Science a GoGo's Home Page Forums General Discussion General Science Discussion Forum Why we invest in science

The Bad Astronomy Blog has this article about the fall out from NASA research. In this case a system developed by NASA for a rocket engine turns out to be a major improvement in fire fighting technology.

Bill Gill

I have never understood why people object to spending on science research and indeed research of all kinds.

Sometimes there is a huge benefit- I live in Victoria, an area of the world with one of the highest rates of bushfire, and high rates of water shortage so this latest discovery resonates with me. But putting that to one side-- do we not want science and other research to FIND OUT THINGS!? We are human and we need to know, we want to explore and reach further than ever before. We possess imagination and we should be driven to extend it.

Thanks for posting this Bill. We sometimes forget that everything we do should not be safe and ordinary.

I'd better stop now as this could turn into a dissertation on predestination, and for that we would need the Rev (where is he I wonder?) and NQS.

I think the reasons why people are inclined to criticise lavishing money on what many see as pointless projects is at least two-fold.

1) Many people are unaware of the underlying research and its possible benefits and see things like space programs as Governments indulging in expensive showing off. Possibly, more transparency and better public education would help.

2) It is tempting to look at a situation in which billions of dollars are spent on firing another piece of hardware into space, while millions of people are starving and living (and dying) in squalid conditions, and wonder about its morality. The fact that these people are suffering because of personal and corporate avarice, rather than because of scientific expenditure, is easily overlooked.

Tycho Brahe's research was state-funded. Kepler used Brahe's research to derive laws of planetary motion. Newton's most important work was largely indebted to the prior discovery of these laws.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tycho_Brahe
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kepler%27s_laws_of_planetary_motion

The book Longitude details the prize for developing a chronometer (clock) that could be used determine longitude at sea.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Harrison

The Internet exists because of DARPA investment. The original name was "ARPANET."
http://www.livinginternet.com/i/ii_arpanet.htm
(I used to work for BBN, btw.)

A HUGE amount of scientific advancement was achieved by government investment to develop instruments of war.

There are other reasons for doing this. We used to have political leaders who understand it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYb_mhiE-qU

Probably there was less popular discontent about the funding of, for example, Brahe's research than there is about space travel today, because, then, less people were aware of what was going on. With increased awareness must go improved education.



I trust this is a departure from the logic that says: Space projects are good because they can lead to benefits in terms of scientific development in other areas. I suspect that many of those who would agree with that statement might hesitate to agree if you replaced "space projects" with "war".

Historically, governments "invested in" (in some sense) implements of defense and offense long before there was any reasonable hope of visiting space.

Absolutely right; but I doubt that that makes war any more attractive a proposition to the vast majority of people.

weather it will become a force for good or ill depends on man
and only if the United States occupies an position of preeminence can we help decide weather this new ocean will be a sea of peace or a new terrifying theater of war.