Stanford President Marc Tessier-Lavigne will resign effective Aug. 31. He will also retract or issue lengthy corrections to five widely cited papers for which he was principal author after a Stanford-sponsored investigation found “manipulation of research data.”
Let me preface this by saying I’ve worked in both academia and private enterprise.
I would say it’s more proof that the idea of academia as an “ivory tower” that holds itself to a higher standard than business and government is utterly delusional. Academia is subject to the same desire for power, money, and prestige because it’s run by people, and people with too much ambition and not enough integrity tend to rise to the top because they simply do not care about ethics. It’s the same everywhere; higher education is no different than the business world.
Except that the saying, “those who can’t do, teach; those who can’t teach become college professors” is absolutely true without exception and I will fight anyone who disagrees.
I had some really good college professors. And a couple of shitty ones.
College professors teach classes. Do you mean university administrators?
Academics do research and publish papers. Getting recognition for your research attracts grant funding and leadership opportunities. One could say this can corrupt the pursuit of truth and knowledge.
I’ve seen academics push colleagues to be cited in their papers in order to grow their influence. Counting citations is a way academics compete and try to show their value. It doesn’t necessarily correlate to quality research.
Okay, i agree with all of that, but I was addressing that “those who can’t do, teach; those who can’t teach become college professors” can’t make sense as college professors, in addition to research, teach college courses.
Albert Einstein was a college professor for a large chunk of his life (Bern, ETH Zurich, etc) I think he should get a pass.
Einstein was the world’s greatest patent clerk who dabbled with physics on the side
Anytime the government freely gives money to industries, they get incredibly bloated and extorted by these types.
It’s sad, because often the money is supposed to go to a good cause, but over time it always seems to end up like this.