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Re: how to judge creative ideas



Here are some quotes that don't much support John D.'s opinion about research:

"By research in pure science I mean research may without any idea of
application to industrial matters but solely with the view of
extending our knowledge of the Laws of Nature. I will give you just
one example of the "utility" of this kind of research, one that has
been brought into great prominence by the war-I mean the use of
x-rays in surgery. Now, how was this method discovered? It was not
the result of research in applied science starting to find an
improved method of locating bullet wounds. This might have led to
improved probes, but we cannot imagine it leading to the discovery
of x-rays."
Sir Joseph J. Thomson (1856-1940)

"The best persons to decide what research should be done are the ones
doing the research. The next best is the head of the section. After
that you leave the field of best persons and meet increasingly worse
groups. The first of these is the research director, who is probably
wrong more than half the time. Then comes a research committee,
which is wrong most of the time. Finally there is the head
committee, which is wrong all of the time."
C. E. K. Mees
"If any student comes to me and says he wants to be useful to
mankind and go into research to alleviate human suffering, I advise
him to go into charity in stead. Research wants real egoists, who
seek their own pleasure and satisfaction, but find it in solving the
puzzles of nature."
Albert Szent-Gyorgyi (1893-1987)

And of course the Curies felt that a scientist making a profit as a
result of their research was somehow immoral, and they freely
published their results, based upon which I understand that several
fortunes were made. So in their case, even though their research had
immediate and obvious commercial applications, they eschewed seeking
any of the profits from them. Today, we consider such purity "quaint."

And I have a question for John: Does he expect that the researcher
who measured the mass of the top quark to pay for the research out of
their own pocket? I do agree that the taxpayers have the right not to
pay for it should they so choose, and it is incumbent upon the
researchers to convince them or their representatives of the
worthiness of their project--something that the promoters of the SSC
failed abysmally to do (by I might add, trying to link its
construction to the potential for "practical spin-offs," an argument
which went over like a flat tire). But in the case of the huge
projects, like Fermilab, or the HST, or many of the others, if not
the taxpayers, then who?

Hugh
--

Hugh Haskell
<mailto:haskell@ncssm.edu>
<mailto:hhaskell@mindspring.com>

(919) 467-7610

Let's face it. People use a Mac because they want to, Windows because they
have to..
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