{"id":237631,"date":"2013-12-16T13:21:05","date_gmt":"2013-12-16T13:21:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/2013\/12\/16\/hellotailor-mugglepolitics\/"},"modified":"2018-09-29T19:21:33","modified_gmt":"2018-09-29T19:21:33","slug":"hellotailor-mugglepolitics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/2013\/12\/16\/hellotailor-mugglepolitics\/","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"<div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-237631 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail'><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/2013\/12\/16\/hellotailor-mugglepolitics\/attachment\/237632\/'><img width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/tumblr_mxf3x2LD201sgerh2o1_500-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/tumblr_mxf3x2LD201sgerh2o1_500-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/tumblr_mxf3x2LD201sgerh2o1_500-100x100.jpg 100w\" sizes=\"100vw\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/hellotailor.tumblr.com\/post\/69705306348\/mugglepolitics-utcjonesobservatory-peter\" class=\"tumblr_blog\" target=\"_blank\">hellotailor<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><a class=\"tumblr_blog\" href=\"http:\/\/mugglepolitics.tumblr.com\/post\/69683414864\/utcjonesobservatory-peter-higgs-i-wouldnt-be\" target=\"_blank\">mugglepolitics<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><a class=\"tumblr_blog\" href=\"http:\/\/utcjonesobservatory.tumblr.com\/post\/69233808535\/peter-higgs-i-wouldnt-be-productive-enough-for\" target=\"_blank\">utcjonesobservatory<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><strong>Peter Higgs: I Wouldn\u2019t Be Productive Enough For Today\u2019s Academic System:\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<div id=\"main-content-picture\">\n<div class=\"caption\">Peter Higgs: \u2018Today I wouldn\u2019t get an academic job. It\u2019s as simple as that\u2019. Photograph: David Levene for the Guardian<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"article-body-blocks\">\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/science\/peterhiggs\" title=\"More from the Guardian on Peter Higgs\" target=\"_blank\">Peter Higgs<\/a>, the British physicist who gave his name to the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/science\/higgs-boson\" title=\"More from the Guardian on Higgs boson\" target=\"_blank\">Higgs boson<\/a>, believes no university would employ him in today\u2019s academic system because he would not be considered \u201cproductive\u201d enough.<\/p>\n<p>The emeritus professor at Edinburgh University, who says he has never sent an email, browsed the internet or even made a mobile phone call, published fewer than 10 papers after his groundbreaking work, which identified the mechanism by which subatomic material acquires mass, was published in 1964.<\/p>\n<p>He doubts a similar breakthrough could be achieved in today\u2019s academic culture, because of the expectations on academics to collaborate and keep churning out papers. He said: \u201cIt\u2019s difficult to imagine how I would ever have enough peace and quiet in the present sort of climate to do what I did in 1964.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Speaking to the Guardian en route to Stockholm to receive the 2013 Nobel prize for science, Higgs, 84, said he would almost certainly have been sacked had he not been nominated for the Nobel in 1980.<\/p>\n<p>Edinburgh University\u2019s authorities then took the view, he later learned, that he \u201cmight get a Nobel prize \u2013 and if he doesn\u2019t we can always get rid of him\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Higgs said he became \u201can embarrassment to the department when they did research assessment exercises\u201d. A message would go around the department saying: \u201cPlease give a list of your recent publications.\u201d Higgs said: \u201cI would send back a statement: \u2018None.\u2019 \u201c<\/p>\n<p>By the time he retired in 1996, he was uncomfortable with the new academic culture. \u201cAfter I retired it was quite a long time before I went back to my department. I thought I was well out of it. It wasn\u2019t my way of doing things any more. Today I wouldn\u2019t get an academic job. It\u2019s as simple as that. I don\u2019t think I would be regarded as productive enough.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Higgs revealed that his career had also been jeopardised by his disagreements in the 1960s and 70s with the then principal, Michael Swann, who went on to chair the BBC. Higgs objected to Swann\u2019s handling of student protests and to the university\u2019s shareholdings in South African companies during the apartheid regime. \u201c[Swann] didn\u2019t understand the issues, and denounced the student leaders.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He regrets that the particle he identified in 1964 became known as the \u201cGod particle\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>He said: \u201cSome people get confused between the science and the theology. They claim that what happened at\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/science\/cern\" title=\"More from the Guardian on Cern\" target=\"_blank\">Cern<\/a>\u00a0proves the existence of God.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>An atheist since the age of 10, he fears the nickname \u201creinforces confused thinking in the heads of people who are already thinking in a confused way. If they believe that story about creation in seven days, are they being intelligent?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He also revealed that he turned down a knighthood in 1999. \u201cI\u2019m rather cynical about the way the honours system is used, frankly. A whole lot of the honours system is used for political purposes by the government in power.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He has not yet decided which way he will vote in the referendum on<a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/politics\/scottish-independence\" title=\"More from the Guardian on Scottish independence\" target=\"_blank\">Scottish independence<\/a>. \u201cMy attitude would depend a little bit on how much progress the lunatic right of the Conservative party makes in trying to get us out of\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/europe-news\" title=\"More from the Guardian on Europe\" target=\"_blank\">Europe<\/a>. If the UK were threatening to withdraw from Europe, I would certainly want\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/uk\/scotland\" title=\"More from the Guardian on Scotland\" target=\"_blank\">Scotland<\/a>\u00a0to be out of that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He has never been tempted to buy a television, but was persuaded to watch The Big Bang Theory last year, and said he wasn\u2019t impressed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Every line of this was mind-boggling and engaging.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Peter Higgs is so awesome.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>hellotailor: mugglepolitics: utcjonesobservatory: Peter Higgs: I Wouldn\u2019t Be Productive Enough For Today\u2019s Academic System:\u00a0 Peter Higgs: \u2018Today I wouldn\u2019t get an academic job. It\u2019s as simple as that\u2019. Photograph: David Levene for the Guardian Peter Higgs, the British physicist who gave his name to the\u00a0Higgs boson, believes no university would employ him in today\u2019s academic &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/2013\/12\/16\/hellotailor-mugglepolitics\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"gallery","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[949,24079,185,4],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237631"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=237631"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237631\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":237633,"href":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237631\/revisions\/237633"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=237631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=237631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=237631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}