would, of course, have to involve many tables and charts, lists and citations (of work written by anyone who might actually read it or make related funding decisions affecting the authors).  And, of course, this was not just a public service: it would be published as a ‘meta-analysis’ of science, and listed prominently on the authors’ own CVs.

Actually, I have heard that now and again this imitative behavior was pointed out to the scientists, so they could see how after years of training to think originally (that is, to be what the word scientists originally meant) they had been lured away from that path by the need to build up ‘objective’ credits so they could get grants or tenure (to enable them to amass more credits).  Whether this explanation could, if it were understood, have corrected or even prevented their behavior isn’t clear, and the odds don’t seem to be very good…..

In any case, one day along came a Proper Piper.  “Let’s stop just feeding our own career-kitty, and think about those who are providing the feed!”  Huh?  They looked at each other in wonder:  “If we did this, we might help people in need, rather than spending so much effort on what we need (or, at least, want)!"  And a small number of these scientists, mainly who were young and still had unsullied minds, dared try to reform the system in this way.  They came to be called Thinkers, an odd cult, one might say.  

Now, whether or not it's true, rumor has it that a few Thinkers did, in fact, separate from the herd.  Unfortunately, I can’t tell you who or where they are, because they remain hidden, knowing that by defying the prevailing System, they would not be well-tolerated.  Posses of Deans, Chairs, and other administrators, journalists, PR-spinners and bureaucrats hunt these Thinkers, their collective enemies, down wherever they can be found.

Meanwhile, as a substitute source of income, the universities admitted far more students than will be able to get jobs, but could ably serve as an additional source of revenue (or, as serfs, to do the lab work that the professors are too busy hustling more grants to do themselves).  This generates what I think Marx and Engels viewed as the exploited army of the unemployed.  I've heard that 'Omicsland is heavily populated with these societal discards.

Of course, all tales of this sort may be fanciful, but there's nothing fancy about them if they're true.  So, if they dared, someone should investigate!

I’m not averse to Christmas

The yearly winter bash

I only wish that this was

Not mainly about cash!

The world needs an oasis

Away from anger’s clash
But mostly Santa’s gift is

A time when prices slash!!

So I pen a verse to Christmas:

To bird and taters mashed

To cheer and loving wishes--

And shopping frenzies passed!