I made the mistake of taking on a grant review in my old field of research. The first this year. Much has happened since January. And many of my priorities have changed. A few reflections. /1

After reading the grant proposal, I had to decline the review, because of an intellectual conflict of interest. The proposal was well-written, certainly not uninteresting in terms of proposals in its field, and the applicant was well qualified. /2

But for one, reading through the 30-page proposal made me viscerally sick. All the hours and effort wasted for a 10–15% funding chance. Excessive details, time planning, questions about applicability, and whatnot. All a tremendous waste of time. /3

The basic truth is that once reviewers & panels have sorted out the loonies, the incompetents, the lazies, and the psychopaths, they perform no better than a random lottery to assess the potential for success of a project. /4

Worse: reviewers & panels introduce a (conservative) bias & cronyism into the process that stifle innovation and playful exploration in basic science. I had this very clear feeling suddenly that I really (really) do not want to be part of this ever again. /5

And then the proposal itself: single-cell sequencing, network inference & analysis. Goodness, I’m bored of this. Technical fads come and go, and ideas die in biology. We’re stuck in the wrong corner of thinking, and nobody can do anything about it. /6

Because the truth is that millions are wasted on yet another genome, yet another single cell sequenced. It’s just one damn thing after another. What we need is conceptual innovation. We need to rediscover life. Treating the living world as a machine is what got us here. /7

I cannot support funding any more of this stuff as long as it’s impossible to make a living with speculative explorations that tackle the hard problems in the field. It’s time to change the way we study life. Get out of the mechanistic cage. /8

Nobody will fund that. Especially not with panels stacked with academic politicians who just want more of the same… /9

Obviously, I had to resign as a reviewer. I can’t take my despair out on anyone who is actually willing to continue suffering and surviving in this system. I admire you. I could no longer take it. This is what academia is like these days. /10

Obviously, this is my personal view. Based on my personal experience.

I am not anti science. On the contrary, we need good science more than ever.

I am not against academia. We need academia more than ever. /11

But it’s time to move beyond this monster of an academic system we’ve created, where innovators no longer belong. The system has to change. Change will not come from within. That’s why I’ve left. And I don’t miss it. Not a bit. /12