A vision for the future of science

Thomas Friedman has a recent column on the recent budget cut bill passed by the US Congress that cuts funding for NSF by 2%.

Of all the irresponsible aspects of the 2005 budget bill that the Republican-led Congress just passed, nothing could be more irresponsible than the fact that funding for the National Science Foundation was cut by nearly 2 percent, or $105 million.

Think about this. We are facing a mounting crisis in science and engineering education. The generation of scientists, engineers and mathematicians who were spurred to get advanced degrees by the 1957 Soviet launch of Sputnik and the challenge by President John Kennedy to put a man on the moon is slowly retiring.

But because of the steady erosion of science, math and engineering education in U.S. high schools, our cold war generation of American scientists is not being fully replenished. We traditionally filled the gap with Indian, Chinese and other immigrant brainpower. But post-9/11, many of these foreign engineers are not coming here anymore, and, because the world is now flat and wired, many others can stay home and innovate without having to emigrate.

If President Bush is looking for a legacy, I have just the one for him - a national science project that would be our generation's moon shot: a crash science initiative for alternative energy and conservation to make America energy-independent in 10 years. If President Bush made energy independence his moon shot, he would dry up revenue for terrorism; force Iran, Russia, Venezuela and Saudi Arabia to take the path of reform - which they will never do with $45-a-barrel oil - strengthen the dollar; and improve his own standing in Europe, by doing something huge to reduce global warming. He would also create a magnet to inspire young people to contribute to the war on terrorism and America's future by becoming scientists, engineers and mathematicians. "This is not just a win-win," said the Johns Hopkins foreign policy expert Michael Mandelbaum. "This is a win-win-win-win-win."

Or, Mr. Bush can ignore this challenge and spend the next four years in an utterly futile effort to persuade Russia to be restrained, Saudi Arabia to be moderate, Iran to be cautious and Europe to be nice.

Well, that is about the US. I was curious to find out about Indian governmental expenditure on science and innovation. I found this interesting article from the United Nations University Press. It is called "Technological Independence - The Asian Experience". It is a very detailed article, and I have not read it completely yet and I write this while I wait for this huge piece of code to compile. But here are some interesting pieces:

A study by Konrad and Wahl (who?) classified countries into eight stages of S&T (Science & Technology) development on the basis of seven quantitative indicators of S&T potential, such as S&T personnel, R&D expenditure, proportion of productive R&D, etc., and five qualitative indicators of development of S&T infrastructure. According to these criteria, India is classified in the sixth stage (of the eight successive stages), along with other newly industrializing countries (NICs) such as Brazil, the Republic of Korea, Indonesia, and Argentina. The higher stages, i.e. seventh or eighth, include all developed countries, with the USA, Germany, Japan, and France in the eighth, and Italy, the Netherlands, and Canada in the seventh.

Another study analysing the technology exports of developing countries has rated India as "most diverse and 'deep' (in terms of going into basic design of products and capabilities among the NICs ... India is able to provide not just the operating knowledge to set up and run industries (the know-how), but also the design and manufacture of the plant and equipment, designed specifically for the client (the know-why)." India's achievement is considered to be more notable because of the fact that "India seems to have the lowest relative reliance on foreign technology of all the NICs in the past fifteen years or so."

Well, that sounds nice, but are the problems:

In spite of the growing amounts spent, the national laboratories have failed to become important sources of industrial technology.42 Furthermore, a large proportion of the technologies developed by them are not utilized for commercial purposes. The impulse to innovate originates either in the production process (process simplifications/improvements, material/labour-saving devices, overall efficiency, etc.) or in the market (product improvement, changing demand/tastes/patterns, scope of import substitution, etc.). The national laboratories receive no feedback from either of these sources. They operate in an environment isolated from production units, do not sell innovations directly to the industry, draw their resources almost entirely from the government, and have mostly officials and scientists on their boards. They are not involved in the import of technology. Therefore the possibility of their contributing to the local absorption of imported technology does not arise.

Quite disturbing to me. I am sure privatization of some of these behemoth organizations would go a long way in opening up the organizations, making them more accountable, profitable & attractive to the youth. I was talking to my cousin, a very senior manager in BEL (Bharat Electronics Limited), one of the largest Public Sector Units about opportunities for the younger generation, and what attractions are there for a person like me. Sadly, there was not much - too much bureaucracy, hierarchy, politics in most such organizations. Unless people like our president, APJ Abdul Kalam, an ambassador and promoter of science & technology, makes a foray in this direction, I can see it will be really hard for India to promote, encourage & sustain interest of the youth in S&T.

More perhaps over the weekend on this.