David Deutsch: Einstein Would Fail Modern Grant Applications
episodePreviously titled “Einstein Would Fail Modern Grant Applications | David Deutsch” — renamed by the publisher on Aug 3, 2026
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Why would Einstein fail a modern grant application?
Why would Einstein fail a modern grant application? Fortunately, I'm not very familiar with with the way that um grant applications are dealt with. I only know the gross features In both senses of the word gross, the Uh th that is where where I noticed that grants that should have been awarded aren't Um fairly reliably when it comes to fundamental research, which is what I'm mainly interested in. So uh Judging by my experience, and I certainly don't know what it was like what it was like uh over a hundred years ago in Germany. But um Um Judging by my experience today in in Britain and in America Um he he he wouldn't have stood a very good chance because Um he wouldn't have been able to say Um what the application well first of all you wouldn't have been able to say very clearly what
Uh he was trying to do Because uh there was no one On the Panel, the judged Physics applications. So none of them would have known what a manifold is, um what the Riemann tensor is, uh so so his application would have had to explain that in very elementary terms. And they w would have had in front of them a pile of applications to Which from their point of view had much more merit because they they could see that these were open research problems that needed to be solved. Only On the bigger p in the bigger picture. They were incremental, whereas the Uh Einstein's was fundamental. So uh I I think he would have had difficulty getting a grant and I think in historical fact he did have such difficulty. Uh it was only when Max Planck
saw that there was something interesting about him that that he got him a job and again, that isn't possible nowadays because there'd be anti nepotism rules, there'd be rules about uh the procedure and all the pr every procedural rule um is a is an impediment to uh any new kind of thing being tried.
Anti nepotism sounds positive. What's the negative side to it?
Well the so um n nepotism so literally if it means not giving a job to your nephew, then perhaps perhaps that uh perhaps that has merit. But uh what it means is uh in practice that if you know someone personally, you can't take part in the selection process for that person. And you certainly can't get the university to let that person in. So it all has to be at arm's length. In order to ensure fairness. Now the The amount of unfairness that can be caused by not having that rule is very tiny compared with the enormous unfairness of having that rule, because having that rule means that only people who know nothing about the candidate can rule on whether the candidate's accepted.
So the natural question that arises in someone's mind is why is it that we need grants anyhow? So professors of the past, like and I'm speaking about fundamental physics, not just a generic professor, but say Einstein or Feynman or or Everett, which I know you have some personal stories on Everett and I'd like to get to those at some point. But I'd never heard them complain about the grant system. However, I hear complaints, especially off air, from contemporary professors about it frequently. So why does one require grants if they're already paid a salary? What are the grants for? What if you don't get a grant? Are you just sitting around twiddling your thumbs? Are you then seen as a net cost to the university and they just make you lecture?
Yeah, uh I yeah, th that's what it is. I I uh I I repeat, I'm not very familiar with the system and that's not an accident. I have d uh intentionally distanced myself from any knowledge of the system because i it is a very unpleasant thing to be as to be uh connected with. But yes, um professors Uh can do full time teaching. Um, most of them don't want to. Uh and that's uh not because they don't like teaching, I I think in many cases, but because they have to teach to a regimented um uh curriculum and syllabus and uh they can't exercise their creativity and and uh reveal to students why they are are passionate about the subject. And they have to get through a lot of it because the students are all competing with each other to get the exam results, which aren't uh which are a very inaccurate measure.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
Why would Einstein fail a modern grant application?
0:00–12:23
2
How do anti‑nepotism rules affect the chances of getting a grant?
12:23–27:07
3
What problems arise from the current grant‑funding structure for fundamental research?
27:07–52:34
4
Why is fundamental research considered essential despite the focus on incremental work?
52:34–1:05:09
5
What does David Deutsch say about the evidence for string theory and its impact on physics?
1:05:09–1:32:29
6
How does the conversation shift to Everett’s many‑worlds interpretation and the probability problem?
1:32:29–2:01:26
7
What is the basic axiom of Constructor Theory and how does it differ from conventional physics?
2:01:26–2:11:33
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