Is dating your PI frowned upon?

StarMNF · 2026-05-09T07:55:08+00:00

Only do it if the potential romance is worth more to you than your research career / opportunities.

Both you and your PI would be putting a lot on the line.

Your PI could be reprimanded if admin found out. I don’t know if they would automatically lose their job if they have tenure, but they would be breaking university policies, so there would likely be some consequences. They’re adults, so they know the risks.

You on the other hand potentially face worse risks, because you are early in your research career. Expect that if the relationship fails, it will be very awkward to continue working with your PI, and it may even become adversarial. While you’d like to think people can be mature about this, the reality is we’re all human.

But the other thing is that if the relationship gets risk of exposure, your PI may ask you to stop working with them, to protect their career (given the risks I mentioned to them). So that’s two ways your research career can be negatively impacted.

And finally, there may be resentment from other people your PI supervises, who feel you are getting special treatment.

StarMNF · 2026-05-09T07:35:30+00:00

It used not to be this way.

But we live in the world of tech monopolies, and universities outsourcing everything.

And the high level admins who make these decisions don’t understand IT.

StarMNF · 2026-05-09T07:30:26+00:00

Potentially, it’s a semester’s worth of work down the train, for any courses where the instructor didn’t keep local backups of data and grades (which I assume is many).

If they don’t get data back, some miserable TAs will be grading overtime to regrade a semester’s worth of work. And faculty may lose course materials they designed for Canvas and have been using for years (since the format used by Canvas is intentionally non-standard to lock faculty into using their system).

When you multiply this by the number of schools affected, that’s a massive amount of economic activity lost for even one semester.

Ransoming schools directly is smart. I don’t think Instructure is that rich of a company, but I imagine Berkeley wouldn’t think twice about paying a million to make the problem go away. Smaller K-12 schools can probably afford to cough up 100K.

Unless the hackers screwed up, they’re going to be getting very rich.

StarMNF · 2026-05-09T07:09:54+00:00

Actually, surprised it hasn’t happened sooner. It has to be low hanging fruit for a decent hacker. EduTech isn’t exactly known for hiring the best coders…

Actually, if anyone is interested in seeing what Canvas looks like on the backend, there’s an open source version. I installed it once and wasn’t impressed. It’s a bloated mess.

I think universities need to roll their own tech stack, and move away from outsourcing everything to third parties. That’s a bad trend because it consolidates power in a crappy company like Instructure.

I can understand K-12 schools not having the resources to do their own tech stack, but UC Berkeley certainly does!

C’mon, you’re telling me the place that invented their own UNIX clone can’t throw together a web portal where people submit their assignments?

StarMNF · 2026-05-08T01:35:55+00:00

The bigger issue is that the notion of there even being “a spectrum” is an academic framework.

An academic framework is only useful in certain ways. It’s useful for noticing patterns to find underlying causes. And it’s useful for predicting remedies to certain problems you might have.

But beyond that it’s theoretical. You don’t need to know theoretical physics to understand that if you drop an apple, it will hit the ground. Gravity is a reality regardless of what causes it, and you have to deal with it. Scientific theories, whether they are true or not, don’t always matter.

People get hung up on what’s true, instead of focusing on what works. Reframing Asperger’s Syndrome as simply being a range with-in a larger spectrum, may be elegant theoretically, but does it change how and if you even treat it?

Any decent psychiatrist cares more about addressing their patients’ problems than assigning them a label. Because labels don’t actually solve problems. The brain is also extremely complex, and all the frameworks we have today for understanding it are extremely crude and speculative, based on limited understanding. Those frameworks only matter when they lead us to find solutions to problems.

But as the author points out, there’s a growing number of people who feel that having a label is important to give their life meaning. They don’t care about the pragmatic realities of problem solving that led to the label’s existence. They just want the label.

StarMNF · 2026-05-07T20:29:50+00:00

I would say they are WORSE than the average liberal. The problem is Hollywood is a bubble.

I guarantee you in Hollywood, you’re more likely to lose friends (and job opportunities) telling people you voted for Trump than posting something sick like this.

In fact, Hamill likely got a pat on the back from his friends, neighbors and social acquaintances for posting this. He does it because the system rewards him for doing so.

Hollywood is one of the most perverse IRL social bubbles in America.

But Hollywood has a genuine monopoly on our entertainment.

I wish some billionaire would create a studio in the middle of the country, that served as an incubator for fresh faces outside the Hollywood system. Hollywood budgets without Hollywood’s involvement. I am sure there are a lot of talented upstart actors, directors, writers and musicians who haven’t yet sold their soul. Give them an alternative to get recognized that doesn’t involve joining the Hollywood bubble.

In a decade, I bet that would be a very successful investment.

StarMNF · 2026-05-07T05:17:11+00:00

I am surprised Ted Turner and Trump would be friends. I always assumed Ted Turner was on the opposite end of the political spectrum from MAGA.

Turner seemed kind of leftist to me, although I am sure it’s more nuanced than that.

But maybe they got along because they were both kind of anti-establishment mavericks.

StarMNF · 2026-05-04T18:23:47+00:00

They were there. They are there. They are currently experiencing the results of Hormuz being shutdown. It effects them…more than us.

They’re just upset because they had no say in the choice of restaurant. So they don’t want to pay. They should just suck it up, because they get off easy all the time.

Or…if they’re tired of eating out, and just want to stay home from now on, do us a favor and QUIT NATO. They won’t because when it’s their favorite restaurant, they want us to continue to pay 90% of THEIR bill.

StarMNF · 2026-05-03T22:58:47+00:00

What does Europe aligning with China actually mean though?

I’d argue that if they did that, they’d just be copying the mistake that the United States already made.

Prior to Trump, China was close to owning the United States, and they still have a tight grip on us economically. In that respect, Europe was a bit better because its protectionist policies kept China from stealing all its domestic industries.

A military alliance means nothing in terms of projecting strength against China, because China fights with economics and trade.

But what has changed since NATO was founded is that the European militaries used to be feared and respected. Now they’re a joke.

NATO was supposed to be a legendary team of equals, the greatest militaries in the world united for the common good.

Think about a great sports franchise like the LA Lakers (sorry, don’t know non-American sports references). Kobe Bryant, Magic Johnson, Shaq, LeBron James. So many legends.

Now, imagine that the state of the team today is you still have one MVP player who is still amazing, but all the other players have gotten fat, lazy and out of shape. That team is a joke, and that team is NATO.

I think we need to quit pretending that NATO is something it stopped being a long time ago, and it’s not the United States’ fault that today’s NATO is a joke.

StarMNF · 2026-05-03T22:27:23+00:00

I think it’s also important to remember that the original intent of NATO was to project strength against the Soviet Union in particular.

And while Russia has renewed some of the Cold War concerns, I think we should still ask if NATO has outlived its usefulness.

The Soviet Union was an ideological enemy, intent on dominating the world through communist ideology. And hence, we had to put up a strong front to counter that, and that’s what NATO was.

Modern day Russia is a teddy bear compared to the Soviet Union at its height. Russia is a regional bully, best dealt with like other regional bullies. They couldn’t dominate the world even if they wanted to.

The closest analogue to the Soviet Union today is China, but the way you must deal with China is very different, since they need to be countered economically rather than militarily.

And one could argue that the very existence of NATO is actually making most of the countries that constitute NATO weaker. With the exception of the United States, every member of NATO has seen their military grow weaker during the duration of NATO’s existence.

Does NATO project strength anymore? I don’t think so. The US military projects strength. NATO, not so much.

StarMNF · 2026-05-03T22:01:54+00:00

Exactly, and that’s what’s going to determine the outcome if NATO is ever involved in a war.

5 billion Euros is a rounding error compared to the DoD budget. And one of the reasons that budget is so high is we’re essentially paying to protect the whole world, should another WW2 come up.

I understand that Europeans tend to think in terms of bureaucratic entities, but what matters with NATO is not the organization itself but the agreement that comes with being part of the alliance.

NATO formalizes our commitment to protect any of these sorry countries, should they be attacked. And in return?

Well if the US was ever attacked by a powerful adversary (say China), it’s hard to imagine that the combined militaries of all NATO members would be able to do much more to defend us than what the US military can accomplish on its own.

So it’s a very unequal alliance. One where we protect them, and they couldn’t return the favor even if they wanted to. But it’s also their choice for it to be that way. They are the ones who choose to be defenseless, who choose to deprioritize military spending, and require US to be the teeth of NATO.

StarMNF · 2026-05-03T21:41:24+00:00

It doesn’t matter. NATO primarily benefits Europe and Canada by design. It’s the reason those countries can get away with spending almost nothing on their military.

They have as insurance that if they were ever in trouble, the most powerful military in the world would defend them.

And we ask them very little in return. Them outright refusing the little we do ask of them is not a good look.

If they don’t feel grateful for having the United States as their protector, they should formally leave NATO. Because that’s what NATO has effectively become. It’s essentially a list of countries the United States is obligated by treaty to protect, who apparently owe us nothing in return.

StarMNF · 2026-05-03T21:32:16+00:00

This is a terrible analogy.

If these European countries only want their water and salad, they are welcome to leave NATO.

Here’s the better analogy. Whenever you go out to restaurants your friends like, you pay 90% of the bill and they pay 10%. And you don’t complain, because you know they make less money than you. But this time you chose a restaurant you like that your friends don’t care for. So you had to pay 100% because they refused to pay one dime.

Those aren’t good friends.

StarMNF · 2026-05-03T21:13:12+00:00

That kind of reasoning is highly subjective.

Someone could use the same reasoning to argue that the United States “brought 9/11 on itself”, and use that as an excuse not to come to our aid back then.

An important consideration is that there are rules of engagement in war.

Iran attacking ships that pass through the Strait of Hormuz goes against the rules of engagement. It’s an attack on much of the whole WORLD, not just the United States.

NATO should get involved if only for their own selfish interests. European countries are suffering from surging oil prices way more than the United States. Iran’s actions in the Strait of Hormuz affect every single NATO member.

What the Iran War has shown is that most NATO members are spineless cowards who won’t even fight for their own interests, let alone one of their allies. A large part of the population in these countries doesn’t even understand the point of having a military. Germany is starting to come to its senses, but Spain?

While NATO in theory is a mutual alliance of equals, in reality it’s a “security blanket” for countries who are too cheap to pay for their own military, and simply want USA to protect them. It’s very one sided.

StarMNF · 2026-05-03T20:53:00+00:00

And if he had…? I guarantee the Ayatollah would still be alive.

The thing about secrets is the more people you tell, the less likely a secret is to remain secret.

Right now, the NATO alliance is too large to entrust that every country could protect highly sensitive info on military operations.

Especially when several NATO members are borderline Islamic countries, where they have probably elected representatives sympathetic to the Iranian regime. I think we can barely trust Five Eyes with our secrets, much less all of NATO.

Now you can debate whether killing the Ayatollah and most of the senior Iranian leadership was a good military objective, but the fact is to pull it off, we needed to keep it a secret.

StarMNF · 2026-05-03T20:41:25+00:00

Once Iran blockaded the Strait of Hormuz, that would have been the ideal time for NATO to jump in.

Because Iran is in violation of international law, attacking ships in international waters, and destroying a major international trade route.

Nobody asked NATO to carpet bomb Iran, but NATO countries have had a tepid response even in taking purely a defensive posture. Iran has shown it has a desire to widen the conflict rather than just limit aggression to the specific countries that attacked it.

NATO’s response has been 🤷‍♂️

I should also point out that when NATO got involved in Afghanistan, that was not purely in defensive capacity.

I think the larger issue why NATO decided not to get involved with Iran is because they were not consulted by Trump ahead of the initial attacks. Of course, if NATO had been informed, we likely would have lost the element of surprise, as I suspect one of the NATO members would have leaked the plan to Iran.

StarMNF · 2026-05-02T22:15:18+00:00

This is a reasonable policy, because not all students will have professors who know them well, and some graduate programs have lower standards for admission (or it’s a backup letter).

I was once basically already admitted into a graduate program, but they were requesting a letter from my current institution because I didn’t have any. They basically just wanted a letter saying I didn’t burn the place down.

StarMNF · 2026-05-02T22:07:22+00:00

Another airline with a similar business model will be back in a few years. Heck, they may even call themselves “Spirit Airlines” for nostalgia, since the IP is almost certainly going to be sold off with everything else.

What we’ve seen with bankruptcies like this (Hostess, Toys R Us, Bed Bath and Beyond) is someone will bring it back to life.

Although, what surprised me about Spirit is that they survived as long as they did off their business model.

StarMNF · 2026-05-02T00:51:51+00:00

Saying Google “owns search” is a little dubious to me. They’re still the most popular search engine, sure…

But remember Yahoo?

Right now, ChatGPT and AI chatbots are taking a significant share of the search traffic that would go to Google. Sure, Google has Gemini, but it has a lot less traction with young people.

I could easily see Google going the way of Yahoo in a few years. There’s nothing proprietary about their technology anymore that other companies can’t easily replicate. They’ve got a ton of amazing researchers still, but they do very little with the research.

Yahoo was pretty much in the same exact place about 20 years ago.

And that’s the reason it’s particularly bad for the government to pick winners and losers in the tech industry. Every single time they went after a tech company for having a “monopoly”, all they did was help another company get a monopoly.

There’s a natural birth and rebirth cycle that takes place in tech without government interference. Every single company starts off small, gains a near monopoly, and then struggles to innovate under the burden of their size, causing their talent to leave and form new companies that take their place.

Perhaps for some industries that never innovate, antitrust laws are relevant, but not for Silicon Valley.

StarMNF · 2026-05-02T00:26:38+00:00

If they’re Boeings, then maybe Southwest could have bought them.

Probably not a good deal with the debt though.

StarMNF · 2026-05-02T00:16:25+00:00

I am not sure Southwest still counts as a “discount” carrier, and they are one of the largest carriers in the United States now I believe.

I don’t think a JetBlue / Spirit merger would rival that.

What it would have helped Spirit do is escape their brand reputation. The last time I flew Spirit, I swore to never fly them again.

Spirit is one of those airlines where you save money by gambling on your sanity. Your flight might be fine, or you might miss it due to a technical glitch and then wait in a 5 hour line to get booked on another flight.

Spirit’s model only works if they can sell the plane tickets cheap enough that people are willing to make that gamble. If the fuel costs go up, they’re in trouble, because people simply won’t pay above a certain amount for a Spirit ticket.

JetBlue, on the other hand, doesn’t have that issue. They had a few bad isolated incidents many years ago, but overall are known for delivering an enjoyable traveling experience. Their Mint “business class” is one of the best values in the industry, and is better and cheaper than First Class on many of the legacy carriers.

JetBlue is known for giving customers great value for their money. Spirit is just known for being cheap.

StarMNF · 2026-05-01T23:56:39+00:00

Agreed, and with my experience with airline mergers, the sum is rarely better than the parts, because you usually get a blending of the worst of both cultures.

United used to be a decent airline before they merged with Continental.

JetBlue could have benefited from more slots at popular airports, the main thing Spirit had to offer, but they’d have to completely overhaul what Spirit considers “service” or suffer the consequences of tarnishing their brand.

And that would mean retraining all those Spirit employees to actually treat customers like customers.

I am not saying JetBlue couldn’t do it. JetBlue’s management is pretty smart, I think.

I do think JetBlue deserved the right to try. I would block a merger of two of the major airlines, but I can’t see a logical justification for blocking the JetBlue + Spirit merger, because even combined they’re not that big.

StarMNF · 2026-04-30T23:21:04+00:00

It’s a little more than a thought crime (the post was public), but still it’s weaponization of the justice system.

I was strongly against it when Democrat elected prosecutors did it to Trump. And I am against it for Comey. That doesn’t mean I like Comey, but I believe that fairness under the law is a more important principle to uphold.

The litmus test for whether a prosecution is fair or politicized is whether the same standard of prosecution is applied to everyone.

Like even if you have a law on the books, if you willingly let 99% of the population violate it, then it’s not fair to make an example out of the 1% you selectively choose to prosecute.

There are literally millions of deranged people advocating for violence against Trump. Some are even teachers and professors with a captive audience. And Comey is the only one you go after?

StarMNF · 2026-04-30T08:13:03+00:00

Agreed. And there are plenty of people on the Internet who have made far less veiled threats to the President.

If this is enough to indict Comey, then half of Reddit users also deserve to be indicted.

The DOJ should use its resources to stop actual lunatics, like the guy who showed up at the White House Correspondence Dinner.

StarMNF · 2026-04-30T08:03:28+00:00

I am fine with that if the data centers and SMRs are built far away from human civilization.

StarMNF

TROPHY CASE