Anyone Else Staying Up For The CERN Announcement About The Higgs Boson Tonight?

[Ben Kenobi]

If people elect representatives who end up controlling a government which provides funding, that's kosher, too.

Apparently Asher supports a large government. Who knew?

[giblets]

He never said he supports "big government", moron.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

So does this all mean we can have warp drive and personal teleporters now?

[Uncle Sparky]

So does this all mean we can have warp drive and personal teleporters now?

No, just the military can have them.

[Asher]

Okay, what the ****, physicists?

http://www.theverge.com/2012/7/4/3136652/cern-scientists-comic-sans-higgs-boson

COMIC SANS?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Apparently they're willing to devote some of my wealth too.

Oh, that darned representative democracy thing.

FWIW, I'm fine that a portion of my wealth is going to fund high level scientific research .

[KrazyHorse]

Feel free to donate your own money, then.

[Imran Siddiqui]

I do. They are called taxes. Do I have refer to that darned representative democracy thing again? Feel free to move, then.

[Aeson]

Compared to the alternative uses that the governments involved would have found for the money, it's probably very well spent.

[Kuciwalker]

Oh, that darned representative democracy thing.

It seems "we're a democracy" excuses any policy selected by our elected representatives.

[Kuciwalker]

Is there any use of funds you would call wasteful, Imran? Or does pretty much anything go as valuable, so long as people vote for it?

[notyoueither]

Try that voting thing? It's a way to influence how money gets spent.

I find it strange that KH proposes some sort of communal patent purchases and then has a problem with public funding of general scientific knowledge.

[Kuciwalker]

The problem isn't funding general scientific knowledge. The problem is funding useless general scientific knowledge just because it sounds really science-y.

[Aeson]

At a few bucks a head we got years worth of mini black hole jokes, hardly useless

[Jon Miller]

No one has given any reason why science is wasted funding as part of the human endeavor (science, exploration, arts, entertainment, religion, etc).

We decide to fund some parts of the human endeavor collectively (By the government) and other parts individually.

If we didn't fund physics by the government and instead by private patrons, more money would likely go to cold fusion, string theory, teleportation, astronomy, and the like. Things that have captured human imagination, but not necessary what would further science, further science education, and further the development of new applications.

The government listens to experts, who (taking into account public opinion), determine the best areas to invest in to further the human endeavor, science education, and develop new applications. The LHC runs because a host of other interesting experiments do not run.

I would argue that the greatest wastes in the name of science come from the very application focused military rather than the scientific counsels/etc, as far as not furthering the human endeavor, science education, or developing new applications.

If we switched to the private funding of science, I think that science would languish due to more funding going to quacks.

JM