This is my third post today, so any follow-up will have to wait until tomorrow.
On Sun, 26 Oct 2008 09:53:57 -0700, Rick Froman wrote: >Wow, that was a lot of response to something you don't understand. I hope that what I wrote represented a thoughtful, analytic examination of what I interpreted in your post and not just gibberish. I apologize if I did not directly address your points and/or being prolix. >Whatever agricultural research is being done with the fruit fly >in France, By the Agricultural Research Service (ARS), a branch of the US Department of Agriculture which can be described in the following terms (from the ARS website: |The Agricultural Research Service (ARS) is the U.S. Department |of Agriculture's chief scientific research agency. Our job is finding |solutions to agricultural problems that affect Americans every day, |from field to table. Here's a few rough numbers to illustrate the |scope of our organization: |1,200 research projects within 22 National Programs |2,100 scientists |6,000 other employees |100 research locations including a few in other countries |$1.1 billion fiscal year 2007 budget | |Mission Statement | |ARS conducts research to develop and transfer solutions to |agricultural problems of high national priority and provide |information access and dissemination to: |ensure high-quality, safe food, and other agricultural products |assess the nutritional needs of Americans |sustain a competitive agricultural economy |enhance the natural resource base and the environment, and |provide economic opportunities for rural citizens, communities, |and society as a whole. | |Vision |The ARS vision is to lead America towards a better future through |agricultural research and information. So, to be clear, the U.S. government is not paying French farmers to fool around with fruitflies while more pressing needs such as building bridges to nowhere in Alaska go unanswered. >it is totally irrelevant to the mass of responses cited by Stephen >Black that all point to the important scientific advances in genetics, >autism and other areas by studying the lowly fruit fly. Just to be clear: most people's familiarity with the fruit fly stems from genetic studies, such as that cited by Stephen Black and others (even reporters have been somewhat aghast that Palin would refer to RESEARCH with fruitflies as trivial and wasteful given the readily available info about their role in genetics research). I am somewhat surprised that Palin would actually be familiar with aspects of agricultural research such as the olive fruit fly but I concede that it was probably some party apparatchik who gave her the talking point in order to "excite" her supporters against those "pointed headed intellectuals" who waste federal money studying "dumb things" like fruitfiles. >Just because research is done with fruit flies does not make it >worthy of funding (especially if the research is into the eradication >of the fruit fly). Sorry, non sequitur. Perhaps you have some research reviews that provide an evaluation of the research that Palin refers to? If so, please provide us a link to it. If we are willing to make the assumption that this research has been funded after a critical review (as with much of federally funded scientific research), then the justification for the research should have satistified relevant reviewers of the research. If you know/think that such an evaluation was not done, please identify the source for this information. If you are making this statement on the basis of your own evaluation of the research, I'd say you're entitled to your opinion but I would wonder what background you have in agricultural research and the specific topics under study. If this is just your own personal *non-scientific* opinion, then I'm sorry to have wasted everyone's time by making the faulty assumption that you actually had a scientific objection to the research. >Certainly the argument from Ronald Fisher's work could be used >to advance any research agenda. Non sequiter. I used Fisher as an example of the importance and worthiness of agricultural research. It seems to me that you are discounting all research in this area. Perhaps this is a mistaken interpretation on my part but I have yet to hear anything from suggesting that you think that agricultural research is worth doing. >In which case, how do we prioritize what should be funded by >the government and what should be funded by the private agribusiness >industry? Perhaps we should just let political appointees decide what is and what isn't science, thus reducing the number of proposals that would be submitted for federal funding. Consider: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/06/11/nasa-admits-deutsch-muzzled-scientist/ In any event, the process of providing federal funding for research is an intrinsically political process which scientists should be more involved in. To understand why, I'd suggest looking at Paul Edward's book "The Closed World"; see: http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?ttype=2&tid=8188 >For example, how much pharmaceutical research should be funded >by the profits of the drug industry and how much should be supported >by government funding? Should funding be decided by where the >company is and how much clout the congressman has to bring home >the bacon? I wish you would stick with agricultural research since this was the basis of Palin's foolish comments but if you don't really believe in agricultural research, then I can understand the tactic of shifting to pharmaceutical research. If you're going to stick to pharmaceutical research, then I suggest that regardless of the funding source (i.e., tax dollars or profits from pharmaceutical companies) federally funded research should remain in hands of the researchers with oversight provided by the relevant governmental agencies. I have admit to not understanding your comment about congresspeople bringing home the bacon. Outside of allocating money that is disbursed by the appropriate governmental entity such as NIH, what role do they have in evaluating and deciding which research studies get funded? Am I missing something or are you actually saying that congresspeople are on the scientific review committees that decide which research proposals get funded? >As to aplysia, I was making that analogy, probably not clearly >stated that, if aplysia were to be found to be objectionable to the >fishing industry, would their use in psychological research be used as >a reason to fund research into their eradication? Help me here. Are you saying that the fruit fly research being done by ARS is being directly funded by agribusiness instead of federal tax dollars allocated to the Department of Agriculture for such research? If so, please provide evidence in support of this point. Perhaps you can lay out the process by which the specific research was funded and show that the decision to fund this research was made at the specific request of relevant businesses. I still don't understand your "analogy" about aplysia and their "eradication". I don't see the connection between their use in psychological research and situations where they may pose a threat to fish species (such as shown in the link to the ARS article that I had provided in my last post -- you did read that, right?). >There may be good reasons for the research but support for >it would not logically be connected to its use in psychological >research. I'm sorry but I really don't understand what you're talking about here. Let me make a couple of points: (1) Scientists allow unwarrented attacks on scientific research to occur at their own peril. If there are good scientific reasons for not funding research (e.g., research on perpetual motion machines), the scientific argument should be presented. Palin certainly was not doing this, indeed, it is unclear what degree (if any) of understanding she has of scientific issues. Her comment about research on fruitflies was just a talking point to pander to a group who don't care about science. Rick seems to have an objection to research with fruitflies but I have not heard anything resembling a scientific argument as to why such research should not be done. (2) The issue of which research proposals to fund is a complex and difficult business. People who are really good at getting grants realize what a subtle, delicate, and disciplined choreography is involved (sometimes it's like trying to dance while standing up in a rollercoaster). Oversimplification of the process, especially to pander for political purposes, does not serve anyone. -Mike Palij New York University [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
