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Top Advisory Panel Warns Erosion of U.S. Science
fbg111 writes "From the NYT: A panel of experts convened by the National Academies, the nation's leading science advisory group, called yesterday for an urgent and wide-ranging effort to strengthen scientific competitiveness. The 20-member panel, reporting at the request of a bipartisan group in Congress, said that without such an effort the United States 'could soon lose its privileged position.' It cited many examples of emerging scientific and industrial power abroad and listed 20 steps the United States should take to maintain its global lead."
Considering how the attack on science by religious conservatives has reached a fever pitch, I am not surprised that fewer people are entering the hard sciences as a career. When every scientific discovery is met by screeches and howls by the religious right, the general public is left with the impression that scientists are just another protected minority who are forcing their views on the rest of society. There is little to no discourse on *how* these scientific discoveries are vetted; but even if the scientific method were explained in detail, the public has shown it still wants to believe in magic.
Biology and any other field of science dealing with the age of the Earth are destined to decline in the US. The balance of power has already tipped decidedly to non-US schools in technical training in these fields and will continue. This report will be ignored because Congress owes too much to the religious right to do anything that advances knowledge in human evolution or radiometric dating.
Any student of history knows that Scopes lost his trial. Things haven't changed that much in the US in nearly a century.
"Rocky Rococo, at your cervix!"
but we more than make up for it with intelligent desing
Copied verbatim from TFA:
If nothing else convinces you of the magnitude of this problem, consider the fact that The New York Times confused "lose" and "loose."
In response to a radio programme about Intelligent Design, I wrote the following, concerning the potential erorsion of science in Saskatchewan classrooms:
John Gormley of 980 CJME.com had two guests debate Intelligent Design, and sadly almost 2:1 callers thought that ID should be in the science classroom. Every one that gave a reason why they thought that, presented a flawed understanding they held about a scientific concept. As one caller pointed out, only the United States is looking at this debate seriously, and every country in Europe is laughing at it because it's so stupid. Intelligent Design is an attack on science by Christian fundamentalists who want to get their foot in the secular school door. An understanding of science is a blow to the culture of ignorance that a few of the fundamentalist leaders count on to maintain control over a bewildered and sheep like flock.
Here's what I wrote to Gormley, but he was only taking calls so it wasn't read on the air:
Thank you for having a discussion about Intelligent Design today. Your guest Larry Krause put it so well when he said that the effort to insert creationism into the science classroom is a perhaps "well meaning attack on science". Intelligent Design makes no sense in Saskatchewan, where it's apparent that we'll have a half Aboriginal population in a few decades. If we're to require a creator to initiate our earth's development, why should it be a Christian God that puts it all in motion? There are a number of creation theories, and I've seen nothing that the Intelligent Design crowd has put forward that discounts a mythological figure from Aboriginal history being the earth's true creator.
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I don't think it serves our children any better to have Aboriginal creation myths taught in science class than it does to teach them God created your little bits and it wasn't the laws of the universe that did it. But I wanted to make the point that this is about religion, and if someone who's for ID is against Aboriginal creation myth, then they show their true stripes. It isn't about an "intelligent designer" it's about Christianity's God. It isn't about the "science" behind ID [which there is none], it's about injecting Christian myth into a class that our future drug designers, and doctors rely upon to be effective professionals.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
This is sort of already in place. Every international student, who graduates can apply for a work permit known as OPT (Optional Practical Training, I believe). This allows that student to seek employment in a field that is relevant to his/her education and or qualification. It is not automatic but nonetheless I have yet to hear a student get rejected for it. But it ends right there. After the year is over the individual already has to have a work permit or have a petition for it to stay legally in this country. I have personally seen couple of brilliant students leave this country because they couldn't get the work permit in time. Thus this suggestion of "expedited residence status" could be a very benefecial.
But now comes the ugly side of it. I bet the locals will not approve of it immediately, for very good reasons. Now they have to compete with potentially very hard working and probably smarter people for the same job. And I have seen instances where an American has been passed on for an Asian because they believe that person is going to work harder for less pay. But this new suggestion, if it becomes law, tilts the balance in favor of international students a bit. They can bargain for higher pay and will that cause any difference is to be seen. Now, IEEE was really campaigning hard to curtail H1B a year or so ago. We have to see how they react to it.
Use the same 20 step solution to the Lawyer and Doctor shortage
1. Pay More
2. Pay More
3. Pay More
4. Pay More
5. Pay More
6. Pay More
7. Pay More
8. Pay More
9. Pay More
10. Pay More
11. Pay More
12. Pay More
13. Pay More
14. Pay More
15. Pay More
16. Pay More
17. Pay More
18. Pay More
19. Pay More
20. Pay More
The free market works. That's why our best and brighest are leaving Science. Dumbsh|ts!
I really don't feel that religion has anything to do with this. Most people, even the so called religions right are NOT anti-science. Actually, I could easily see any person living in the United States become deeply conserned in loosing its posisition as a top technological and scientific country, even those conservatives you speak of.
Realistically, the reason is the almighty dollar. Everything revolves around it, it always has and always will. In the US $$ speaks more than any religious morals.
Let's get something straight. The pending doom of American science has very little to do with our political climate.
It has far more to do with school administrations, culture, and parenting.
#1 Tenure needs to be removed. Peer reviews need to be implemented. Salaries should be review / performance based. Schooling for teachers needs to be DRASTICALLY improved. Remove all the buzzword-techno-political crap that's found it's way into teaching and just TEACH.
#2 Kids who aren't in school to learn need to be removed. Yeah, so be it, some kids don't get schooled. If they nor their parents can put forth the effort, then that's too bad. Sure, we'll hear sob stories about how some are going to get left behind. Let me clue you in to a little secret. If you hold back our best and brightest to make sure no one is "left behind" then you're going to DESTROY the best and brightest. Or at least you'll have managed to severely inhibit their potential.
#3 Parenting. Why aren't parents do "fun" things like having foreign langauge weeks where they all try to speak different languages. Turn the fricken TV and computer off. Interact. Socialize. Take your kid out in the f'in garage and fix the car with him.
Finally, TECHNICAL EDUCATIONS. Go to despair.com and read the quote that states not everyone grows up to be rocket scientists. It's true.
How many corporations have scaled back or even eliminated their R&D departments because they won't turn a profit next quarter?
How much money does big oil spend to suppress new technologies?
Overly restrictive patents bar research by all who can't cough up the money to expand on somebody else's work.
Kids are actively discouraged from tinkering for fear of hurting themselves or hurting somebody else's bottom line. Want to experiment with chemistry? Here's some lemon juice and baking soda - but we'll arrest you if you put it into a plastic bottle. Want to play with model rockets? Prove you aren't a terrorist. Want to hack your X-Box and see how circuits work? The FBI'll be knocking on your door. Biology? Take pictures of a worm, but make sure it isn't endangered. Engineering? The city'll come and fine you for not building your treehouse to code.
When you get to college... how many professors actually teach science and how many spend all of their time seeking new grants to ensure the university can afford a new football stadium?
And of the precious little research that actually is happening, how much is classified and never sees the light of day
If the g'vt kept the data on you that google does you'd better believe you'd be calling it "doing evil"
If you think those are the only two choices, you're copping out. There is a third choice: work hard at making the world a better place. Yes, it can be done. Yes, you can pretend it's impossible, if you want an excuse for not doing anything.
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
From the FA:
"...The cost of employing one chemist or engineer in the United States is equal to about five chemists in China and 11 engineers in India."
And how exactly will increasing the number of chemists, engineers and scientists graduating each year increase the appeal of this career to students currently choosing careers in business and law?
My thesis is that in increasing the amounts of graduates in sciences and "lowering prices" they will fail to actually improve the situation.
Microeconomics (oh yeah... THAT natural law) says that increasing the supply of these graduates will DECREASE the price they cost -- in other words by training more... they get cheaper!
College kids are choosing business and law because (a) there are more jobs and (b) they pay better. Decreasing the pay chemists and engineers receive won't improve employment in this area. Why are there less computer scientists these days. Oh yeah, no jobs.
Hence I posit that: Decreasing the cost of engineering and chemists will do nothing to increase the United States' competitiveness in these scientific endeavors
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...where so many gadgets and inventions appear daily that continue to make science fiction into science fact, it is hard to motivate the younger generations to pursue the sciences. Why make a career out of a subject where you may never see the results of your work with your own eyes, when other fields have tangeble results from their work?
Other problems include:
- poor pay
- an increasing tendancy among scientists to take theory as fact
- increased outsourcing by american business
- unmotivated and/or knowledgable teachers(see poor pay as the reason for that)
- Greater competition by other countries
- The fanatical religious destruction of the scientific community.
You are who you are, let no one tell you different. But, never close your mind to a new point of view.
Now go and look at the history of those countries from the time when they decided that being one of the "intellectual elite" was a bad thing.
... unless they changed their opinion.
To me, it seems that they all declined pretty quickly and either vanished or are still on the bottom of the heap
You got two options people:
Either wise up and realize that being smarter is a good thing
or
Practice sucking up to whatever country will surpass us.
In Asia, India, Japan (to a lesser degree), many parts of eastern Europe its prestigeous to be a scientist or engineer. Parents still push their sons in that direction. The president of China is an engineer, the new German leader has a PhD in physics.
I really don't feel that religion has anything to do with this.
You are wrong, as are the people you cite who are "not anti-science." Even if they dispute natural selection and genetics, they of course are pro-science when they are taking an ibuprofen or getting their children vaccinated or getting their yearly flu shot. And no one with a job or an investment portfolio wants to see America lose its technological edge.
But you, like these people, are not drawing the connections between their actions and the results. Science is not just a collection of facts. You cannot just choose to support the knowledge that benefits you (flu vaccines) and fight against the knowledge that disagrees with your beliefs (carbon dated fossils, genetic evolution). Science is first and foremost a PROCESS (not a collection of "facts"), and if you attack the process you are attacking the development of the knowledge that benefits you as well as the knowledge you don't like.
Developing an effective flu vaccine every year is absolutely impossible without basis in the theories of genetic inheritance and natural selection. These theories were not just proposed and voted on by scientists--they have resulted from and withstood investigation from the process of science, conducted by millions of independent scientists over decades.
Attacking the theories in the way that many conservative religious groups have, is to attack the validity of the scientific process itself. It's pretty hard to do a good job educating and encouraging future scientists when the very concept of science is being subverted for religious or political ends.
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Face it, management can easily be outsourced. The only thing that can't be outsourced are service jobs. Want to be sure of having a job in the future? Become a teacher, pharmacist, plumber, doctor, lawyer, fireman, policeman, or any of the many other jobs that one can't telecommute to because they are required by the laws of physics to be in physical proximity to their clients.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
Yeah, my kid listed "air" as part of his answer to "name four natural resources" and got points marked off (air, despite being a non-synthetic commodity resource, was not listed in the book).
I should mention that just outside of town the local gas company has a tower where they compress air to extract oxygen, nitrogen, and argon for commercial sale.
The same teacher marked "fuel" as a correct answer to the same question. When I pointed out that many fuels are synthetic, and thus not natural resources, it became apparent that the teacher did not know what natural resources actually are, and was simply parroting an incorrect textbook.
I know plenty of religious people who would never make such a stupid mistake; but the next generation is having all this wrong information drilled into them in lieu of actual education.