Re: [tlug] Fwd: SYMPOSIUM> Humanities Studies in the Digital Age and the Role of Buddhist Studies, UTokyo 11/16-17

["Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@example.com>]

Raymond Wan writes:

 > Hmmmm...I hate to ruin a "that's academia in Japan" party, but I think
 > that's how things are in many places...  It's not "academia in Japan"
 > but "academia"...

I wish it could be disposed of that easily.  Unfortunately, at least
in economics (my field), computer science and chemistry (I've done a
lot of English review for neighboring faculty), there's a big gap
between the behavior of researchers at top 10 U.S. universities and
top 10 Japanese universities in this respect.  Todai is something of
an exception, but none of the other national universities is, and none
of the private universities get international recognition in economics
or CS AFAIK (maybe Keio for its participation in WIDE, the project
that has done a huge amount for promoting IPv6), dunno about chemistry.

 > Surely tax payer-funded research should be open to all, but there's
 > also a dark side that's often ignored...  :-(

True, but I don't really care about the taxpayers.  What I hate is the
way the faculties are taking aim at their students' feet, and Todai is
no exception there.