This week's issue of Nature includes an interesting editorial emphasizing how crucial it is that scientists and engineers learn how to communicate their value to the general populace. This is something I've thought about for quite some time, as have a number of other people - see this article in Physics Today (subscription only, I'm afraid), this related blog post, and a discussion in the Houston Chronicle's science blog.
It's hard not to get down about this whole topic. Industrial R&D funding (for projects with more than a year lead time) is a shadow of what it used to be, and looming fiscal austerity may well cripple federally funded basic research. If companies aren't willing to invest for the long term, and government is unable or unwilling to invest for the long term, then technological innovation may shift away from the US. If more of the general public and politicians appreciated that things like the iPad, XBox, the internet, and flat screen TVs didn't come out of nowhere, maybe the situation would be different.
By the way, I find it interesting that the Nature editorial discusses looming cuts to Texas physics departments, a topic I mentioned here and was discussed in the New York Times, and yet our own Houston Chronicle hasn't bothered to write about them. At all. Even on their online science blog. Yes, they're aware of the topic, too. Clearly they've had more newsworthy things to worry about.
By the way, I find it interesting that the Nature editorial discusses looming cuts to Texas physics departments, a topic I mentioned here and was discussed in the New York Times, and yet our own Houston Chronicle hasn't bothered to write about them. At all. Even on their online science blog. Yes, they're aware of the topic, too. Clearly they've had more newsworthy things to worry about.
11 comments:
While the US consumer has clearly benefited from the products of federally funded basic research, it is not at all clear that the US economy has, in terms of jobs created.
Really? You realize that the Internet started as federally funded research, right?
See here: http://www.sciencecoalition.org/successstories/
And http://www.brookings.edu/testimony/2010/0629_research_innovation_litan.aspx
Basic research leads to long term innovation overall, oratleast it has historically. If it is not funded by industry and not funded by government, then we are going to face a lack of innovation. It is hard for metro believe that that OSA good thing.
If you want another citation, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0048-7333(00)00091-3
I know you worry about this, which is part of why I voted for you in the DCMP elections.
The trajectories of US job creation and federally funded research have diverged in the last fifteen years or so. Lets recap :
1. Massive research investment in the semiconductor industry - majority of US semiconductor companies are fabless and job intensive fabs have relocated to China, Taiwan and Korea
2. Software industry - jobs have relocated to India, Israel, Eastern Europe, ireland, etc.
3. Massive continuing research in solar - all solar manufacturing is in China now
One can go on and on ..
Massimo - I understand your point, but the honest fact is that historically, basic research in the physical sciences has been a good bet for society in term so of eventual technological improvements. High Tc got "killed" (comparatively) because no one has solved the problem after n years (now 25), not because someone promised maglev trains. I'm pretty sure that telling the public, "Science is important for cultural progress, but probably won't be useful even in the long term" is not a winning strategy for anyone, and I bet you'd agree.
Anon@11:16 - So, is your position that we should give up, then? Because even when we do end up developing good technologies US manufacturing jobs can be off-shored to countries with cheaper labor and government-subsidized manufacturing? I don't accept that - I don't accept the idea that we should stop trying to innovate because it's a fool's errand.
J - thanks! I've never run for a professional society office before. We'll see what happens.
We should not give up of course. I dont know what the solution is but I know we cant subsidize the world's research forever and get little for it with a 15 % unemployment rate. Perhaps the solution is Smoot-Hawley. Perhaps it is for research to be more industry oriented and more industry-led. After all, for-profit corporations do a much better job safeguarding precious IP and also realizing its commercial value. That said, giving billions to NSF is still much better than giving trillions to the banks.
The era of US preeminence in science is coming to an end. In the coming decades, science itself will move to China, Korea and India. By this I mean the percentage total worldwide basic science funding.
It was a good run, but I don't see a reason to try and claw back something that's not going to return, Doug. Tell your students to move to Korea or Japan.
Anon@3:21, I think we're talking at cross purposes. Clearly, all other things being equal, I'd expect China and India to each be producing four times as much science/engineering as the US, since they each have about 4x the population.
I'm not trying to claw back US predominance, and I didn't say I was. I'm saying that if the US is to compete and be innovative, period, investment in research is needed. Making a conscious decision not to invest in research either publicly or privately is not a recipe for economic success, period.
well thx. good one
Actually the Physics Today article is free.
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