[Rhodes22-list] Politics and Science

[Michael D. Weisner]

Ron,

Unfortunately, research funding cuts continue to be made by folks who really 
have no idea what they are doing.  In the mid 80s I entered industry as a 
result of a similar instability in medical research and high energy physics 
funding cuts (can you say Reagan and Brookhaven?)  Most of us scattered 
fairly quickly as the paycuts (10% at first) and layoffs began to threaten 
the security of our growing families.  Every postdoc was approached by 
industry and most of us found new "homes" within months.

The attitude of the bean counters seem to be that research funding is a 
luxury.  It can therefore be cut without great loss.  One administrator who 
had to cut 10% out of his budget at the last minute, thought hard and long 
when I offered, jokingly, "To save 10% across the board, we could reduce 
oxygen usage by 10% when treating patients requiring O2 therapy, placing 
patients on 90% instead of 100% oxygen."  He was so intrigued with the idea 
that he asked for a full justification why some patients had been on 100% 
oxygen in the first place.  Peter principle at work ...

I hope your funding is restored - call Obama and ask him why IL was not 
represented properly.

Modern research ... Ah, the sound of a million monkeys typing (on their 
PCs?) ...

Mike
s/v Shanghaid'd Summer ('81)
       Nissequogue River, NY


From: "Ronald Lipton" <rlipton at earthlink.net> Saturday, January 12, 2008 
12:17 AM
> 2008 was supposed to be a good year for science in the US.  A study
> by the National Academies had made a strong argument that basic
> research is vital to the economic health of the US.  That resulted in a
> bipartisan agreement to increase funding for the physical sciences.
> Budgets were increased for the NSF and DOE Office of Science in
> the appropriations bills passed by the House and Senate.  Last summer
> these bills were vetoed by the president as "budget busters".  The
> government
> operated on a continuing resolution until the end of last year when
> the Omnibus bill was passed.
>
> This bill reduced overall funding for Science by $1 billion below the
> level agreed last summer.  The cuts in Particle Physics and at
> Fermilab, where I work were particularly devastating.  All funding
> for a new experiment to measure the properties of neutrinos was
> cut.  R&D funds for the next generation particle accelerator, the ILC,
> which was intended to regain leadership in the field in the next decade
> from
> a new machine in Europe scheduled to start up next year, were cut to 1/4
> the level expected.  Since the budget was passed 1/4 of the way through
> the year all of this money has been already been spent.
>
> As a result all work on the projects which would have been the future of
> the
> field in the US have to stop.  At Fermilab 170 people were working on
> these projects and will be reassigned and 200 layoffs are planned.  At
> Stanford Linear Accelerator Center 125 people will be laid off.  The
> Fermilab
> budget was $52M below the budget initially passed by Congress. Those of
> us who survive will be asked to take 2-3 days/month of unpaid furlough.
>
> The cuts were a result of a last minute flurry of adjustments to bring the
> budget below the limit set by President Bush for veto.  Fermilab was
> hit particularly hard because Dennis Hastert, former speaker of the house,
> had resigned a month earlier and none of the Illinois delegation was
> watching the store.  The cuts were not the result of any plan as far as
> I can tell, just a random cut in the final weekend of preparation of the
> Omnibus bill. US commitment to ITER, a demonstration fusion reactor
> to be built in France was also cut to zero in spite of international
> funding
> agreements that took decades to negotiate.
>
> This is the sort of thing that can't easily be recovered from.  The
> accelerator
> group at Stanford, the best in the world, will be fragmented.  People
> will be
> laid off and leave the field.  Bright students will go elsewhere.  The
> international
> community will get yet more evidence that the US is not a reliable 
> partner.
>
> I had been working on detectors for the ILC.  We had a program
> that led the field in the development of advanced silicon detectors and
> electronics. Because we do R&D much of our work with US companies funds
> beyond state-of-the art work too risky for immediate commercial
> applications but which
> lay the technical base for the future.  We we strongly involved in 3D
> electronics,
> where ~10 micron thick layers of circuit are stacked vertially,
> increasing the
> density of electronics without decreasing the transistor size.
> We may be able to continue, but certainly at
> a reduced level. Our group of IC design engineers, one of the best such
> groups
> in the world, will likely fragment, and much of the R&D will be delayed or
> narrowed.
>
> This was not due to on party or another, but our government has become
> increasingly
> dysfunctional.   As by far the richest country in the world we could
> afford to be inefficient,
> but we have real challenges now.  Killing the future of a field of
> science that, aside
> from enormous scientific and intellectual contributions, has generated
> technologies such
> as medical imaging, fast electronic logic, practical superconducting
> magnets for MRI,
> and the world wide web protocols, essentially by accident, is one
> example of that
> dysfunction that hits close to (my) home.
>
>
>
> Ron
> __________________________________________________
> Use Rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org, Help? www.rhodes22.org/list
>
>