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In the pharmaceutical business at least, huge sums of money are frequently spent on strategies that even graduate students could point out as being unlikely to
by pcrh 10y ago
In the pharmaceutical business at least, huge sums of money are frequently spent on strategies that even graduate students could point out as being unlikely to succeed. The reasoning behind these unproductive decisions is almost always "markets".
- adrianratnapala 10y agoCan you elaborate on how this works? Do you mean there is (in effect) some kind of market for vapourware, so companies work on things that sound good even though they predictably can't work? Who benefits?
- pcrh 10y agoThe people who benefit are those who can raise funds/support for the next round. It is more difficult to obtain objective evidence about biological sciences and its subset, medicine, than other fields such as maths or chemistry. This is due to the inherent complexity and poorly understood processes by which living organisms thrive, or not. So, there is abundant interest from non-experts (i.e. potential investors or market analysts) in gaining a slice of attractive markets such as currently unmet conditions e.g. lung cancer or Alzheimer's disease. Such people are sometimes more easily swayed by the proclamations of "famous professors" than graduate students might be. So, yes, there is in effect a lot of "vapourware" in the drug business. And much of it succeeds precisely because there is insufficient expertise on the behalf of investors, who get their knowledge of the underlying science third hand, or worse.
- hilop 10y agoThe OP topic is complaining that acedemia is too reluctant too fund things that are unlikely to succeed.