https://archive.md/YYrav
"Roald Sagdeev has already watched one scientific empire rot from the inside.
When Sagdeev began his career, in 1955, science in the Soviet Union was nearing
its apex. At the Kurchatov Institute in Moscow, he studied the thermonuclear
reactions that occur inside of stars. A few lab tables away, Andrei Sakharov
was developing the hydrogen bomb. The Soviet space program would soon astonish
the world by lofting the first satellite, and then the first human being, into
orbit. Sagdeev can still remember the screaming crowds that greeted returning
cosmonauts in Red Square. But even during those years of triumph, he could see
corruption working its way through Soviet science like a slow-moving poison.
The danger had been present from the U.S.S.R.’s founding. The Bolsheviks who
took power in 1917 wanted scientists sent to Arctic labor camps. (Vladimir
Lenin intervened on their behalf.) When Joseph Stalin took power, he funded
some research generously, but insisted that it conform to his ideology. Sagdeev
said that his school books described Stalin as the father of all fields of
knowledge, and credited the Soviets with every technological invention that had
ever been invented. Later, at scientific conferences, Sagdeev heard physicists
criticize the uncertainty principle of quantum mechanics on the grounds that it
conflicted with Marxism.
By 1973, when Sagdeev was made director of the Soviet Space Research Institute,
the nation’s top center for space science, the Soviets had ceded leadership in
orbit to NASA. American astronauts had flown around the moon and left a
thousand bootprints on its surface. Sagdeev’s institute was short on money.
Many people who worked there had the right Communist Party connections, but no
scientific training. Eventually, he himself had to join the party. “It was the
only way to secure stable funding,” he told me when we spoke in June.
In 1985, Sagdeev briefly gained the ear of power. Mikhail Gorbachev had just
become general secretary at 54, young for the Soviet gerontocracy. He promised
broad reforms and appointed Sagdeev as an adviser. The two traveled to Geneva
together for Gorbachev’s first arms talks with Ronald Reagan. But Sagdeev’s
view of Gorbachev began to dim when the premier filled important scientific
positions with men whom Sagdeev saw as cronies.
In 1988, Sagdeev wrote a letter to Gorbachev to warn him that the leaders of
the Soviet supercomputer program had deceived him. They claimed to be keeping
pace with the United States, but had in fact fallen far behind, and would soon
be surpassed by the Chinese. Gorbachev never replied. Sagdeev got a hint as to
how his letter had been received when his invitation to join a state visit to
Poland was abruptly withdrawn. “I was excommunicated,” he told me.
Sagdeev took stock of his situation. The future of Soviet science was looking
grim. Within a few years, government funding would crater further. Sagdeev’s
most talented colleagues were starting to slip out of the country. One by one,
he watched them start new lives elsewhere. Many of them went to the U.S. At the
time, America was the most compelling destination for scientific talent in the
world. It would remain so until earlier this year."
Via David Farber.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
