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Published online 20 March 2008 | Nature | doi:10.1038/452392a
£130-million cut to grants hits UK physical scientists
Researchers fear job cuts.
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Another case where we have become over dependent upon Government funding. It should have been clear that this sort of this was always a risk. Governmental priorities are not those of science and the motives for government funding are not those of science. It's time for private institutions to step in.
I could not agree more!!!
applied science research in areas like nanomaterial being promoted in the context of globalisation and war related research. we have to mobilise opinion for promoting basic science research--sivakumar
This is yet another setback to Physics. The UK is following the bad example of the Republican led government across the atlantic. In my view there is no such thing as applied research or basic research. There is good research and mediocre research. If research cannot be applied it is not worth doing. Frequently applied theoretical research is just a euphemism for plugging in numbers into other people's equations without understanding where they come from or what their limitations are. This kind of research does not deserve any support.
I totally agree the author's point of view
Girish suggests that "if research cannot be applied it is not worth doing". It's clear from comments at a recent Open Meeting that EPSRC is of a similar opinion. Leaving aside the issue of whether EPSRC's current knowledge transfer/top-down strategies are best suited to foster and drive innovation [short answer: they're not], let's consider whether "application-less" science is indeed worthless. Consider the following examples: 1. Did Einstein's general/special theory of relativity only make a contribution to society when it was commercially exploited in GPS technology? 2. Why do we search for life on other planets? Is it solely for the technological spin-offs that arise from the research? 3. Was the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA worthless without its subsequent application/ commercial exploitation? The traditional view is that it is naive to expect the research councils (i.e. the taxpayer, i.e. society at large) to fund work which does not lead to (commercial) applications. To "paraphrase" Charles Clarke, UK Education Secretary (2002-2004): "Science for science's sake is a bit dodgy..." Girish, are you happy to support this view?
I do agree with Mr. Clarke. The science-for-science-sake paradigm often leads to self-indulgent and pointless activity that is nothing more than self-deception -- as I theoretical condensed matter physicist I know only too well. The demand that science eventually lead to a kind of understanding that will enable that knowledge to be used to create technological marvels, raises the bar and puts pressure on us `pure' physicists to come up with realistic theories and not be content at wasting our careers solving toy models.
Girish, Thanks for responding. Returning to the questions posed in my previous post, do you also see Einstein's special and general theories of relativity as "toy models"? Are Einstein's staggering intellectual achievements of no value to society unless they can be used "to create technological marvels"? Similarly, is Darwin's theory of evolution value-less unless we can technologically exploit it? (By the way, I noted that I paraphrased Clarke's statement. The precise quote was "Education for education's sake is a bit dodgy". Would you also agree with this?)