It is worrisome that you were here downvoted for this view; as it is one that I believe (as a working scientist) is one of the larger issues that has been left

It is worrisome that you were here downvoted for this view; as it is one that I believe (as a working scientist) is one of the larger issues that has been left out of this discussion. For example, public universities used to be fairly unconstrained in their support of grant research. Now most, if not all, have an office devoted to the commercialization (patent protection) of their own publicly supported research; quite often subsidized by private interests. So if a researcher wanted to study the effects of cell-phone usage on the developing brain, (which didn't involve me, but rather a colleague), then suddenly several large companies were going to "lamentably" pull out of supporting the athletic department with its "amateur sports" endeavors. And the list of subtle control of "public" research continues. Science and commercialism can mix productively, but it should never be done covertly. Unfortunately corporate thinking is nearly always covert.