Random Observations on Federal Funding
for Physics, Astronomy,
and Earth Science
L. Strow
Updated: Apr 2, 2001
Document URL: http://asl.umbc.edu/~strow/Notes/funding.html
This document summarizes a few observations concerning particular aspects of Federal funding of Physics and Earth Science for a friend working with Congress.
For the very busy reader, just look at the text in dark red to see the highlights/factoids.
The question is, does data exist that can support doubling the funding for the basic sciences? Doubling federal research dollars for basic science research by 2007 was suggested by Senator Phil Gramm in 1997, (see http://www.aip.org/enews/fyi/1997/fyi97.011.htm). While I assume his suggestion to ``double'' the budget is a somewhat arbitrary figure chosen for it's simplicity, it is possible to argue that some things have changed by a factor of two in the physical sciences in the past few decades, and in particular in physics.
Most people acknowledge that advances in the physical sciences are largely responsible for the enormous growth in our economy during the last 15 years. However, the scientific foundations for that growth were developed even earlier. The technology base for the aerospace, microelectronics, and telecommunications industries rest on advances made in the 1960's and 1970's. Yes, progress is continuous, but the fundamental advances that helped grow these industries can generally be traced to exploratory research in the physical sciences. This is also becoming true in biomedical fields as they depend ever more heavily on ``high-tech'' instruments and computers that have their genesis in the physical sciences.
The long delay between discoveries in basic science and their utilization just underlies the fact that technological progress is a very slow, incremental endeavor that can take years to mature before the public recognizes the advances. Federal research dollars represent the vast majority of the funding for basic research. Consequently, large shifts in how federal research dollars are allocated to the federal science enterprise directly affect the economy. Because it takes years for the benefits of basic research to affect the average citizen, it is easy for our lawmakers to mis-judge what type of research actually will provide the most benefit to society.
A vigorous science and technology enterprise in this country requires highly competent physical scientists. Moreover, for defense applications, these scientist must often be U.S. citizens. In the next section some facts on demographics in physics are outlined that suggest we are potentially facing a shortage of high quality physical scientists. At the present time universities are responding to the large demand for computer scientists (really programmers) in the information technology (IT) industry. Although the need is real, it may be short-lived. More importantly, IT programmers are not the basis for technological development, and we cannot afford to skim off the brightest minds in the universities into the IT industry, or the foundation for technological growth will suffer. This is precisely what is happening today.
Students have the feeling that computer science is where the ``action'' is. This is fueled by (1) the high starting salaries in the IT industry, (2) the perceived lack of excitement in the physical sciences, and (3) the fact that majoring in CS is much easier than majoring in physics or chemistry. I contend that declining funding for the physical sciences, leaving them with older less well equipped research labs, significantly contributes to item (2) above, the perceived lack of excitement (and rewards) associated with majoring in the physical sciences.
Of course, academia must change as well, and not concentrate on educating Ph.D.s just for faculty positions. Although this is still an issue, I believe that most faculty in physics recognize that change is needed in this regard. However implementation will take time, along with encouragement from both the funding agencies and university administrations.
So, is there any concrete evidence that federal funding should be doubled? There is no question that the U.S. is not producing either the quality, or quantity, of Ph.D.'s in physics that we were several decades ago, especially if we focus on U.S. citizens. These differences are on the order of factors of 2, documented below. The above discussion suggests that the decline in the number of physical scientists in recent years could limit the pace of technological development in the next few decades.
Factoids on Graduate Students in the Physical Sciences:
Although these numbers do not directly address a need to double funding in physics, they do point out that enrollments in Ph.D. programs in physics have undergone very large negative trends that could have severe implications for the U.S. in the future. Increased funding will positively affect these trends because students do see the effects of federal funding for their professors, especially in research universities. When students see ``action'' they will follow.
As an aside, it is important for the public to understand that even recent revolutions in information technology came out of basic research in the physical sciences. For example, the concept and implementation of the World Wide Web came out of CERN, the European equivalent to Fermilab, our premier elementary particle research organization. The first graphical WWW browser (Mosaic) was developed at the University of Illinois National Center for Supercomputer Applications (federally funded).
NASA is a project oriented agency, with a primary mission to develop the nation's capability to operate in space and use space for science research that cannot be done on the ground. NASA has a very large infrastructure to oversee these programs since they involve very large contracts with the aerospace industry.
Although NASA has significant budgets for basic science by university investigators, the emphasis is on the development and use of space-borne observing platforms, whether they be for earth science or astronomy. The NASA research establishment does not have a culture that nourishes smaller programs such as those funded by the NSF in astronomy.
If NASA were to take over the NSF ground-based astronomy program, I suspect the costs would rise significantly since NASA is used to doing bigger projects that require far more programmatic over-site than NSF-sized projects. In addition, it would be more difficult to persuade the NASA culture to fund smaller astronomy efforts that don't address ``the big questions'' of the moment, although these smaller research efforts can often uncover ``big answers''. Remember, large projects at NSF would be little projects at NASA. I doubt you will find anyone, anywhere, in favor of shifting ground-based astronomy to NASA, except maybe in Washington.
Congress is continually facing questions related to global warming, hearing witnesses that will state divergent opinions. Moreover, heads of federal agencies are loathe to state that global warming is a fact to legislators. This is not surprising given that many legislators who determine funding for these science agencies don't want to hear that global warming has started.
The facts are clear, we have seen global warming in the past 100 years, and it is probably due to increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. However, we do not know precisely how the atmosphere will react to these increases in the so-called greenhouse gases in the coming decades. The climate can be unstable (we've had ice ages, and also extremely warm periods in geologic history). The climate models are still crude, requiring many parameterizations derived from observations, and not just from the basic physics.
It is important to remember that a stable climate on earth is the result of a possibly precarious balance between two large numbers, the heat inflow (the sun) and heat outflow (thermal radiation emitted by the earth to space). At present, the time/space distribution of water vapor and clouds that control this heat flow somehow takes a form that gives us a balance, and stable climate. Possibly subtle effects could destroy this balance as carbon dioxide increases in the atmosphere.
The consequences of ignoring possibly correct climate model results may be catastrophic. There is ample documentation on possible scenarios here, the best source is probably the latest IPCC report on climate change.
In the long run we are going to run out of fossil fuels, so we must change our patterns of energy consumption anyway. Why not face that fact, and develop the technologies that are needed to achieve lowered dependence on fossil fuels now, and lower the risk of climate warming? Our economy will benefit in the long run the quicker we accept the fact that we cannot depend on fossil fuels forever. The question is, can our political institutions ever legislate for the long run, rather than for the next election?