I'm truly glad I've managed to get the public interested in questions about basic research.
The U.S. can still maintain research institutions, such as Caltech, that are the envy of the world, yet it would be hubristic and naive to think that this position is sustainable without investing in science education and basic research.
No matter how counter-intuitive it may seem, basic research has proven over and over to be the lifeline of practical advances in medicine.
Governments will always play a huge part in solving big problems. They set public policy and are uniquely able to provide the resources to make sure solutions reach everyone who needs them. They also fund basic research, which is a crucial component of the innovation that improves life for everyone.
Government isn't that good at rapid advancement of technology. It tends to be better at funding basic research. To have things take off, you've got to have commercial companies do it.
Basic research is to work at the very edge, the very border of, of knowledge, and move that border forward. You look and look for new secrets, and you don't know where it's going to lead you.
My first job out of school was to do basic research at Johns Hopkins University's applied physics lab.
In basic research, the use of the electron microscope has revealed to us the complex universe of the cell, the basic unit of life.
A meticulous virtual copy of the human brain would enable basic research on brain cells and circuits or computer-based drug trials.
Science fiction has its own history, its own legacy of what's been done, what's been superseded, what's so much part of the furniture it's practically part of the fabric now, what's become no more than a joke... and so on. It's just plain foolish, as well as comically arrogant, to ignore all this, to fail to do the most basic research.
