Perplexing PI Lever Pressing

The CSR directives assure us that the priority scores for our grants will be available on eRA Commons within 3 working days of the conclusion of the study section meeting. Of course, we have generally been waiting 4-5 months after initial submission for the study section to be held for a given grant.
Why do we do this?

Remembering

I’m old enough to remember this. And like Janet, I recall the palpable sense of dismay and reversal of progress.
Those of us in biomedical research fields frequently operate in environments that bring us in contact with other scientists who originate in China. Some of us are lucky enough to know a span of age ranges from the older generations who left China before Tiananmen or in the immediate aftermath down to the young whippersnappers fresh out of undergraduate or graduate education. There is a difference. I don’t know if it is a change in who China trains scientifically or who they let seek postdoctoral training in the US. It is possible. But assuming that is not the case, the political attitudes have shifted in the post-Tiananmen generations. They seem to toe the national political line more. They view the demonstrators and civil liberty political types as dangerous, wrong and subversive. And to view the Tiananmen massacre as either necessary or a lie.
My readers are for the most part domestic US folks. China is a far distant place with a different culture and politics. What could we possibly take away from this?
Well, I think some of our younger generation here, politically active and progressive as they are don’t really get it. Luckily, we have revere. Who placed this into the appropriate context.

And who also talks about his history of Palin’ around with terrorists.
If you happen to work with a lot of younger Chinese scientists who seem to have a different appreciation of the events of 20 years ago on Tiananmen Square…check your attitudes on our own political history. It’s worth a thought or two.

Lessons from the BSDs in long black robes

sourceThe good Dr. Jekyll & Mrs. Hyde spotted something the other day that I can’t believe hasn’t been noticed by a wider audience. In the wake of the Sotomayor nomination, DJ&MH posteda telling quote from Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg of the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS).

From this week’s NY Times Week in Review:

But Justice Ginsburg said her own influence in all sorts of cases at the justices’ conferences was uncertain. “I will say something — and I don’t think I’m a confused speaker — and it isn’t until somebody else says it that everyone will focus on the point,” Justice Ginsburg said.

That is, she is one of the nine highest-ranking judges in the nation, with the power to define and defend constitutional law, and she sometimes kinda feels like people ignore the points she makes…until a guy says the same thing ten minutes later.