
Before Nobels: Gifts to and from rich patrons were early science’s currency - Vigier
https://theconversation.com/before-nobels-gifts-to-and-from-rich-patrons-were-early-sciences-currency-66360
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kapitza
A more accurate title might have been "before NSF."

The practical effect of the shift from patronage to grants is a transition
from multipolar to unipolar science. Any one rich patron may or may not have
an instinct for what research deserves support, but their collective judgment
should be a fairly wise crowd. Few rich people were born yesterday.

In a grant-funded ecosystem, even multiple funding institutions which are
branches of multiple governments tend to merge into one big meta-institution,
with one big opinion. This is how we get intellectual monocultures across many
fields, especially fields without practical feedback from a commercial
application. One big opinion is hard to change. Unfortunately, science is kind
of about changing our minds...

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jessriedel
There are plenty of billionaires rich enough to support scientists for their
whole careers, and certainly much more than in the past. So to make your
point, you have have to argue that some sort of cultural/status effect is
keeping unconventional scientists from just taking billionaire money, or
disincentivizing them from giving it away.

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lukasm
Isn't the existing system of grants disincentivizing billionaires from giving
the money away? "My taxes goes to X institution" "I donated to Y institution"

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matco11
Several countries offer tax schemes to support local movie productions:
private investment in local movie production is incentivized by way of tax
breaks to the investors.

I am not aware of equivalent tax breaks offered to investors to support
science or technology development, it is seems to me it could be a great way
to incentivize scientific progress.

Does anyone know why tax schemes to support science are not being used?

