Lawrence Summers

Lundi 29 janvier 2007

'Save our Souls...? ('What about mine?' -Edition)

America must not surrender its lead in life sciences (Subscription 'sorrily' required...)
by Lawrence Summers

The 20th century was shaped by developments in the physical sciences. ...[S]olid state physics ... allowed mankind to take flight and split the atom.

(In chemistry and physics, an atom (Greek ἄτομος or átomos meaning "indivisible") is the smallest particle of a chemical element that retains its chemical properties. (átomos is usually translated as "indivisible."; Philosophical atomic ruminations date back to the ancient Greeks and Indians in the fifth and sixth centuries BCE. It was the Greeks (Democritus; see below) who coined the term atomos, which meant "uncuttable".
The first philosophical statements relating to an idea similar to atoms was developed by Democritus in Greece in the fifth century BCE around 450 BCE. The idea was lost for centuries until scientific interest was rekindled during the Renaissance Period.)

Advances in … physics also led to the development of the transistor,

(The first three patents for the field-effect transistor principle were registered in Germany in 1928 by physicist Julius Edgar Lilienfeld, but Lilienfeld published no research articles about his devices, and they were ignored by industry. In 1934 German physicist Dr. Oskar Heil patented another field-effect transistor. There is no direct evidence that these devices were built, but later work in the 1990s show that one of Lilienfeld's designs worked as described and gave substantial gain.)

the semiconductor

(The electrons must move between states to conduct electric current, and so due to the Pauli exclusion principle (That was a joke!) full bands do not contribute to the electrical conductivity. However, as the temperature of a semiconductor rises above absolute zero, the states of the electrons are increasingly randomized, or smeared out, and some electrons are likely to be found in states of the conduction band, which is the band immediately above the valence band. The current-carrying electrons in the conduction band are known as "free electrons", although they are often simply called "electrons" if context allows this usage to be clear.)

and ultimately to the information technology explosion that transformed economic life. The 20th century was an American century in no small part because of American leadership [Wenn zwei, oder mehr, sich streiten (meistens idioten) , freut sich immer nur der dritte...] in the application of the physical sciences...

[T]he 21st century will be defined by developments in the life sciences. Lifespans will rise sharply as cures are found for chronic diseases and healthcare will come to be a larger share of the economy than manufacturing. Life science approaches will lead to everything from further agricultural revolutions to profound changes in energy technology and the development of new materials. ...

It is natural to ask whether the US will lead in the life sciences ... as it did in the physical sciences... (...as it did?...oh, come on, you know that such a statement absolutely doesn't correspond to the truth...) It is a profoundly important economic question, but one whose implications go far beyond... At present, ... the US is clearly leading in the life sciences. But past performance is no guarantee of future success. ... If America is to maintain its leadership in life sciences..., important steps must be taken.

Most abstract but most important, there needs to be respect for the scientific method and its results. In sharp distinction to … other industrial countries, there is an increasing move away from respecting the scientific method in US schools. Polls demonstrate that up to one-third of high school biology teachers have as much faith in intelligent design as in evolution …[and] that as many as 70 per cent of the American people agree with them. Matters are not helped when the president advocates the teaching of intelligent design alongside evolution as a “different school of thought”.

Second, funding has to be a priority. During the past three years, when there has been more possible in the life sciences than there has ever been, when we are on the cusp of achieving important breakthroughs in everything from stem cells to the treatment of cancer, government funding for science research has been cut in real terms. This has been particularly hard on young researchers...

Funding, however, is ... also a matter of … compensation levels… In today’s economy a … graduate of a leading business school earns a substantially higher salary than a ... graduating ... PhD in biology. Several years after graduation the differences are even more pronounced. It should not be a surprise that ... more of our talented young people are not headed towards careers in (say?) … the life sciences.

Third, we need to control the role of politics in allocating science dollars, which are currently tossed around like so many political footballs. The fact that diseases that afflict the relatives of key congressional appropriators receive a disproportionate share of research dollars is not a step towards scientific progress. And it is not a step towards a healthier 21st century to allow the views of a vocal minority in effect to cut off funding for embryonic stem cell research – which is likely to lead to revolutions in the treatment of Parkinson’s disease, diabetes and cancer within the next generation.

Finally, we need to support clusters of extraordinary performance. If competition is individualistic, the US is going to have a very difficult time (not only the US...)because salary levels … are going to be much lower in other parts of the world. Rather than focus on each individual …, the US needs to focus on fostering clusters of innovation – such as Silicon Valley in information technology, Boston in the life sciences, New York in finance – where each talented individual derives his or her strength from all that is around. Competing with that on price is much more difficult.

These are not issues that can be addressed in a year or even a presidential term. Nor are they issues that will have a large predictable impact over a period of several years. But over the long run, few issues are as important...

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Transcript...

...the large challenge of the anxious middle, whether in the industrial countries like the US in Europe or the middle income countries... these are a very large number of people who are not in a position to take huge advantage of the miracles under way in India and China…but on the other hand we’re not looking forward to the prospect of competing with Indian and Chinese workers on labor costs…and for this group, that might be called the ‘anxious middle’ the process of globalization and global integration is a very challenge in one…

Second question from the other topic…eehhmmm. What could the Europeans do to solve the global imbalances problems?

I think, this is case for Europe to make a greater contribution to global demand that it has in recent years…given the substantial structure surpluses that appeared to be in place in the world countries for some number of years, it would seem natural that the deficit offset to those surpluses be something that'd be shared across the industrial world rather than bore only by the US and that makes a case for more sim…? fallacies in the macro-economic dimension meaning monetary and fiscal policies and also in the structural dimension in Europe…

Par Pancho Villa
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