[Peace-discuss] RE: [sf-core] FW: Gerald Epstein | What's So Bad About a Banker Brain Drain?

[LAURIE SOLOMON]

>Back to the stone age! 

>Back to average human lifetimes not exceeding ≈35 years. 

>Back to having no communication with another except to what you to walk to. 

>Back to ignorance.  

 

Of course, there are some who would argue that returning to these things may not be all that bad.  It might be argued that it is not about the length of life as much as the quality of life no matter what its length.  While quality of life is arguably a subjective thing,  I am not sure if living into the 70’s, 80s, and 90s is such a desirable blessing if one is doing so as a someone’s  science project.  Moreover, once we leave the first world, many of the people do not benefit from first world advances and die young if they are not killed by wars and extermination made easier and more devastating by scientific advances and weaponry or through such scientifically possible manipulation of environmental conditions via biological controls and manipulations.

 

 It also could be argued that all the so-called advances has not come without its undesirable side effects and unintended consequences.  With this in mind, I have to say your response is sort of a glib reply; I certainly expected more from you than a black & white slogan response.

 

>Despite useful remarks about transparency (Most university research has been completely transparent) and the profits that derive from applications of >science, I find this comment, especially in the last paragraph, astonishing. The bitterness and resentment is misdirected.

 

Getting a little defensive are we?  I challenge you to go around with me to the various science and engineering departments as well as the administrative officers at this and other universities and ask them to identify and show use a list of all the research being done by members of their department or the university in the case of the university administrators and let us see the names of the funders and the contractual papers  that govern the use of those funds.  I bet that we would get very little cooperation much less information.  I say that this makes your statement about most university research being transparent questionable.  

 

If one adds the fact that there is a lot of governmentally funded defense, national security, and law enforcement related research being conducted in and at universities around the country by academic researchers or academics serving as consultants which are to totally or in part  confidential or secret with those receiving funding signing or otherwise agreeing to non-disclosure agreements, one has further reason to doubt the extent of the transparency of information surrounding research at the university and who it is being done for and why it is being done.  Do we even know what percentage of university research is or is not of this type?  There also is a lot of contractual research going on at this and other universities for  private companies (some of which is funded by those companies, some by government grants, and some by a mix of the two).  In fact the amount of contractual research has been on the rise as has the privatization of a variety of things including research and research facilities, stadiums, etc. at universities – including publically funded state universities.

 

You really mean to tell me that scientists, engineers and academics are special types of people unlike everyone else in that they are not inclined to follow the money when designing and carrying out their research so as to get research grants and exploit funding opportunities, so as to set themselves up in a position to get lucrative consulting contracts, so as to establish a foundation for future side ventures and businesses.  I do not think that they are that pure, that they do not engage in pettiness, organizational and professional politics and backstabbing, ambitiousness and desire for fame, fortune, and power.  What percentage of academic research by scientists and engineers are being done in fields or areas or on topics and problems for which there is no grant money available from the government or private enterprises?  

 

I don’t find any of my comments astonishing or outrageous; and any resentment and/or bitterness that I may have expressed is not totally misdirected.  I resent anyone who uses public resources for secret purposes or in  support of secret agendas or for private gain and benefit/profit.  

 

 

 

 

From: Morton K. Brussel [mailto:brussel at illinois.edu] 
Sent: Sunday, February 15, 2009 4:17 PM 
To: LAURIE SOLOMON
Cc: peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net; sf-core at yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [sf-core] FW: Gerald Epstein | What's So Bad About a Banker Brain Drain?

 

Back to the stone age! 

Back to average human lifetimes not exceeding ≈35 years. 

Back to having no communication with another except to what you to walk to. 

Back to ignorance.  

 

Despite useful remarks about transparency (Most university research has been completely transparent) and the profits that derive from applications of science, I find this comment, especially in the last paragraph, astonishing. The bitterness and resentment is misdirected. 

 

--mkb

 

 

 

On Feb 15, 2009, at 3:46 PM, LAURIE SOLOMON wrote:





Scientists Celebrate Dawn of Barack Obama's Age of Reason
http://www.truthout.org/021509E
Mark Henderson, The Times: "There was indeed a palpable buzz yesterday in
the subterranean conference rooms of the two downtown Chicago hotels where
the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is holding
its annual meeting. The real excitement, however, has had much less to do
with Darwin than with the most famous former resident of America's second
city - Barack Obama."

(My comments) Where have we heard similar expressions before?  Of course,
the Bush proponents would argue that their term was an age of reason also;
it just used different rules of evidence and argument, different forms of
logic and reasoning, and different arguments and understandings.  But the
important and undisclosed part of this is that science as a enterprise and
industry is a special interest group whose interests are now being served;
unfortunately, like the financial industry, it is being given stimulus money
and other funding, permissions to engage in research that was not permitted
before and in ways that were not allowed previously, and opportunities to
ear revenues and make profits at public expense for private actors - the
scientists, the universities and companies that they work for, and the
investors who get value for risks that the public takes.  

If the scientists research is pure research and of some short or long range
benefit to society and the public so as to justify their public funding and
right to engage in the research, then why not insist on all copyrights and
patents related to the research and its findings be public and that private
persons or companies who are using said research or findings for profit be
required to pay monthly licensing fees to the government at reasonable and
fair market value based on the profits generated by the products and
services which utilize the research and research findings done with public
money? In addition, if public money is to be spent on scientific research or
on research done in public facilities or by public employees (i.e., faculty
members in public institutions), then that research should be made totally
and completely transparent with respect to the research itself, the
findings, the methodologies employed, the contracts between he involved
parties, and the uses to which the research is being put. 

However, I doubt if the new age of reason will not be very similar to the
older ages of reason where scientists are out for themselves although they
justify their activities under a clock of public good, and the type of
research and the benefits of it are determined by the needs and profit
opportunities of the funding sources (particularly the government whose
public funding is more times than not for secretive national security,
defense and policing purposes with other benefits being mostly spin-offs and
not the main purpose) and those who seek to make financial gain from the
research.  Very little scientific research these days is being done for
purely intellectual or academic reasons.

 

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