www.scienceintransition.nl
@SciTransit en @MiedemaF
1971
2000
2010/12
October 2013
NRC 2 nov 2013
Cycles of Credit
‘
Volkskrant 9 Nov 2013
Bruno Latour and Steve Woolgar (1979)
Laboratory Life
Cycles of Credit
‘
Volkskrant
Hessels et al, Science and public policy 2009
Science in Transition
Major developments in science over the past 30 years:
•The scale of the enterprise has increased in numbers of people involved in
many countries
•Big Science: larger, international and often multidisciplinary teams and
consortia obtain funding (‘hunting in packs’)
• science is increasingly capital intensive, with rapid depreciation of
equipment, lab etc
•The business cycle is much shorter: technologies, methods, break through
concepts arise faster with more and fast ‘creative destruction’
•Management has changed also because
of this to more business-like styles
‘
(NPM)
Volkskrant
Science in Transition
Major developments in science over the past 30 years:
•Rewards and incentives have changed: more quantitative, ‘objective’
measures are widely being used. IF, H index, numbers of papers, numbers
of citations, earning capacity = amount of grant money won
•Funding schemes are mostly short term (4 years), projects thus aim for
deliverables on a very short term; ‘long haul’ funding is scarce
•More problem- oriented science but this is still seen as a problem, because
of adherence to the classical linear model
‘
Volkskrant
Science in Transition
Major problems associated with developments in science over
the past 30 years:
•Short- term, high- rate production because of careerism and
economics not always related to content
•Quality control suffers : because of the rapid increase in
scale and competition reviewing is poor, replication not done;
all this because of lack of reward and time
‘
Volkskrant
Science in Transition
Major problems associated with developments in science over
the past 30 years:
• Problem choice: risk
reduction and risk avoidance , 'art of
the soluble'
• Relation with society: image and understanding of the
system democracy and poblem choice
•The mores and behaviour of administrators, scientists and
students which has changed ‘
Volkskrant
Science in Transition
•Signaling the issues and start the debate
•Get insights by literature study, but mainly by empirical
studies
•From analysis to action: STS insights need to be put to
practice. Like in medicine, science must not only reveal
pathogenesis and diagnose, but must also deliver ideas and
interventions for prevention, care and cure.
•Societal Impact of STS is to produce ideas and interventions
‘
for game-changers in science. STS Innovation thus a Toolbox
for SiT
Volkskrant
A Toolbox for Science in Transition
A Toolbox for Science in Transition
Reflections
1. Science in Transition: a Science of Science Project
•Scientific research on the current system of science.
•Multidisciplinary theoretical and empirical work, mainly
on the sociology and economy of science,
•Historical analyses of the changes that science has gone
through since World War II.
A Toolbox for Science in Transition
‘Low hanging fruit’ to start with now:
2. Impact 3.0
The evaluation of research impact needs to change.
•The simple use of impact factors in funding, appointment
and promotion decisions is on the way out, see the San
Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment.
•Measures both for in-science use and for societal impact;
value attributed by potential users in society must be
developed including use of hybrid fora.
A Toolbox for Science in Transition
3. Incentives and Rewards
•Research management will have to take into
account the various types of impact and provide
career opportunities for the different types of
researchers
•Grants from NWO, ZonMw and charities should
explicitly be awarded based on Impact 3.0.
•This must result in a mix of basic and targeted
research, where also basic science is judged in a wider
context.
Cycles of Credit
‘
Volkskrant
Hessels et al, Science and public policy 2009
A Toolbox for Science in Transition
4. Dealing with Risk Avoidance
•High profile personal grants tend to favor researchers
based on the usual metrics, who produce knowledge for
the internal science market mainly.
•Because of this risk reduction in grant review procedures
too much emphasis is on short term production of high
impact publications.
•This results in too little diversification of leading
investigators in the institutes.
A Toolbox for Science in Transition
5. PhD Talent Management and Education
•Our PhD factories provide poor prospects for PhDs and
post docs that want to make a career in academia.
•We have to rethink and redesign these streams to better
coach our students for careers in and out side science: How
much PhD’s should we produce? Do MD's in high numbers
need a PhD at all. What are optimal criteria for PhD theses
•We have to promote scientific literacy among our Master
and PhD students.
Paula Stephan: How economics shapes Science, 2012
A Toolbox for Science in Transition
6. Targeting Societal Problems
•Trust in science and scientists is not only about how
trustworthy and careful we do and report our science,
•it is as much about the question whether we do research
on the right questions.
•We have to relate more with stakeholders in society to
orient our research, both basic and targeted research, this
has already started in anticipation of EU HORIZON 2020
which targets the so-called Grand Challenges.
A Toolbox for Science in Transition
7. Communication
•Stop telling the myth of a perfect method performed by
individuals with high moral values without any bias or
interests.
•Be honest to tell about science being a job and how the
economy of science shapes science and the content of our
science. That scientists have personal beliefs that shape
their scientific ideas.
•Explain how science does make objective facts, but that a
lot of uncertainty remains in particular regarding complex
real world problems.
A Toolbox for Science in Transition
The bigger societal picture
•8. Problem Choice in Democracy
•Finally the problem of agenda setting in a democratic
society presents it self. How are we organizing this process
designated by Philip Kitcher the 'ideal deliberation'.
•The KNAW presented 49 big questions coming from the
scientific fields, as a national research agenda. This was,
however, not in ideal deliberation with representatives
from society.
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