Miller McCune addresses The Real Science Gap in this (rather long) article. It provides a lot of food for thought in talking about the current structure of training (and paying) our future scientists. A brief historical bit about Vannevar Bush’s (yes, the memex guy) 5 suggestions for “the basic structures of civilian research that remain to this day,” including what became the NSF.
The article goes on to criticize that we have too many scientists in universities, for too long, working at too low wage on faculty projects not of their choosing. There is some truth to these claims, but their suggestion is pretty shocking:
Any change in the science labor market would, of course, require dismantling the current system and erecting something that would value young scientists for their future potential as researchers and not just for their present ability to keep universities’ grant mills humming. This would mean paying them more and exploiting them less. It would also mean limiting their numbers by both producing and importing fewer scientists, so incomes could rise to something commensurate with the investment in time and talent and the high-level skills of a Ph.D.
Fewer scientists?! I personally do social science, which is pretty hard, but hard sciences are even more difficult. One has to wonder if we would be where we are today if someone 50 years ago had argued for fewer scientists. Sure, there is a lot of work that is wasted (failure is an integral part of the scientific process), but this time is an investment that has brought us where we are today. Arguing to throw the whole thing away is incredibly shortsighted.
Note that the comments are worth a skim. There are a few other interesting articles about this and related problems:
- Where Have You Gone, Bell Labs? (Business Week)
- Professionalization in the Academy (Harvard Magazine)