Hoodwinked!
March 14th, 2006Posted by: Roger Pielke, Jr.
The science community has successfully tricked a major politician into thinking that the U.S. is experiencing a rapid decline in its science and technology standing in the world. In the March issue of the American Physical Society News (link here, subscription required) Congressman Frank Wolf (R-VA), chair the very influential House Appropriations subcommittee with jurisdiction over the major science agencies, writes the following:
In my role as chairman of the House Science-State-Justice-Commerce
Appropriations subcommittee, which controls the budget of NASA, the National Science Foundation, the White House Office of Science and Technology policy and NOAA, I have met over the past year with groups that advocate for business, education, and research and development. What I heard from them is that America is facing unprecedented competition from countries such as China and India and our role as the global innovation leader is being challenged. I was alarmed to learn that three key measuring sticks show America on a downward slope: patents awarded to American scientists; papers published by American scientists, and Nobel prizes won by American scientists.
What does the data say? Actually, the opposite:
Patents granted: Not decreasing, but increasing
Papers published: Not decreasing, but increasing
Nobel prizes: Not declining, US dominant, consider:
The United States is by far the leading country in the world since 1951 in awards of Nobel Prizes in Science, which include Chemistry, Physics and Medicine-Physiology. United States scientists received 195 or 56% of the 350 Nobel Prizes in Science awarded from 1951 to 2005. The United States has received a majority of Nobel Prizes in Science each decade from 1951 to 2000. From 1991 to 2005 U.S. scientists earned 59 (57.8%) of the 102 Nobel Prizes awarded in Science.
The solution to this “crisis”? According to Congressman Wolf:
Remembering how the nation was mobilized to compete for the space frontier after the Soviet Union launched Sputnik in the late 1950’s, I wrote President Bush last year urging him to embrace this issue. I asked that he dramatically increase our nation’s innovation budget–federal basic research and development–over the next decade to ensure U.S. economic leadership in the 21st century.
I wonder if anyone is going to let Congressman Wolf know that he is basing policy on a complete misunderstanding of the “problem”? Don’t count on it. Special interests are especially special when they are yours, and what is a little fudging of the facts when science funding is at stake? The science community plays the crisis card inappropriately at some risk, as policy makers don’t usually like being hoodwinked.
March 14th, 2006 at 9:30 am
Roger
Perhaps the key science policy question of the 21st century isn’t so much when and how scientist should get involved in political advocacy. Perhaps a far bigger problem is how decision-makers can establish effective procedures that allow them to carefully assess any claims or demands by science communities with vested, political or economic interests.
March 14th, 2006 at 9:34 am
Benny- Yes, I agree. I think that this question is fully part of the broader issues that arise at the science-policy-politics interface.
March 14th, 2006 at 12:08 pm
Since all of the people who Mr Wolf met with set science policy and in fact do so as their principal occupation, although some may have been scientists at one time, the lesson, if any, is not to listen to those trying to set science policy.
The interesting point about US science and engineering is that it has always depended on attracting talented people from other parts of the world. What is concerning today is that the degree of dependence is increasing as fewer US citizens are training for S&E careers.
For decades the attraction of the US was the possibility of doing interesting things here that could not be done elsewhere. Globalization is changing this. In my own field I have seen the most talented students from India and China return to their home countries to well equipped labs with excellent support. Ten years ago that simply did not happen. I saw the same thing in the seventies with European students who trained in the US. Increased globalization means that the US will no longer be able to cream off the most talented, but will have to rely more on developing its own human capital.
March 14th, 2006 at 3:41 pm
My impression is that people are patenting more often and breaking their ideas into multiple patents. Changes in the comercial and legal environment may be skewing the trend. In my previous job there was a group of 20 or so patents each of which was a small variation on a theme, which all could have been included in one patent. The venture capitalists wanted it that way, but the university where one of the inventors worked accused the inventor of padding his resume.
Quantity and quality of papers are two different things. There has been increasing pressure to publish and a proliferation of journals.
There is also a long time lag between education and funding, and Nobel prizes. So it will take a long time for changes to show up in the data.
That said, I don’t know if this is a case of bad arguments in a good cause of just total nonsense.
As for the quality of american K-12 education, any objective look at the bottom 20% of the schools will show it is a disaster. In my local HS’s Berkeley High or Oakland tech have drop out rates in the neighborhood of 40% and the turn over rate for HS teachers in Oakland is 30%. THis is typical of inner city schools thoughout the nation. One can get an excellent education at Berkeley High or Oakland Tech, as good as most private schools, but one has to be properly tracted. The well off are doing very well, but the bottom is a total disaster.
March 14th, 2006 at 4:09 pm
Roger, you may have it, but I for one would *really* like to see some substantiation for laying this at the feet of “the science community”. Who provided what bad information? Certainly there must be plenty of corporate interests that might lobby for increased research funds. You really make it sound like some conspiracy of white labcoat-wearing uber-geeks.
March 14th, 2006 at 4:42 pm
Coby- Thanks. I’m not sure Rep. Wolf heard from specifically, but his message is being broadcast by the APS, and I’ve gotten most way through a critique of Rising Above the Gathering Storm, which is not so solid an analysis, yet has been used in advocacy by a wide range of science groups. Should you need more details, I’d recommend Daniel Greenberg’s Science, Money, and Politics (U of Chicago). I don’t think there are white-coated uber-geeks, but there is certainly a science lobby that speaks for the community, (probably decked out in Armani suits with K Street addresses;-)
March 15th, 2006 at 3:17 am
Roger
Here is a wonderful French example of how politicians can avoid bad science advice (and have a great seightseeing holiday at the same time): DIY science
http://www.myiris.com/newsCentre/newsPopup.php?fileR=20060314155420047&dir=2006/03/14&secID=livenews
March 15th, 2006 at 10:20 am
I like it Ben: DIY science: just take the results that appeal to your ideology and ignore the rest!
Magnifique!
but anyway, the linky Ben provides is strange in that it doesn’t support what he says. There is nothing in there that shows that their decision-making process is such that they will avoid bad science advice. I’m not sure why you said what you said, Ben…
Best,
D
March 15th, 2006 at 12:43 pm
Dano
I find your attacks on people continue to be annoying. When I brought this up previously you replied that you were created to expose obfuscation and other improper behaviour. There is nothing I have seen here now or previously that puts Benny in that category.
You might consider that your own comments are doing what you were created to expose. I believe that Benny’s link does support what he says. Please reflect upon it rather than just reacting. The French lawmakers are going outside of their own country to learn more and they are not just visiting one country they are going to several. Isn’t that how one learns? Certainly that is far better than just being a captive audience listening to narrow viewpoints.
Perhaps it might be wise if you sought your own demise and reincarnated into someone more mannerly.
I do hope you take this in the right spirit.
TT
March 15th, 2006 at 1:15 pm
Thank you TT, I do take it in the right spirit.
The assertion was “how politicians can avoid bad science advice”.
The short blurb described some FR parliament members traveling to India on a fact-finding mission.
Nowhere in the arty does it mention what staffers are coming along.
Nor does it mention anything about how the members are receiving information or with whom they are meeting or talking to.
So the arty is, at best, a vessel into which you can pour whatever you want.
But maybe I’m missing something, TT. Perhaps you can point out for me how they are avoiding bad science advice.
Are they speaking to non-FR scientists [har-har]? Are they not speaking to scientists at all? Are they only speaking to certain scientists? Are they speaking to policy-makers?
As apparently I missed these answers and you caught them, maybe you can be kind enough to point out what I missed.
Thank you in advance TT,
D
March 15th, 2006 at 2:25 pm
Dano.
Your points are well-taken if Mr. Peiser was addressing, “how politicians can avoid bad science advice”. On the other hand he may just have been commenting on his previous comment and Roger’s reply; that is the way I took it.
Another thought has occured to me. Might both of us have missed the point? Could Mr. Peiser have just been making a joke about junketing politicians? If so I am sure that he was just trying to lighten up the conversation.
Mr. Peiser, Would you please respond to these four comments?
Thank you
TT
March 15th, 2006 at 3:16 pm
I can see your premise as being valid, too, TT.
Best,
D
March 16th, 2006 at 3:04 am
TT
Yes, thanks. This was tongue-in-cheek indeed – I thought I’d hinted at that
E.B. White once remarked: “Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but the thing dies in the process and the innards are discouraging to any but the pure scientific mind.”
March 16th, 2006 at 9:30 am
Apologies, Benny – I use a winky when kidding
so perhaps I’m not trained in alternative emoticons.
Best,
D
March 16th, 2006 at 11:28 am
Thank you both. Until now I did not know what those symbols meant.
TT
March 16th, 2006 at 3:01 pm
Ahhhh…TT is not hopelessly geeky. Outstanding.
Best,
D
(go ahead – ask me about my emoticon skills)
March 17th, 2006 at 2:23 pm
Roger,
Can you respond to my observations above? Perhaps you ignored them since I wrote it too quickly, I was unclear and error prone.
I don’t think your arguments are very good, which does not mean I am disagreeing with them, just that they are not strong and seem simplistic. To restate and expand:
1)I don’t believe the number of patents is a good metric for innovation. There are changes in legal and economic factors effecting the number of patents.
2)Similarly there are other factors effecting the number of papers published. I recall Steven Weinberg saying a number of year ago, that we would be better off if we just destroyed most of the theoretical physics papers (not so for the experimental “one can always use another data point”).
3)There is a long delay between investments in education and science and the awarding of Nobel prizes. We will not see the affects of recent changes for many years.
4)This is secondary to your point but… The article on Nobel prizes argues that US K-12 education is excellent. This is true of the top schools but it completely ignores the dismal nature of the bottom schools. We have enough good schools to produce a lot of top scientists but we are miserably failing a very large percentage of the population.
5)We will not maintain leadership by merely remaining constant in our investment. One needs to improve in the face of more competition.
Thanks,
Greg.
March 17th, 2006 at 9:10 pm
Greg-
Thanks for your comments. I’m happy to respond.
1. I agree. It was not me who asserted that patents are a measure of competitiveness, but Rep. Wolf (and also found in RAGS).
2. Ditto.
3. Ditto.
4. Agreed.
5. This is an assertion. It may well be correct, but if it is correct there should be an argument to make beyond the assertion.
Thanks!
March 18th, 2006 at 7:23 pm
Of course, the notion of improving investment needs to be specified. Greg (and others), how would you describe an “improved investment” in this context?
The assumption behind RAGS and most reports of the same type is that an improved investment is primarily (or even solely) described as more dollars. Sadly this reduces science and technology policy to budget policy (as Sarewitz has argued to the point of becoming an axiom). The difficulty of finding and using effective measures for innovation (patents are at best proxy measures – noting one kind of result from innovation) makes it difficult to break from this emphasis on dollars.