There was an interesting post on Phil Plait’s Bad Astronomy Blog in September. It showed an interview with Brian Cox and David King. Cox came off from the interview looking much, much better than King. The comments seemed to capitalize on that and it seemed rather quickly that the merit of the discussion or points of view presented by both King and Cox were lost. Not being an expert on funding in the UK, nor on the politics of either King of Cox, but seeing what I thought might be valid question lost in the roar of criticism, I tried to write up my thoughts on the matter in a reasonable fashion.

The short of my view is this (irrespective of King or Cox) : Each year a sum of money far too small is allocated to science. As such, there has to be some rather tough decisions made about which projects receive funding and how much. It is reasonable to consider placing some of the decision based upon science that is likely to have some impact on large problems. I find the argument for “basic” science funding based upon spin-offs to be largely lacking. It’s not untrue that “basic” science often makes significant, even world changing contributions. However, “applied” science also very frequently has unexpected spin-offs that result. I think the primary justification for “basic” science with little or no direct connection to real-world problems needs to come from human curiosity and wonder.

There were several comments that followed. Sadly many seemed to be of the one or two line variety without much substance. I did get a comment that I disagreed with and thus posted up a further response. As I put a bit of effort into each I’d like to keep a copy of them here, just cut and paste.

post 1 :

# michael s pierce Says:
September 13th, 2008 at 1:48 pm

With all respect to Brian Cox, my personal point of view is that the largest reason to pursue such interests as current high-energy physics needs to be for the innate value that we humans place on understanding our universe at different levels. Call it curiosity, call it exploration, whatever, it certainly has it’s own value. But I find the degree to which Cox bases his argument on spin-offs to be rather second rate. As we push back the unknown we discover new questions, problems, and directions. Some of those have direct bearing revealing new ideas & technologies that directly benefit us. Other times they bring to light dangers we were not previously aware of (or thought we could do nothing about). However, Cox’s argument about spinoff’s is equally applicable to the more applied sciences as well. Dollar qua dollar I’d expect the spinoffs from “applied” fields to be no worse or better than spinoffs from “basic” science.

It can be cast in a different light. A classic example being Tang and Teflon from Apollo. Truly, if we wanted such things we could have made a much cheaper investment directly without going to the moon. I am disappointed that we spent the money? No, my point is that if we’re going to spend such vast sums of money, we need to sell it to the public for what I think is the right reasons.

I think King’s argument can often be lost on people. Understand that he’s not against science funding (he himself being a world renowned surface scientist, physicist and chemist before stepping into more of a political life) nor is he against funding “basic” science in general. It’s a question of balance and sadly the question of funding has been all too exacerbated by the erosion of monetary support. Funding hits has come across the board, it’s not just high-energy physics, it’s not just basic science, it’s impacted everything.

Perhaps it’s important to understand where a person like King is coming from. His field has both beautiful basic science and technologically important applied aspects to it. He’s witnessed incredible accomplishments in his career (having made quite a few himself), but has also seen too frequently the numerous instances where advances in science either happened very slowly or simply did not happen due to funding woe.

His own field is at the heart of basic energy. The problems he has seen and worked on for much of his life have had direct bearing on both energy use/consumption and climate change (along with many other things). It’s true that as Cox says, that (for instance) particle beam physics has bearing on cancer therapy. However, the proximity of that work is likely often (I suspect, though not being an expert in that field I’ll leave it at suspect) not very closely directed to such research. There is a spinoff, there is benefit, but money and effort directed explicitly towards that end would probably be a much better buy if your goal is treating cancer.

I am very happy that high-energy physics is in the headlines and am likewise dismayed at the failure (largely) of say my own field to engage the public with our own exciting discoveries. There has to be a balance between funding for research both basic and applied.
However, significant weight must be given to directly (and adequately) funding work that has the highest likelihood of successfully solving some of our greatest problems. That last sentence is what I believe to be the crux of King’s argument and is one not to be taken lightly.

Michael

PS : and yes, I am elated that the LHC is about to begin operation. I am ecstatic that we will find “Mr. Higgs” or a set of particles filling that roll. And the experimentalist mindset I have is absolutely giddy at the fact that a simply countless number of competing theories produced in the past few decades may be put to rest (and maybe, some of them confirmed!).


post 2:
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# michael s pierce Says:
October 28th, 2008 at 4:16 pm

Apologies for not replying sooner, I only noticed your response a day ago. Please permit me to be a bit verbose if only for the benefit of others reading this. Much of my response is a more general statement and despite its length (and discussion of facts well known to you), it is not intended to be condescending.

I disagree with your statement regarding much of King’s research. Many of the parts of his research I am aware of tend to be rather important for basic energy. While much of it is highly academic, much of it also has significant relevance the “applied” side of science. There is of course a spectrum between academic and applied, but it seems to me that much of his work is quite closely related to basic energy research with at least some relevance to industrial and applied scientists. I think that is especially true if you compare his work to other fields that clearly are further towards the “basic” side of the spectrum. I’ll pick the two best examples that come to my mind at the moment: Alternative power sources such as fuel cells (yes, I’m well aware that they’re not the panacea they’re often made out to be) and cleaner conventional engines.

I think that basic science in support of fuel cells (particular the understanding of Pt surfaces and the ‘model’ fuel CO) and oxidation of gases such as NO and CO into less harmful products would qualify quite well for science with a rather direct connection to energy and the environment. Platinum crystal facets, Pt alloys, and Pt micro/nano particles have been some of the more promising and interesting surfaces with regards to catalysts for fuel cells. It is also true that catalytic converters providing a means for oxidation reactions such as CO to CO2 and NO to N & O, (among others) make for cleaner burning engines. Again, that interesting metal platinum makes an appearance. Glancing through a few searches it looks like he’s got at least around 60-70 papers that deal with the activity of gases such as CO and NO on surfaces. That number could easily be well below that actual mark. I’m certain he was often guided by curiosity and academic interest, but I imagine a reasonable amount of his motivation had to do with the potential payoff of understanding these things better.

Perhaps my original wording is misleading towards implying something to the effect of “King makes Fuel Cells or King’s research makes your car produce no CO.” If that is the impression my words give, then they should be restated. Nonetheless, I do think there’s a quick and ready connection between much of his work (over 3 decades of it) and what can be applied towards cleaner power and engines. I find it hard to imagine that the potential payoff of understanding those systems and reactions played little role in his motivation. Remove the work by people such as King or Ertl and the industrial scientists trying to develop fuel cells and catalytic converters would be at a genuine loss. Compare that to the contributions of many a successful scientist rooted in high-energy physics (such as Brian Cox or even a more senior researcher). They often do fascinating work, but the connection towards real world problems is very often (not always, but very often) much further removed. They rely much more heavily on innate human curiosity/answering big questions (truly often a valid reason) and potential spin-offs (I find that less compelling as I see both “basic” and “applied” science generating unexpected benefits). It seems to me that the work of King, while often very academic, still has significant importance to the “real world.” I think you’ll find true applied industrial scientists working in basic energy that do cite some of King’s work. Perhaps I’m lacking imagination but I’m not seeing that direct of a connection for someone like Cox (and I shouldn’t have to say this again, but here goes : that’s not a knock against his research based on a curiosity or wonder metric).

There’s perhaps a bit of confusion for some people upon our use of the terms “basic” and “applied.” They’re often stated as if there’s a clear and distinct difference upon which we all agree. Often that’s the case. However, very often that line is rather blurry, especially depending upon your point of view. The terms “basic” and “applied” science often have different meanings depending upon who is using them. Typically “applied” is used when there is a specific end in mind other than answering inherently interesting questions and satisfying curiosity. Typically the term “basic” is used to describe work that is principally undertaken to sate our curiosity. However, the “line” between the two is drawn in very different places. I consider my own work on the basic side. I’ve given talks before industry crowds and often had the response, “that’s interesting, but really too academic to be useful to what we’re concerned with.” At the same time, many of my friends in high-energy physics or astronomy look at my work as deep in “applied” territory.

In fact while I think my own work does fall on the “basic” side, it’s near enough to occasionally be of interest to those on the “applied” side. I take a great deal of pleasure and satisfaction in that respect. I think it’s a fascinating, interesting place to do science. I’m also happy that my work does contribute (in my case in only a small way so far) towards things that I think might make the world a better place. King’s work that I’m familiar with often falls in this middle ground (though with much greater impact than my own).

My defense of King is not based on any personal knowledge of the man nor am I very informed about his politics. Living in the states, I’m well aware that there’s probably a great deal I do not know or understand about the state of science funding in the UK. Rather, it’s based on the (admittedly) limited amount that I have seen such as the above video and my knowledge as a scientist (which compared to quite a few people is also limited, I am only a post-doc). However, from that I see a great deal of people bashing King with arguments that seem very ad hominem and without recognizing that you should give very serious consideration to the following situation.

Regrettably we only have a certain amount of money each year with which to fund science. It is far, far too low an amount to fund everything and everyone. As such, while we may work in the long term towards hopefully getting better science funding (and education), in the short term we’re faced with a very serious issue. We’re going to have to decide that some things don’t get funding or get much less money than they need. Perhaps it is in our genuine interest to weight some of our decision about which projects receive money (and how much) based upon those programs that are working more directly towards problems with a broad societal or potentially global impact?

I think that’s a tough and fair question to ask.

Best wishes,

Michael