Once again, there is merit to cutting funding when more than half of research is irreproducible crap. A decimation can function as the first step toward rebuilding. The problem is that you DO need to have plans to rebuild it. We don't.
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The Gutting of America's Medical Research
41–50 of 98 posts
Re: The Gutting of America's Medical Research
#42Once again, there is merit to cutting funding when more than half of research is irreproducible crap. A decimation can function as the first step toward rebuilding. The problem is that you DO need to have plans to rebuild it. We don't.
Why do you think reproducibility will improve if funding is cut significantly? That is less money for labor, instruments, and consumables, which means less money for experiments, particularly for follow up experiments that have no deliverable.
Re: The Gutting of America's Medical Research
#43it's so surreal to me how this is happening under our eyes and nobody's stopping it. the impact this will have on our health is so staggering. and what's worse, even if these cuts were reversed tomorrow, it would still take quite some time to reverse the negative effects
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Re: The Gutting of America's Medical Research
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's why when you apply for grants, they are reviewed by the panels of experts and then you have to report the results/progress. Nobody will just give you money for something crazy.
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Who should judge scientific quality, if not individuals familiar with the methods used to generate the results? We are living the counterfactual right now, where political opportunists with axes to grind have replaced the pattern matchers you describe.
Re: The Gutting of America's Medical Research
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
There will be follow-on effects, too. Like "wellness" ending up on the same tier as "medicine". Without the research, who's to say? This will also compound the Qanon fascination with "medical freedom", where the patient gets to dictate to the doctor what to do (i.e. use ivermectin against COVID, or whatever other superstition rises to the top of the Qanon imagination cauldron).
> This will also compound the Qanon fascination with "medical freedom", where the patient gets to dictate to the doctor what to do (i.e. use ivermectin against COVID, or whatever other superstition rises to the top of the Qanon imagination cauldron). That's very double-edged. The open question is should humans have the right to take substances individually? Sure, you get Ivermectin/covid deniers. But you also get hom…
> But why shouldn't I be able to treat myself?
Consider this analogy: you should be allowed to put a gun to your own head and pull the trigger. You should not be allowed to put on a suicide vest and blow yourself up in a group of people.
Re: The Gutting of America's Medical Research
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
There will be follow-on effects, too. Like "wellness" ending up on the same tier as "medicine". Without the research, who's to say? This will also compound the Qanon fascination with "medical freedom", where the patient gets to dictate to the doctor what to do (i.e. use ivermectin against COVID, or whatever other superstition rises to the top of the Qanon imagination cauldron).
> This will also compound the Qanon fascination with "medical freedom", where the patient gets to dictate to the doctor what to do (i.e. use ivermectin against COVID, or whatever other superstition rises to the top of the Qanon imagination cauldron). That's very double-edged. The open question is should humans have the right to take substances individually? Sure, you get Ivermectin/covid deniers. But you also get hom…
I go further and say that you should be able to buy any drug from the pharmacy without a prescription*. As well as testing kits. Having to have an ongoing relationship with a doctor just to refill your medication or get antibiotics when you get strep is a huge waste of everyone's time and money. And there are countries where you can already do this and they haven't collapsed. It makes the job of pharmacist actually matter as someone other than a pill counter.
It ends so many stupid discussions we have in the US. Can this medication be prescribed for an off-label use? Who cares because you can just buy it. Do you meet some arbitrary federal weight guideline for Ozempic? Who cares you can just buy it.
* every rule has exceptions, don't get bogged down with them.
Re: The Gutting of America's Medical Research
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
In part because the expiry of patents puts a cap on the return on investment private research can get you. Patents last for about 25 years, but important innovations have returns far into the future, hundreds of years. At that rate, you would very often be better off accumulating interest on capital anyways. Notwithstanding the nature of scientific progress as an accumulation of smaller experiences (each individually…
Even ignoring the limits of patents, how much of this research "pays off"? Do 1% of research grants go towards something tangibly useful, or is it closer to 0.1%?
In this climate, close to 100%.
Re: The Gutting of America's Medical Research
#48Once again, there is merit to cutting funding when more than half of research is irreproducible crap. A decimation can function as the first step toward rebuilding. The problem is that you DO need to have plans to rebuild it. We don't.
Sure. But which half? If half is legitimate, and half is fraudulent, who do you expect to still be in the game after you cut half, the legitimate researchers or the fraudsters?
Talking about rebuilding after just shifts this problem instead of solving it. When you start to spin things back up, who's at the front of the line looking for new grant money?
Re: The Gutting of America's Medical Research
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
this sounds like it's a really bad idea for the government to fund. What's to stop someone who happens to have made it in the ivory tower go crazy, spin up some kooky ideas that are highly risky and just blow taxpayer money on something not really accountable?
I understand your reasoning, but our efforts to prevent this is part of why professors spend so much time writing grants and filling out other paperwork these days. It’s better in my opinion to just accept reasonable risk. I would add that weird ideas can be surprisingly useful; nobody expected research on gila monsters to lead to our most successful weight loss treatment to date.
the fucking gila monster story is pure revisionist history. back in the late aughts after the human genome got sequenced and qpcr started picking up it was pretty obvious from islet alpha cell proteomics that glucagon would be an interesting drug target.
Re: The Gutting of America's Medical Research
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
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Who should judge scientific quality, if not individuals familiar with the methods used to generate the results? We are living the counterfactual right now, where political opportunists with axes to grind have replaced the pattern matchers you describe.
nobody is saying this is not the least worst way to fund science in general. the point is that use of taxpayer money demands a higher level of accountability that this method cannot satisfy.