Hacker News Reader

Does that mean a lack of funding can't catalyze the issue?

Edit: Just for transparency (topical!) I did not downvote you, and totally agree that cronyism is a major (and yeah maybe causative) issue, but I also think the decision on how to fund is basically an entirely separate problem which really doesn't have an obviously good solution (in my mind).

View on HN

Make the companies that profit from the research do the research themselves, in house, and pay for it and direct it themselves. That's the only way.

You can't set up academia as a soviet-style bureaucracy and expect it to perform any differently from a soviet-style bureaucracy.

But not all scientific research will benefit companies. Some will even be detrimental to large companies (disruptive technologies). Therefore blueskies pure science needs funding from some source other than industry.

What I do find disturbing is the trend to push University research towards immediately commercially viable stuff. Industry would/should do this stuff anyway.

What, like the pharmaceutical industry? I would argue that much good knowledge is created that way but it, too, has its issues. See much of Ben Goldacre's work.

http://www.badscience.net/

Reply on news.ycombinator.com