SIVACRACY.NET

This comment is not meant to disparage the work of Melissa or anyone at Rockefeller University.

"The scientific research enterprise in the United States is in danger of suffering major damage as a result of stagnated funding and the failure of political leaders to take science seriously" is an overstatement.

The most one can surmise from the current state of affairs is that the model which Rockefeller employs is suffering major damage. If your scheme for funding is federally funded grants, then you're in trouble. The problems described in the article seem, to me, to stem from an historic over-reliance on federal funding. Instead of complaining about stupid politicians, intelligent design, the Bush administration and the constraints placed on the funding; a better solution would be to wean oneself from the federal teat, and never go back.

There's plenty of money sloshing around; private, corporate and philanthropic. Rockefeller U is the child of such largesse. Rockefeller scientists did much great work before the advent of post-WWII, federally funded, "big science". Maybe they should re-examine their roots.

That's completely unrealistic!

Much research IS funded privately. But it's rarely public, open, or far-reaching.

The problem is, there is no private funding for science that does not have strings.

What's wrong with the public funding science that benefits the public? It's a system that works brilliantly.

BTW, is there one place in the world that funds expensive research outside of state funding?

Do we really want to run a scientific culture that works about as well as Nigeria's?

Do we really want to surrender all the good science and scientists to India, China, Japan, France, Germany, and Brazil? These places take science seriously.

We no longer do. That's the point.

I would like to suggest the following federally funded site:

http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/infbrief/nsf06306/

I appreciate your assertions which I will number 1-8.

#1 Nonsensical, but is more importantly, disproved, by the data in the aforementioned website.
#2 Part 1-MOST research, 71%, is not federally funded. Part 2- "public, open, or far-reaching"; sometimes yes, sometimes no. Irrelevant in either case because the same can be said for federally funded research.
#3 All research grants, public and private, come with strings attached. I think that's the point I am trying to make. If you don't like what your patron is telling you to do, find a different patron. I am not making a blanket statement against federal funding.
#4 Again, I don't have a problem with public funding... but, it doesn't work brilliantly or no one would be grumbling about it.
#5 According to the NSF statistics the United States would be one place.
#6 Absolutely not. But what has Nigeria got to do with anything?
#7 Absolutely not. But most foreign born scientists work in the private sector. Corporate outsourcing of R&D is a more worriesome and relevant problem in that regard. Also, saying a nation state takes science seriously or not seriously is an unprovable assertion. I don't know how you could even qualify or quantify that assertion.
#8 Who's we? I do, my brother does, so does my mom.

Thanks Siva, again, for allowing comments on your weblog. I don't agree, point for point, with some of what I read; but I wholeheartedly support any person who stands up for truth, freedom and equality.

It is important to be more specific than just saying "political leaders" are harming science.

"The Republican War on Science" by Chris Mooney puts it right.

"When politicians use bad science to justify themselves rather than good science to make up their minds, we can safely assume that wrongheaded and even disastrous decisions lie ahead."

For Reviews of Chris Mooney’s book:
http://www.chriscmooney.com/article_db.asp?id=323

A Quote from a Review:
Scientific American.com
By Boyce Rensberger

http://www.sciam.com/print_version.cfm?articleID=0000226E-C6D8-1332-86D883414B7F0000

In almost every instance, Republican leaders have branded the scientific mainstream as purveyors of "junk science" and dubbed an extremist viewpoint--always at the end of the spectrum favoring big business or the religious Right--"sound science." One of the most insidious achievements of the Right, Mooney shows, is the Data Quality Act of 2000--just two sentences, written by an industry lobbyist and quietly inserted into an appropriations bill. It directs the White House's Office of Management and Budget to ensure that all information put out by the federal government is reliable. The law seems sensible, except in practice. It is used mainly by industry and right-wing think tanks to block release of government reports unfavorable to their interests by claiming they do not contain "sound science."