Pre-election

Let me share my personal impressions of the conference organized by one of the candidates for President of the Russian Academy of Sciences, since this characterizes the style of a person who can become the head of the Academy and the manager of its considerable resources.

In the fall of 2011, I had the opportunity to participate in the St. Petersburg Scientific Forum, held by Zh.I. Alferov [1], This event made an indelible impression on me and some other participants, among whom there were several Nobel laureates (we managed to exchange a few words with two), not even with its merchant, but with its truly lordly scope. They, like me, felt “uncomfortable with people.” The main banquet for the elite was at the Yusupov Palace. Awww, Leningraders, doesn’t this remind you of the regional committee secretary, Comrade Romanov? During the intermission of the opera at the Mariinsky Theater, the invited speakers were ushered not into a buffet filled with common people, but into a special Hermitage-like hall with appropriate drinks and snacks. But this was not enough. The conductor and director of the Mariinsky Theater also came there to, bending their waist respectfully, introduce themselves to the only Nobelist living in Russia and, at the same time, to the foreign Nobelists who came to visit him. Everything was so tasty and sweet that there seemed to be no “misfortune”, i.e. There was no abolition of serfdom, which happened exactly 150 years earlier, in Russia.

The Skolkovo Foundation and the Russian Federal Property Fund paid for this luxury from the money of Russian taxpayers intended for fundamental science and innovation.

Zhores Ivanovich managed to build communism in one single Academic University. However, I am afraid that there will not be enough money in the treasury to reorganize the entire RAS in the same spirit.

1. http://scientificforum.spb.ru/2011/index.php?row=6&subrow=0&lang=ru