Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watnot!watdcsu!brewster From: brewster@watdcsu.UUCP Newsgroups: can.politics Subject: Re: Potshots Message-ID: <3085@watdcsu.UUCP> Date: Thu, 5-Mar-87 13:38:40 EST Article-I.D.: watdcsu.3085 Posted: Thu Mar 5 13:38:40 1987 Date-Received: Fri, 6-Mar-87 21:38:08 EST References: <206@fornax.uucp> <3063@watdcsu.UUCP> <241@pembina.alberta.UUCP> <251@pembina.alberta.UUCP> Distribution: can Organization: U of Waterloo, Ontario Lines: 94 >From: cdshaw@alberta.UUCP (Chris Shaw) >> If instead of taking the current state of Toronto say, and cloning >> 10 more, we took the current state, and produced 5 improved >> "super"-clones then I agree with your conclusion. >The point you're so desperately trying to make is that if you doubled Torontos >budget then it then Americans would be travelling North for their education. Not exactly, I was trying to say that if you increased Torontos budget (by some factor) then it might be reasonable to call it a world class research institution, which might have the side affect of Americans coming north; but would more likely have the side affect of more foreigners of every type coming to study in Canada, which is good or bad depending on your personal viewpoint. I don't believe that anyone considers Toronto (or Waterloo, or McGill, or etc.), in their current state, to be world class research institutions. (Pockets of excellence do not a world class institution make, and no one will dispute that there are some pockets of excellence in Canadian universities). I grant that there are universities around the world (and in the US), that are worse off, but there are also universities doing much, much better. Berkeley recently announce an alumni fund raising drive which will attempt to raise 1 BILLION dollars by 1991. Compare this to Waterloo's recent Watfund which raised approx 30 million over the same length of time and which includes to some extent corporate donations such as computer stock that companies couldn't move and so dumped for tax write-offs. Who will be able to afford to do leading edge research in the 90's ?? >Actually, most of this cash in the US comes from that huge fount of free bucks, >the Military. For example, a report from MIT indicated that more than 25% >of their research funds were from the DOD. Another interesting statistic >reported recently in IEEE Software indicated that the "top 5" CS >schools in the US got the lion's share of DOD money. Say about 50%. The >remaining schools of the top 30 got 45%, and the rest got bits & pieces. >The fault I find with your estimation of research quality in US vs Canada is >that you're comparing their top 5 with our top 5. When 50% of the US military's >research budget is spent in their top 5, one expects a skew. MY point was >that if you take a look at US schools 6-30, and applied the factor of 10, >Canadian schools come out ahead, simply because within the 6-30 range, there >is not such a gross funding skew. I don't debate your figures but I do debate your conclusion. Sure a lot of research money comes from military in the US, and a lot of people feel this is anywhere from undesirable to unacceptable to morally repugnant. But that doesn't change the fact that the schools in question are doing excellent research. Despite any personal qualms you have about how research is funded, you can't simply ignore the research results. It sounds like you are saying "If we ignore the top universities in the States then Canada comes out even or ahead in quality." This seems to be analogous to saying that since the NFL receives large network revenues, the average CFL team is actually better than the average NFL team after the top NFL teams are dismissed from the comparison due to the revenue skew. And while the BC Lions "might" beat the Bills, this matchup isn't really a fair comparison of the two leagues. It seems to be a little bogus (as opposed to bogus as hell) to simply apply your factor of 10 for comparison purposes. Institutions simply dont scale by multiples. Double the budget of Toronto and you won't have twice as many undergrads, twice as many grads and profs, twice as many publications, twice as many results, twice as many breakthroughs. This is especially true of public institutions. If the Canadian swivel service doubled in size do you think service would double ? if it were cut in half would service drop by a factor of two ?? I also feel that your refusal to admit that the US has better research institutions may in part be related to some misplaced nationalism. You know, "The US has better research institutions than us ???, no way, we're Canadians and we're at least as good as you are, why, we may even be better than your are, yeah, yeah, thats the ticket, we're twice as good, no, three times as good as you are, why, we're the best in the world, yeah, yeah, thats the ticket." If our institutions are not world class it seems to me that the people attending these institutions should be telling this to the public so as to increase support, as opposed to vaccuously claiming we are at least as good as the US and probably even better. Try not to become a man UUCP : {decvax|ihnp4}!watmath!watdcsu!brewster of success but rather try Else : Dave Brewer, (519) 886-6657 to become a man of value. Albert Einstein