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As long as science continues to be funded by corporations, we will always have this problem of getting results biased towards the corporations. I wonder what el

As long as science continues to be funded by corporations, we will always have this problem of getting results biased towards the corporations. I wonder what else can be used to fund scientific research if not the government?

kovek 9y ago
I've seen that people start off gofundme's or the like when they need some financial support with an urgent unexpected issue. People are happy to help and contribute, sometimes even if they are complete strangers. I've read someone say it was because people want to know who is getting their support. Maybe if it was possible to easily support research similarly, then people might pitch in?
- karthikb 9y ago
  Check out https://experiment.com/ https://experiment.com/ for exactly this!
- dannyw 9y ago
  Early stage research still costs a lot of money. You won’t raise $200k from a bunch of individuals like a go fund me; and individuals are probably not the best at judging the impact and merit of proposals. We need an overhaul of the way research is funded, but I don’t think asking everyday individuals to fund is the right way.
btrettel 9y ago
Grad student here. I have thought about this a lot. I think governmental funding sources have problems similar to those from companies. They may not be as explicitly biased, but agendas will exist. There's also the problem that the people approving the funding don't necessarily make good choices. I might prefer an explicit lottery to the current system. My plan right now is to save money, retire early, and then doing whatever research I want that fits my budget. This avoids many of the problems with the current system, but is not possible for many. This would allow me to pursue more risky research (in the sense that the research may fail to produce useful results) than an assistant professor trying to get tenure could. I also wouldn't have to raise funds, so I could focus on projects I believe are important, not just what can get funded. In the book "Invention" by Norbert Weiner, as I recall, he suggests that the government could fund independent researchers to encourage better research. I don't think that will happen, so I have a DIY solution instead.
- folli 9y ago
  You're plan sounds very appealing, but is unfortunately very limited to non-wet-lab sciences, such as CS. The amount of set-up and running costs for just a barebones functioning laboratory, e.g. in biochemistry, is in the multi-million dollar range, so there you will still be needing some sort of funding or a very large savings account.
  - dorgo 9y ago
    I suspect some corruption going on when I hear something like this. I have no experience with biochemistry, but in my university they showed us a (selfbuild) 3D equipment consisting of one or a couple of computers, 3 (good) beamers and a gauntlet to control the scene. I couldn't believe the price-tag: 300k €. I think the problem is the same for many institutions. They get budget and need to spend it somehow (if they don't then they get less the next year).
dluan 9y ago
Hi! I'm one of the founders of experiment.com. The NBER just released a paper this week on crowdfunding, primarily looking at Experiment's dataset: http://www.nber.org/papers/w24402 http://www.nber.org/papers/w24402
thfaway 9y ago
Now..Where does that put all the research that says vaccines are "safe and effective"..
- adrianN 9y ago
  You don't need much research when you can just compared the number of people that used to die from illnesses that we vaccinate against with the number of people who die from vaccines.
  - thfaway 9y ago
    This is a commonly touted statistics. But it is like saying banning a Car of type 'X' will save Y lives because for the past few years Y lives were lost in accidents involving car X. Sadly it is so easy to fool people into falling for this and turn them to ardent vaccine supporters. A vaccines does not prevent death. It just, if it works, prevents the incidence of a single disease. Try to see the difference. If 5000 kids were dying of Measles, introducing a Measles vaccine will not save 5000 lives. It just prevents incidence of Measles. Kids with poor health/immune system will still be dying. But they won't show up in measles statistics, showcasing a huge win for the vaccine. If you look at the Mortality rate of kids, you won't find any drastic drop in MR corresponding to the introduction of any vaccine...But you ll find drop in disease incidence..But as I described it, I think it is quite meaning less.. btw. I was not starting a debate on if vaccines are actually saving lives. What I was asking was the validness of the claim that vaccines (yes people, eh..I mean doctors say "vaccines", instead of specifying any single one, for some reason generalizing all vaccines to be similar) are safe. And since vaccinations are done to every single child, what if we might be again subtly damaging generations of children..

kovek 9y ago

I've seen that people start off gofundme's or the like when they need some financial support with an urgent unexpected issue. People are happy to help and contribute, sometimes even if they are complete strangers. I've read someone say it was because people want to know who is getting their support. Maybe if it was possible to easily support research similarly, then people might pitch in?

karthikb 9y ago
Check out https://experiment.com/ https://experiment.com/ for exactly this!
dannyw 9y ago
Early stage research still costs a lot of money. You won’t raise $200k from a bunch of individuals like a go fund me; and individuals are probably not the best at judging the impact and merit of proposals. We need an overhaul of the way research is funded, but I don’t think asking everyday individuals to fund is the right way.

btrettel 9y ago

Grad student here. I have thought about this a lot. I think governmental funding sources have problems similar to those from companies. They may not be as explicitly biased, but agendas will exist. There's also the problem that the people approving the funding don't necessarily make good choices. I might prefer an explicit lottery to the current system. My plan right now is to save money, retire early, and then doing whatever research I want that fits my budget. This avoids many of the problems with the current system, but is not possible for many. This would allow me to pursue more risky research (in the sense that the research may fail to produce useful results) than an assistant professor trying to get tenure could. I also wouldn't have to raise funds, so I could focus on projects I believe are important, not just what can get funded. In the book "Invention" by Norbert Weiner, as I recall, he suggests that the government could fund independent researchers to encourage better research. I don't think that will happen, so I have a DIY solution instead.

folli 9y ago
You're plan sounds very appealing, but is unfortunately very limited to non-wet-lab sciences, such as CS. The amount of set-up and running costs for just a barebones functioning laboratory, e.g. in biochemistry, is in the multi-million dollar range, so there you will still be needing some sort of funding or a very large savings account.
- dorgo 9y ago
  I suspect some corruption going on when I hear something like this. I have no experience with biochemistry, but in my university they showed us a (selfbuild) 3D equipment consisting of one or a couple of computers, 3 (good) beamers and a gauntlet to control the scene. I couldn't believe the price-tag: 300k €. I think the problem is the same for many institutions. They get budget and need to spend it somehow (if they don't then they get less the next year).

dluan 9y ago

Hi! I'm one of the founders of experiment.com. The NBER just released a paper this week on crowdfunding, primarily looking at Experiment's dataset: http://www.nber.org/papers/w24402 http://www.nber.org/papers/w24402

thfaway 9y ago

Now..Where does that put all the research that says vaccines are "safe and effective"..

adrianN 9y ago
You don't need much research when you can just compared the number of people that used to die from illnesses that we vaccinate against with the number of people who die from vaccines.
- thfaway 9y ago
  This is a commonly touted statistics. But it is like saying banning a Car of type 'X' will save Y lives because for the past few years Y lives were lost in accidents involving car X. Sadly it is so easy to fool people into falling for this and turn them to ardent vaccine supporters. A vaccines does not prevent death. It just, if it works, prevents the incidence of a single disease. Try to see the difference. If 5000 kids were dying of Measles, introducing a Measles vaccine will not save 5000 lives. It just prevents incidence of Measles. Kids with poor health/immune system will still be dying. But they won't show up in measles statistics, showcasing a huge win for the vaccine. If you look at the Mortality rate of kids, you won't find any drastic drop in MR corresponding to the introduction of any vaccine...But you ll find drop in disease incidence..But as I described it, I think it is quite meaning less.. btw. I was not starting a debate on if vaccines are actually saving lives. What I was asking was the validness of the claim that vaccines (yes people, eh..I mean doctors say "vaccines", instead of specifying any single one, for some reason generalizing all vaccines to be similar) are safe. And since vaccinations are done to every single child, what if we might be again subtly damaging generations of children..