I guess the European Union, which funds the European Research Council, must be useful for something after all.

...But this type of labor is exactly what scholars want to do...

Sorry I am not understanding this or am I missing some intended irony or sarcasm--which scholars; what labour?

Yes basman, Marty is ranting. In his unclear grammar, he wants to say that despite the blather os the activists (typically failed researchers) the real researchers, those that actually do the significant advances, don't care about boycott calls. In his rambling way, Marty has actually praised the academia and laid the blame on the miserable activists.

As for ndmackenzie, it might interest him that Israel was the first financial contributor to EMBO, the European Molecular Biology Organization, the major European scientific organization for the life sciences. Sir John Kendrew, a Nobel laureate and first EMBO president, has publicly recounted how Golda Meir, then Israeli prime minister, was the first head of government to give funds to the nascent EMBO. That was before the UK, before anyone else. That was circa 1970, when Israel was below (in terms of living standards) most Western European countries, and was between two existential wars with ndmackenzie's friends - 1967 and 1973. Yet that little stingy and profiteering Israel has given before anyone else! But don't expect the ndmacknzies of the world to admit Israel has ever done something good, it's theologically non-permissible for them.

EMBO has also been founded independently of the EU. Don't expect accuracy from the ndmacknzies.

What Marty hasn't mentioned is that the Technion has science Nobel laureates, which most British universities don't. There's no question that Cambridge,Oxford are good - and better than Israeli ones. And they should be - they have tradition and a country ten times bigger to draw talent from. But below that, better in Israel. I would take the Weizmann Institute or the Technion over anything in Britain except Oxbridge.

Fascinating about EMBO, sleepy - thanks.

I write as the parent of an Israeli university student finishing his BSc in chemistry and biology at Hebrew U. and applying for graduate work in biophysical chemistry in Israel (I also have a daughter entering her last year at Stern College in NYC, but that is another $tory).

The good news is that against the odds Israel has built some high quality universities and has managed to garner some serioius Nobel prizes in chemistry (actually for work in biochemistry) and economics (plus one in literature but that was not a function of a university).  The bad news is that those prizes were based on work done from the 1950's through the 1980's, and over the past 20 years or so Israel has been subject to a steadily increasing brain drain in the natural sciences.  The reasons are complex but have a lot to do with insufficient research funds, not enough new faculty positions created in Israel's 6 research-based universities (7, if you include Weizmann which is graduate school only), steadily increasing teaching loads.  The quality is also being threatened by ever increasing class sizes and a tendency to "mass produce" undergraduate education.

These troublesome trends stem from the ubiquitous shortage in funds and the pressure from some activist student and faculty groups to push for European-style educational "reforms" where university education is free, and all applicants are accepted as a matter of "right".  As a consequence university tuition is kept ridiculously low (about 10,500 shekels per year) and is totally disconnected from the cost of providing a quality education and retaining quality faculty.  Recent attempts at raising tuition have been met by crippling student and faculty strikes.

The current education minister, the far left-leaning Yuli Tamir (a former professor of philosophy at T.A.U.) is still trying to push for a tuition raise, arguing (correctly, but so far unsuccessfully) that the no-tuition policy at European universities, coupled with easy admission policies, has invariably produced mediocre institutions and graduates.

In short, at least in the world of university level education, the socialist oriented Tamir is willing to concede that you get what you pay for.

Stay tuned....

Hershel Ginsburg

Jerusalem / Efrat

Ginzy: were more funds available between the 50s and the 80s:  if so ok, but if not ,why are things different from the 80s on?

I don't see why it should be "against the odds [that] Israel has built some high quality universities and has managed to garner some serioius Nobel prizes in chemistry (actually for work in biochemistry) and economics (plus one in literature but that was not a function of a university). " It is not as if there have not been spectacularly successful Jewish scientists through the ages.

From ginzy's comments it appears that Israel's education budget, as is that of the United States, is being affected by other budgetary priorities. I wonder what they could be.

mackenzie hypocritically asks:

"I wonder what they could be."

Ask your shiite friends in Iran as their Lebanese Hizbollah and Hamas allies.

But mackenzie already knew the answer.

There isn't going to be a boycott of Israeli academics no matter what a bunch of brain dead Leninist, Trotskyite and Stalinist antisemites think.

"Anthony Julius, acting for 'certain groups of UCU members' has written to Sally Hunt, General Secretary of UCU"  

www.engageonline.org.uk/.../article.php

Gershom Gorenberg who, along with Haim Watzman, runs the South Jerusalem blog has a post on the recent Tom Friedman article that blends into a discussion of the fiscal problem facing Israeli education. Gorenberg writes:

-- Right now, Israeli high-tech is powered by investments made in education many years ago. Some of those investments were made by Israeli parents who got tutors for their kids. A large piece of the investment was made by a different government - the evidence is the Russian accent of many software engineers. But that source of educated personpower has run out.

southjerusalem.com/.../for-tom-friedman-to-win-his-bet-friedmanism-must-go

ndmackenzie said, blah, blah, blah....

more wishful thinking on the part of mackenzie the hyprocrite Brit who has his own country but wants to tell others how to run theirs.

"Almost one in 10 British citizens is living overseas, according to a study of people coming in and out of the UK."

Even the BBC has noticed:

news.bbc.co.uk/.../6210358.stm

"Emigration soars as Britons desert the UK"

www.telegraph.co.uk/.../Emigration-soars-as-Britons-desert-the-UK.html

Pretty soon the only people living  in Britain  will be Arabs. That should bake mackenzie happy.

ndmackenzie said, blah, blah, blah....

more wishful thinking on the part of mackenzie the hyprocrite Brit who has LEFT his own country but wants to tell others how to run theirs.

"Almost one in 10 British citizens is living overseas, according to a study of people coming in and out of the UK."

Even the BBC has noticed:

news.bbc.co.uk/.../6210358.stm

"Emigration soars as Britons desert the UK"

www.telegraph.co.uk/.../Emigration-soars-as-Britons-desert-the-UK.html

Pretty soon the only people living  in Britain  will be Arabs. That should bake mackenzie happy.

Mackenzie is like the 18th century protestant reverend described by Alexander Pope who used to spend his time predicting the fall of the Papacy. He too would site reports about its impending doom.

Same with some deluded Jews who since the founding of the Jewish State have been shouting ‘the sky is falling, the sky is falling.’ Had anyone taken these people seriously nothing would have been accomplished. The fact is that if one reads the press on Israel since 1947 few people believed that the country would establish itself, much less survive and thrive for sixty years. Some Jews still can’t accommodate themselves to success so take refuge in dire predictions.

Mackenzie, on the other hand, is a coward who hides behind the criticism of Israel by other Jews. He is too chicken shit to say out loud what he really thinks, to wit, that he would like to see the Jewish State destroyed.

Mackenzie continues to make us laugh. Now he's arguing that the Soviets-- not the "Russian government" - was responsible for Israel's trove of "programming" talent. There wasn't any serious "programming" to speak of in the Soviet era. There was indeed a lot of intense effort in mathematics and basic science, but all of the code created by those few Russian emigres who've got out was created in their new home countries, mainly Israel and the US.

In any case, America's top technology companies, venture capitalists and brilliant investors like Buffett would not be throwing billions upon billions at Israel now if Israel's technical talent stream were drying up. The increasing flow of FDI suggests that these brilliant investors think the best is yet to come for Israeli technology.

teplukhin2you, what you said.

Also let's not forget that the Soviet discriminated against Jews in higher education and didn't allow them to enter most science programs.

This is what Sergey Brin who should know said.

“Google co-founder: My family left Russia because of anti-Semitism “

By Guy Rolnik, TheMarker  

www.haaretz.co.il/.../ShArtStEng.jhtml'Sergey%20Brin:%20My%20family%20left%20Russia%20because%20of%20anti-Semitism'&dyn_server=172.20.5.5

He also said the following about Israeli technical innovation:

“Google co-founder lauds Israeli innovation in tech, environment”

By Lior Kodner, Haaretz Correspondent and Haaretz Service  

www.haaretz.com/.../983810.html

I am reposting the links to the articles since they didn't work the first time:

teplukhin2you, what you said.

Also let's not forget that the Soviet discriminated against Jews in higher education and didn't allow them to enter most science programs.

This is what Sergey Brin who should know said.

“Google co-founder: My family left Russia because of anti-Semitism “

By Guy Rolnik, TheMarker  

www.haaretz.com/.../PrintArticleEn.jhtml

He also said the following about Israeli technical innovation:

“Google co-founder lauds Israeli innovation in tech, environment”

By Lior Kodner, Haaretz Correspondent and Haaretz Service  

www.haaretz.com/.../PrintArticleEn.jhtml

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