"But this is just the beginning of the story as a real gold rush is emerging in that part of the world. An Austrian friend asked me recently to come visit him at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), where he will be lecturing while on a 2-year leave of absence from Cambridge. An Australian friend made sure to let me know about the “purchasing power” (for quality papers of course) of the Saudi-funded mathematical journal that he is now editing. Even more astonishing –to those who know the person– was the highly unlikely news of a prominent American mathematical physicist leaving his job in ETH, Zurich for Arabia.
Is this the dawn of a new gold rush for scientists, or will we soon be calling them the new mercenaries and pontificating on whether all this is “ethical or unethical science”? A little bit of both I guess, as this Science article seems to reveal (besides some dirt).
One commenter was outraged. “How could these western distinguished professors sell their souls for a few Saudi petro-dollars?”
Equally amusing is to see what fellow mathematician, Neil Robertson, said in justifying his post-retirement income. “It’s just capitalism. They have the capital and they want to build something out of it.” He even links it to a higher calling (a mission for his later years away from Columbus, Ohio?). “I’m thinking this might be a breath of fresh air in a closed society,” he says.
Indeed, why not and why should academics be held to a higher standard for human greed than those in other professions? What distinguishes this phenomenon –though political and existential factors were more powerful an incentive then, than the financial one– from the exodus of European scholars to the US during the last century? What makes it different from watching the top US universities raiding each other’s academics, and consequently their awards, their citations and their prestige?" (thanks Sultan S)
Is this the dawn of a new gold rush for scientists, or will we soon be calling them the new mercenaries and pontificating on whether all this is “ethical or unethical science”? A little bit of both I guess, as this Science article seems to reveal (besides some dirt).
One commenter was outraged. “How could these western distinguished professors sell their souls for a few Saudi petro-dollars?”
Equally amusing is to see what fellow mathematician, Neil Robertson, said in justifying his post-retirement income. “It’s just capitalism. They have the capital and they want to build something out of it.” He even links it to a higher calling (a mission for his later years away from Columbus, Ohio?). “I’m thinking this might be a breath of fresh air in a closed society,” he says.
Indeed, why not and why should academics be held to a higher standard for human greed than those in other professions? What distinguishes this phenomenon –though political and existential factors were more powerful an incentive then, than the financial one– from the exodus of European scholars to the US during the last century? What makes it different from watching the top US universities raiding each other’s academics, and consequently their awards, their citations and their prestige?" (thanks Sultan S)
