War and Research funding

[Jorje286]

lol, come on people you must be kidding me. I'm guessing a lot of you don't discuss stuff on the internet, cause this discussion has been pretty civil in comparison.

Anyway, I don't think science has (or should have) a single purpose behind it. Doing it to discover the world and get to a closer knowledge to reality is also noble. (among other objectives) A lot of science was also motivated by curiosity and a desire to know the world, pure and simple. I bet Darwin wasn't thinking that much about economical advantages or how to benefit humanity when he went on the Beagle and then put forth evolution theory.

For NIH funding and internationals, I don't think it's about equal opportunity, but there's absolutely no doubt that getting internationals can only benefit the process of science in the US. Would that hurt local US scientists because of competition? Ofcourse. But it will definitely reward the taxpayers a lot more. The NIH doesn't really give funding to foreigners out of generosity.

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[DogFaceMedic]

lol, come on people you must be kidding me. I'm guessing a lot of you don't discuss stuff on the internet, cause this discussion has been pretty civil in comparison.

Anyway, I don't think science has (or should have) a single purpose behind it. Doing it to discover the world and get to a closer knowledge to reality is also noble. (among other objectives) A lot of science was also motivated by curiosity and a desire to know the world, pure and simple. I bet Darwin wasn't thinking that much about economical advantages or how to benefit humanity when he went on the Beagle and then put forth evolution theory.

For NIH funding and internationals, I don't think it's about equal opportunity, but there's absolutely no doubt that getting internationals can only benefit the process of science in the US. Would that hurt local US scientists because of competition? Ofcourse. But it will definitely reward the taxpayers a lot more. The NIH doesn't really give funding to foreigners out of generosity.

Yes, this forum is civil and polite compared to the nonsense in other sites. But wait until people get tenure, then it will be nasty.

As for the purpose of science: philosophically, I think science can only be understood in the service of humanity. I am not suggesting a socialized research program; I'm just making the general point that even the search for knowledge for its own sake is in itself a human endeavor undertaken for the benefit of human consciousness. I'm an idealist in some ways.