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Security Versus Science
dogfrt writes "According to this Wired News article, post-9/11 homeland security has had a decidedly negative effect on US scientific research. In specific, researchers are self-censoring what they publish, talented foreign students are being denied visas (approximately 20%, according to one source in the article), and researchers are avoiding work with dangerous pathogens, choosing more innocuous micro-organisms."
Sad, esp. considering how artifical such security is anyway. Frankly, with Ashcroft and Ridge at the helm, I trust the DHS less than what they ostensibly fight against... That aside, if we refuse to allow talented people into our country, what's that do but force them to work for our competitors and perhaps even enemies? Lovely bit of intel there. Oh, well. No one ever accused the Bush administration of having a collective brain cell.
#define DRM chmod 000
Scientists arent being forced to make these decisions, they are making a conscious effort to do so. This is a different world we live in now and as such, requires different ways of thinking and innovating. Just because some researchers are afraid of doing certain things doesnt mean that others wont.
This is something I've beleived for a long time. Security through obscurity (i.e. preventing reserach in areas that may be dangerous), just does not work.
This sounds like a society in decline :-( The one that put human beings on the Moon, the one that saved us from Adolf Hitler and the one that kept the USSR in check. Its democracy is broken.
Enough said.
One could argue that the real risk, at least where pathogens are concerned, isn't so much the scientists using them for terrorist activities, but someone else getting ahold of them who would. No matter what the research is for, the scientists in this modern climate need to maintain an elevated security when dealing with possible/probable bioweapons.
In our greed soaked quest for the allmighty dollar we have outsourced so much of our tech savy to "cheaper" sources that we now depend on others for our critical infrastructure. If too many other countries were to gang up on us all at once and refuse to sell US things they found "dangerous" we'd be finished. We depend on so many countries to supply tech for us, and this is what has made our security dubious. Any one remember the old days when the us could make everything for its safety?
"A towel is the most astounding Mind-boggleing useful thing in the universe, allways know where your towel is"
researchers are avoiding work with dangerous pathogens, choosing more innocuous micro-organisms."
And have you ever considered that the most dangerous kind of research is not the manipulation of known dangerous organisms (and the associated containment precautions), but of supposedly "innocuous" or "harmless" organisms, organisms where there is no need for increased security or containment protocols?
Feed the need: Digitaladdiction.net
Why do they feel terrorists could use their work? So far they have been using such advanced technology as trucks loaded with manure, a box-cutter and some homemade explosives.
Overall they're doing the right thing, but I can't help but feel they're doing it for the wrong reason.
1) the quoted article said 20% of students in physics were having trouble entering the US--that is a long ways from saying they didn't enter all all.
2) There is a real question of if the open borders policy has really helped US science in a meaningful way from the 20's-50's the US had a fairly strict immigration policy and quite a bit of science happened in the US. Right now the US has a serious problem of underutilizatin of native US technical/scientific talent.
I lived in the US on an H1B visa before 9/11. I first got it in 10 months, which is considered fast normally. When I applied for a renewal after 9/11, it was denied, although the first renewal was granted to me without problem and reasonably fast, and I never had so much as a speeding ticket in the US. I thought, well, the US of A doesn't want me no more, so I went back to the EC.
...
Now friends who have applied recently told me it's a matter of 2 or 3 years, and that quotas have gone down drastically (read: they can't get one).
I've started my company in France. So are my friends. We're all experiencing huge pains in the rectal area because the taxman in France is voracious, but we have to stay here (or perhaps go to Canada later, but right now we're staying here) because it seems Uncle Sam can do without enterprising people willing to go to great length and make sacrifices to try to succeed, and eventually pay taxes to the IRS.
I think the INS is right : there should be a barrier to entry in the US that's high enough to winnow out slackers and let worthy people in only. But when the barrier is too high, Uncle Sam deprives itself of workers who already have an education that didn't cost a cent to the country, are provably willing to work hard to make it, and willing to play the US economy game and pay their taxes. If I was a decision maker, I'd welcome such a population in the country.
Too bad your current administration doesn't see farther than its nose-tip
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Let's consider the options for a bright enterprising US graduate holding a bachelor's degree and considering further education. (I'm talking about our best and brightest here.) That student could go to top law school, medical school or business school and expect a six-figure salary after graduation. On the other hand, that student could go to a top school for a graduate degree in science. The result is 6 years of poverty as a grad student followed by a two or three year postdoctoral stint making $35K. Why would a newly minted Ph.D. from a place like Berkeley, Stanford, Princeton, MIT, or CalTech accept that kind of money when they are often expected to live and work in an expensive urban environment? Maybe it's because of the hordes of cheap labor from places like the PRC?
Perhaps a reduction in foreign labor will lead to enhanced salaries for scientists. One might hope that a decrease in supply would shift the salaries up. Unfortunately, since federal funding plays such an important role in domestic scientific output, salaries won't rise significantly unless congress increases funding. Contrary to popular opinion, the government is run by a bunch of cheap bastards, so it could be a while before that happens. If current trends continue, there will be a crunch in US scientific production unless funding increases to recruit domestic talent or the security hawks back down.
The postdoc is the nigger of the scientific world.
The good news is that the amount of research going into creating friendly, fluffy bunnies is skyrocketing!
Expect a new species of ultra-adorable housepets in the near future.
Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
I recently started working as a physics Ph. D. student in Innsbruck, Austria. In our group we have a Taiwanese post-doc who is really talented and does a tremendous job, working 12 hours a day, six days a week.
This guy used to be at Stanford, but when he wanted to get his visa renewed he was told he had to go back to Taiwan and renew it there. So he went to Taiwan, where he was told that he could not get a new visa. There he was in Taiwan, with all his stuff left in California, unable to go back! After some time he managed to get a temporary visa so he could at least go back for 14 days, sell his car and take care of his belongings. Then he went working with us in Austria instead.
Good for us, bad for USA.
It seems to me that if we really want to protect ourselves from chemichal and bio terrorisim, what we need are a lot of researchers who are experts in that area, and a lot of R&D so as to learn how to cope, plan, and respond to disasters. Thanks to my government, just the opposite is happening. So who'se the real threat to national security?
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
----
"Ours was a free culture. It is becoming much less so."-Lawrence Lessig
The real enemy is not the Department of Homeland Security but the terrorists who have forced us to take these drastic measures.
Because we all know about how hi-tech science such as box-cutters were used in the 9/11 attacks. Not to mention that only foreigners are terrorists.
I don't know if the word is really "forced". Although they've certainly forced the US to re-think a lot of what they do.
However, if we (the western world, but especially the States) allow a few uber-fundementalist Islamists whithout even mainstream support by their religion to dictate what can and will be researched, they get that much closer to their goal. Tough call, risk stagnation or distaster?
Actually, the article says that 20% of accepted foreign students in physics "...had problems entering the country last year". It doesn't say they've been denied visas. It also doesn't say what constitutes "problems", and what percent normally had trouble before 9/11. They all may have made it in, just with some troubles.
talented foreign students are being denied visas (approximately 20%, according to one source in the article)
GOOD!
Why is it that the US gets flogged for denying someone a VISA, when other countries do it all the time and is considered "common place"?
Yes, I'm a "Yank" (I live about an hour west of Philly), but I just flat-out don't understand why it's a big deal when the US of A does it, but it's OK for anyone else.
Can someone please enlighten me?
I'm not a prophet or a stone-age man,
I'm just a mortal with potential of a super man.
While I don't work with anything as sexy as pathogens, I am trying to get my grad-level thesis on computer security done. Practically any field of research I want to choose potentially opens me up to criminal prosecution.
As an example:
My university wanted me to do research on LDAP and its related security problems. They wanted me to do this at first on a strawman system, then on the actual system in use on the campus. I objected to this line of research because if I were "caught" probing or attacking the system and the person who discovered me jumped the appropriate chain of command and called the authorities, I would be up shit creek without a paddle.
I also brought up the problem on who owns (or has ultimate authority over) the campus network. It is operated by the university, but owned by the state and to some extent, the feds. What if the university gave me permission but the state or federal authorities decided they didn't like my work? What then?
My professors told me I could do the thesis and "bury" my work. That is, copies would be made for myself, my committee, and a copy in the library under the "restricted section". But if I do so, what's the use?
I tried every decent and legal way I could think of to resolve the issue w/the business before I rented the chicken suit
The best analogy would probably be if American universities suddenly declared that transcripts for new graduates were going to be classified and you couldn't talk about them to the general public. Good luck going to your potential employers upon graduation and telling them, "Yeah, sure, I took some classes, but I can't tell you which ones or how well I did in them either. (But hire me anyways, please!)"
The bold print giveth, and the fine print taketh away
I fear that we are forgetting what we are doing. I read and listen to both sides argue continuously, and never do I hear a good fix, just what is wrong.
It has come to my attention that no one is at fault but us. We take for granted what we see as "our rights", and only when something changes our view, do we jump up.
Being an independent, I look to both side of the political scene and see faults in both. Neither side is always right or wrong. For example, something I heard this morning... Democrats are ranting and raving about the Patriot bill taking away the rights of people. This is far from the truth. It just gives the ability to find "problems" before they happen. A point that was brought up was an analogy of "The Boy who cried Wolf". Where the democrats are always the first to jump on the soapbox and scream and holler about something that really is not worth crying about. Problem is that it is too much like crying wolf... Eventually they will get something right and no one will listen.
People complain that the men in Guantanimo Bay have been given no rights. Well, no duh. What is so wrong with locking up foreign nationals and not providing any of the rights that Americans get, when they have no claim to America? I see no problem with that...
Sure we have had to adapt to a New World, but do not ever forget that this is so that you can enjoy your freedom. Without this protection, we would not be here today. Although you might think that your rights are being infringed, look at the constitution and read it. Then see what you can do and cannot do before you start preaching about rights.
These scientists are making a choice to hold back their own research and that really has nothing to do with what the government imposes on them. If they can't look to foreign students, they find them in the US. Why is that so scary? Are the US students less able to work? Honestly, this should be a good thing. The US needs to rebuild it own strength internally, not with the support of external factions.
Look at it this way... If the Research Scientists are forced into using only American students, then maybe there are jobs for the students that they have a chance of keeping. So instead of costing us the unemployment or welfare they would receive, they add back into the economy... And if the Students really want to come to the US and do research, then get a legal visa and move here.
Do you seriously think that any of this research really would make a difference to a terrorist or not?
How much high tech did it take to fly two planes into two buildings? The planes, that's it. And it's not like they even built the planes themselves.
Security by obscurity is not the way to go. Anybody who has any experience in real life with security (be it physical security, or more abstract as in network security) knows that security by obscurity is nothing more than a pillow to sleep on for those who are trying to protect themselves.
And when that "security" measure is hindering science.. I don't think I have to spell it out for you.
How small a thought it takes to fill a whole life
currently, i'm employed at a major research institution as a postdoctoral researcher. One of our research projects currently is examining the factors influencing the transport of microorganisms in porous media (i.e., what happens to the bugs as they go into the groundwater).
One of the bugs we're looking at is Cryptosporidium parvum, a nasty parasite that was responsible for an outbreak in Milwaukee in 1993 that sickened something like 400,000 people and killed at least 100.
Interesting facts about crypto: It can be purchased over the phone with a credit card. With no previous clearance or paperwork or anything (at least as far as we can tell) to ensure that it is going to someone who won't misuse it. And it comes fully viable and capable of infecting individuals (as we accidently discovered a couple months back).
back of envelope calculations say that if we were to find a 1 million gallon reservoir, and dumped our sample in, (and somehow could mix it real well) there'd be near 1,000 particles per gallon. Given that it takes 1-10 to cause an infection, that's enough to infect the entire town i live in.
amazing. and all it takes is a credit card...
Cooperation within international law is what is needed. The US is forced to take some of these measures because they have to fit people based on minimal information into 2 groups "current or potential terrorist" or "non-threatening". The whole system breaks down when it comes to a judgement call and that can be a very human mistake. Say someone comes to your door and says they think they are going to have a heart attack, you make a judgment as to whether you think he or she is telling the truth and then you act. Do you let this person in your house? You know nothing about them. You get a bad feeling but this person may be at death's door. What do you do? If you are a woman, you may wonder if this person might be a rapist. But that doesn't mean you hate all men.
From what I can tell the US isn't always able to get the information it needs from international sources. The head of Interpol was on "News Hour" a few months ago and he agreed that the system doesn't work because the right information is not available at the moment it is needed. Interpol can't always get the information it needs from the FBI and vice versa because of a lack of protocols for just-in-time transferring of information.
My hope is that the situation will improve with the next presidential elections. I can't believe that Americans will not defend their freedom.
For those of you who haven't read Jerry Pournelle's books, they talk about a future where the hypothetical world powers work to suppress Scientific research in order to preserve "Peace & Stability".
Of course amatuer historians can also point the Constantine Roman Empire and see similar trends.
Unfortunately unlike Pournelle's books, we haven't managed inter-stellar travel before the suppression began, there by haven't manage plant the seeds of future civilizations else where, and unlike the time's of Christian Rome, we don't have the seed's planted by a previous empire and barbarian hordes to force us out of stagnation.
my old sig is obsolete, and I haven't come up with a stupid enough new one yet
I think the event at 9/11 might be among the most negative events that have affected USA and probably far beyond what Osama bin Laden and his company had hoped for. I'm not sure he succeeded in the main goal with the act since the purpose of terrorism is almost always to create respect through fear. However, what they managed to do during the few seconds of the act, is to create enormous effects on the american society that is also reaching to other parts of the world. That terrorist act must have been one of the shortest, yet most affecting, event in recent history. When I think about it, only the nuclear bombs (released by USA ironically enough) in Hiroshima and Nagasaki to put an effective end to WW2 (in an arguably good way...) comes into mind. These were similar split-second events that changed the way how we think.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
>Yes. I know what they want. I know what >motivates them. Envy of economic status that >transforms to hatred.
Osama Bin Laden comes from a family that has incredible amount of wealth. All of the 9/11 hijackers were in the Middle class. If the Islamic radicals were driven by economic status they would attack their own corrupt governments rather than attacking us. Your acting as if the Middle East wasn't the richest source of oil in the world.
Brian Ellenberger
To many people, it's all been a big success. To a select few, 9/11 was the best thing that's happened in years. Before it, they were worried about getting beat up over a collapsing economy, corruption, and election fraud. Now they're flying high, and all their friends are getting enormous no-bid military procurement and reconstruction contracts. Academic soreheads are easy to ignore.
Science creates tools, means to ends, not ends in themselves. Tools have no morality in and of themselves, and so therefore their research should not be judged based upon what they could be used for. Final, production level products of that research, can and should be scrutinized for what they could be used for.
This, too, is pure ad hominem bullshit. The parent would not have to support complete unfettered access to firearms to be consistent. It's one thing to allow researchers unfettered access to materials for their research, but rather different to allow the end product of that research to be available to anyone.
// file: mice.h
#include "frickin_lasers.h"
1. I was not specifically talking about McCarthy and the "super vast majority" of people he accused, more about the atmosphere of conformity and the risks of speaking out.
2. Nobody said the people I'm speaking of who oppose the U.S. government in certain policy issues are against the interests of the United States. Criticising your own government does NOT make you a traitor, sorry. That's a right you have.
3. I am not a U.S. citizen, merely someone who believes in the concepts on which it was founded. Happily, I won't have people screaming "Traitor!" in my face if I dare question what my government is doing.
POWs I believe you mean 'illegal combatants'. POWs have very clear rights as laid down by the geneva convention. 'Illegal Comabatant' is a highly nebulous term which is being used to deny these individuals their basic human rights. These include lack of legal advice, no contact with their respective embassies and cases of alleged torture.
The USA, infested with foreign students, may be slightly ahead of Japan in certain areas of high technology, but is the USA 20 years ahead of Japan? No. The temporal difference is closer to 3 years. Reducing the number of foreign students by 99% in the USA in exchange for the USA "falling behind" by about 3 years in scientific development is acceptable for most Americans. The USA of 2000 is almost as good a place to live as the USA of 2003.
Please read "USA is Right: Security before Science".
Allowing anyone and everyone into your country can't possibly be considered a good thing for most countries. But I see a lot of good things coming from letting students enter your country - just as students from your country enter mine.
How about cultural understanding? The USA doesn't exactly have the best reputation here in Europe. You might not care - but we are quite a few people who would have live in a World where people understanding each others cultural backgrounds - so we can all be at least friendly on some level.
I went to Virginia as a high school exchange student - spent a year there and learned a lot about americans the US in general that I would never have learned as a tourist. When you live among people you learn quite a lot more about them than when you just stay at they hotels and see their monuments. This knowledge I took back to my home country (Denmark) and have since then told a lot about my experience - and I believe that I to some degree have given quite a few danes a more varied impression of the US. Likewise I have told countless of americans about Denmark - and they have experienced how we really aren't that different from them.
And just like I went to the USA some american student (although all too few and even fewer in these times) take the trip to a froeign country - both promoting the US and taking back an understanding of a different culture.
Closing down your country is not the answer. Not economically and not culturally. Americans have a tendency to believe they can pretty much handle everything themselves. Although that is true to a degree it is, and has always been, far from true in all cases. You need to trade with the rest of the World - and to do that you need foreigners who know your country and your culture - and most importantly you need a lot of foreigners who have a positive attitude towards you. Otherwise we're all pretty much screwed (or at least worse off financially).
This is exactly the sort of end goal they were trying to achieve.
If you don't believe me, look around at the changes since then.
People don't trust anyone, governments are taking away rights and privacy wholesale.. Censorship.. Jailings for expressing yourself, mass carnage, daily bombardments of news, peoples work/life habits changed.. etc, etc, etc.
The basic fabric of a free society has been ripped to shreds.. They are just loving it.
THIS is their real goal.. destroy free society so everyone is reduced to their level of poverty and opression...
---- Booth was a patriot ----
What is being described is similar to what happened during the second world war and the race create the nuclear bomb. Scientists working for Allied countries were quite concscious about what they did and didn't publish so as not to give too much information to the Germans about the direction they were taking in nuclear fission research. This was even before the Manhattan project was established. Of course, the difference is, back then, Hitler was a clear and present danger. In the present day a lot of the danger is manufactured in order to justify the huge expenditures that go to the American military industrial complex.