I don't know what's happening with the comment section today but this is a great article. The low hanging fruit you have outlined are definitely more effective at bringing about reform in scientific funding than running ctrl+f 'cis' to decide what to defund.
You are making the assumption that funding science research produces knowledge. I don’t think that’s true. Instead it produces ideological nonsense, like people claiming there are 18 genders. If funding science worked, we should have gain substantial knowledge over the last few decades. Instead, most of the gains came from private research, and most of the public funding produced papers nobody reads and ideologies that are insane.
What percentage of federal funding is devoted to claiming there's 18 genders? Can you point to a single NSF or NIH funded project that is promoting this?
Is there any source that we can look to to determine where most of the gains have come from? I would believe that most modern gains in Computers/Internet/etc came from commercial/private industry, but back at the beginning it was military/government.
I personally know scientists that rewrite their grant proposals to hit the buzzwords for the current administration. I also know some that do not need to. I have not been in private industry for almost 30 years, but when I was, the researchers that I supported were always focused on a possible ROI, and competitive edge over other companies in the same field...
So maybe public funding works in some cases where there is no private industry competition, but not other situations.
You're intrinsically locking yourself into a meta-linear model of 'more funding is good science' -- instead of what the nonlinear phenomenon of funding science actually turns into in the outside world. There's no way you get the perfect map -- and the notion that sometimes the map is non-monotonic doesn't show up in your thinking. Science has some major reform problems in front of it. COVID tore the mask off. And now the population lag is catching up with the exploitation.
Hi Adam, thank you for this post! Last night, I recommended your post “why reading the news is the new smoking” to a friend which got the biggest belly laugh from the title. I think this post compliments that one really well: we should debog ourselves from the soybean tariffs, but we also should focus on the problems near and dear to us. Seriously thank you for addressing and inspiring us to care about these problems in science!
"...the fraud, the waste, the low ambitions, the dogmatism, politicking, and rent-seeking."
We're living through a realignment of the public vs. the private sector, and in the aggregate, the above won't be tolerated by the public, whether some of the reaction is histrionic or not. I'm sanguine about the future of science/funding, but mostly because of what's to come (as one poster mentioned - decentralization), and not what has been.
While this isn't my domain, I'm keen on prizes (*for predefined problems and not Nobels) for the most existential problems and/or high reward science, in terms of what is publicly funded. Make them international in scope. Bring the winners here (if they aren't already). Open source the tech. Create competitive markets.
Will Zeng started Unitary with $6k (https://unitary.foundation/posts/2024/). I started the Experiment Foundation with less and we’ve now funded more than 300 projects (with more than $2M disbursed).
Become the science funder you want to see in the world.
I love Experimental History, but this one seems to miss that the main reason for the recent defundings is that science has become politicized and corrupted, so many people have fundamentally lost confidence in "Science". Government-funded science must be PURE Science, without political bias, which is certainly no longer the case.
Nobody doubts that science makes the world better, but your case would be stronger if you stuck to examples of how *today's NSF/NIH funding* makes the world better. The Really Big Advancements (electricity, hygiene, industrialization) happened long before the US Government got involved.
The bureaucratization of science that happened when the government took over most science funding hasn't been good for science. I'm pretty sure you know this.
> I’m fascinated by this logic. The government pays a lot of people to do a lot of things, so why are researchers uniquely indebted to the American public? Should your local police officer also send you a thank-you note? Should the Secretary of State? Do we all deserve a thoughtful box of mixed nuts from the guy who trims the bushes in front of the DMV?
Honestly? It wouldn't hurt. It'd certainly be better than them acting like they do us a favor by eventually getting around to their jobs, especially the DMV workers.
> reviewed for ideological purity
As opposed to what, the previous era where there was definitely no such reviewing?
You know what’s funny? Silicon Valley venture capitalists use this same basic reasoning to fund rockets to mars instead of trying to improve healthcare
Could you be more specific about what is funny about that?
I am not sure if I read your comment correctly, but you seem to imply that healthcare is now so bureaucratized that it doesn't make sense to invest time and money to improve it.
Also, check out Altos Labs. It is a capitalist-funded research organization tasked with attacking aging. And aging is the underlying cause of most chronic diseases. If this pans out, we might be able to conquer a hundred diseases at once.
Funding science is altogether necessary and good. Unfortunately, bureaucratized, government-funded science : good science :: MASSOLIT : Russian literature. (Readers of "The Master and Margarita will get this.)
Moreover, there are a number of reasons why a plurality of Americans now believe the official scientific establishment is actively trying to harm them. Some of those reasons are valid. One or two may even be sound.
Fixing the funding of science is a hard, perhaps even a wicked problem at this point, but I know this much: the funding model that assumes shaking the federal money tree will forever yield greenbacked fruit for at least *some* lucky projects is rapidly approaching the end of its useful life. We should start thinking hard and quickly about what replaces that.
I don't know what's happening with the comment section today but this is a great article. The low hanging fruit you have outlined are definitely more effective at bringing about reform in scientific funding than running ctrl+f 'cis' to decide what to defund.
You are making the assumption that funding science research produces knowledge. I don’t think that’s true. Instead it produces ideological nonsense, like people claiming there are 18 genders. If funding science worked, we should have gain substantial knowledge over the last few decades. Instead, most of the gains came from private research, and most of the public funding produced papers nobody reads and ideologies that are insane.
What percentage of federal funding is devoted to claiming there's 18 genders? Can you point to a single NSF or NIH funded project that is promoting this?
Is there any source that we can look to to determine where most of the gains have come from? I would believe that most modern gains in Computers/Internet/etc came from commercial/private industry, but back at the beginning it was military/government.
I personally know scientists that rewrite their grant proposals to hit the buzzwords for the current administration. I also know some that do not need to. I have not been in private industry for almost 30 years, but when I was, the researchers that I supported were always focused on a possible ROI, and competitive edge over other companies in the same field...
So maybe public funding works in some cases where there is no private industry competition, but not other situations.
You're intrinsically locking yourself into a meta-linear model of 'more funding is good science' -- instead of what the nonlinear phenomenon of funding science actually turns into in the outside world. There's no way you get the perfect map -- and the notion that sometimes the map is non-monotonic doesn't show up in your thinking. Science has some major reform problems in front of it. COVID tore the mask off. And now the population lag is catching up with the exploitation.
Hi Adam, thank you for this post! Last night, I recommended your post “why reading the news is the new smoking” to a friend which got the biggest belly laugh from the title. I think this post compliments that one really well: we should debog ourselves from the soybean tariffs, but we also should focus on the problems near and dear to us. Seriously thank you for addressing and inspiring us to care about these problems in science!
"...the fraud, the waste, the low ambitions, the dogmatism, politicking, and rent-seeking."
We're living through a realignment of the public vs. the private sector, and in the aggregate, the above won't be tolerated by the public, whether some of the reaction is histrionic or not. I'm sanguine about the future of science/funding, but mostly because of what's to come (as one poster mentioned - decentralization), and not what has been.
While this isn't my domain, I'm keen on prizes (*for predefined problems and not Nobels) for the most existential problems and/or high reward science, in terms of what is publicly funded. Make them international in scope. Bring the winners here (if they aren't already). Open source the tech. Create competitive markets.
Edit: See *
Decentralize science. Crowd fund studies. Put it all on blockchain. Get away from the centralized and easily corrupted science journals.
Decentralize EVERYTHING!
https://joshketry.substack.com/p/decentralize-everything-in-1776-america?utm_source=publication-search
google.ca
You are SO GOOD!!! AUGHGHGHGHGH!!!!
Great read. Especially the "Easy Money" section. Thank you as always!
Why not start your own grant program?
Will Zeng started Unitary with $6k (https://unitary.foundation/posts/2024/). I started the Experiment Foundation with less and we’ve now funded more than 300 projects (with more than $2M disbursed).
Become the science funder you want to see in the world.
may i share this to my linked in account? love this
Yep of course!
I love Experimental History, but this one seems to miss that the main reason for the recent defundings is that science has become politicized and corrupted, so many people have fundamentally lost confidence in "Science". Government-funded science must be PURE Science, without political bias, which is certainly no longer the case.
Nobody doubts that science makes the world better, but your case would be stronger if you stuck to examples of how *today's NSF/NIH funding* makes the world better. The Really Big Advancements (electricity, hygiene, industrialization) happened long before the US Government got involved.
The bureaucratization of science that happened when the government took over most science funding hasn't been good for science. I'm pretty sure you know this.
> I’m fascinated by this logic. The government pays a lot of people to do a lot of things, so why are researchers uniquely indebted to the American public? Should your local police officer also send you a thank-you note? Should the Secretary of State? Do we all deserve a thoughtful box of mixed nuts from the guy who trims the bushes in front of the DMV?
Honestly? It wouldn't hurt. It'd certainly be better than them acting like they do us a favor by eventually getting around to their jobs, especially the DMV workers.
> reviewed for ideological purity
As opposed to what, the previous era where there was definitely no such reviewing?
You know what’s funny? Silicon Valley venture capitalists use this same basic reasoning to fund rockets to mars instead of trying to improve healthcare
Could you be more specific about what is funny about that?
I am not sure if I read your comment correctly, but you seem to imply that healthcare is now so bureaucratized that it doesn't make sense to invest time and money to improve it.
Also, check out Altos Labs. It is a capitalist-funded research organization tasked with attacking aging. And aging is the underlying cause of most chronic diseases. If this pans out, we might be able to conquer a hundred diseases at once.
Funding science is altogether necessary and good. Unfortunately, bureaucratized, government-funded science : good science :: MASSOLIT : Russian literature. (Readers of "The Master and Margarita will get this.)
Moreover, there are a number of reasons why a plurality of Americans now believe the official scientific establishment is actively trying to harm them. Some of those reasons are valid. One or two may even be sound.
Fixing the funding of science is a hard, perhaps even a wicked problem at this point, but I know this much: the funding model that assumes shaking the federal money tree will forever yield greenbacked fruit for at least *some* lucky projects is rapidly approaching the end of its useful life. We should start thinking hard and quickly about what replaces that.