In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, Ronald Bloom <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >DZ <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> Herman Rubin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> > Only getting the government out of directing activities can restore >> > civilization.
>> What are your views about about conducting scientific research at >> organizations such as NIH? > Or publicly funded organizations such as Purdue University ? > Hmmm... There is a purpose for state universities, as long as they have to compete with good private universities. BTW, Purdue was not a major research university before the influx of federal funding, which attempted to "share the wealth". There were excellent state universities, doing quality research, before WWII. Some of these were set up to provide first-class alternatives to private schools, such as the University of Virginia, some were set up as states realized they needed good local institutions of higher learning, with strong private institutions not available, and some were set up for state pride. Many of them even precede the American research university, which started in the late 19th century (yes, that late) but which were going strong by 1900. These universities competed for scholars and their facilities, and were funded mainly by endowment income for private schools, and by state appropriations plus a small amount from endowment and other sources for state schools. Tuition at state schools was nominal, and at private schools was often a smaller portion of the actual cost of education than it is now at state schools. A major part of the value of the system was the total lack of central direction. There was a small amount of direct federal research, and some of this should be continued. But NIH does not just conduct scientific research, but provides something like 90% of the research funding for university research. It is this which needs to be returned to being done by more than 100 competing sources rather than one source. -- This address is for information only. I do not claim that these views are those of the Statistics Department or of Purdue University. Herman Rubin, Department of Statistics, Purdue University [EMAIL PROTECTED] Phone: (765)494-6054 FAX: (765)494-0558 . . ================================================================= Instructions for joining and leaving this list, remarks about the problem of INAPPROPRIATE MESSAGES, and archives are available at: . http://jse.stat.ncsu.edu/ . =================================================================
