Interesting. I was actually of the opinion that Republicans were less pro-science, but obviously I was wrong. NdGT is a crazy smart guy.

Cliff's Notes:

Science funding shrank under Clinton.

Science funding grew under Bush, despite his opposition in two or three areas (i.e. stem cell research).

The decision he mentions toward the end (when he suggests that you read it) is here:



http://www.pamd.uscourts.gov/kitzmiller/kitzmiller_342.pdf


 

Not a secret.

Scientific research doesn't buy cadillacs for unemployed people.

Great find.  I love Neil. (see second vid in sigline).

This is fairly evident if you went hard science in college. Finding liberals was like hitting the lotto. I'm an engineer. All through school, in industry, and working for the DoD; I've only met one person that was a leftist*. Admittedly I haven't been around as long as some of the folks on this board, but this is over a span of about 8 years.


*As in someone in the hard sciences that was a leftist. I've met plenty of liberal fucks.

Truth

Neil does a great job educating everyday people like me who are unfamiliar with the more complex areas of science.

As a tribute, someone should post that graphic that reads, "We got a bad-ass over here."

Yes, Tyson is definately a science bad-ass!

I love listening to Niel.   I'd enjoy him even more if he'd grow out that fro and wear bell bottoms.

Algore brought us global warming.

Does that make dems better?

Respond to my climate/environment survey in team

Yet "academics" still love him.
 

 

I would love to see the numbers that the good doctor used.

I just did a quick lookup of NSF funding and NASA funding by long term, multi decade, time series.

NSF funding

NASA funding

General trend is for funding to go up, independent of the administration, albeit going by party of POTUS is misleading.  More accurate comparison is to look at funding on basis of which party controlled the Congress.

According to American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, $7.6B was allocated to science in 2009.  2008 NSF funding during last year of Pres. Bush Jr was $6.5B.

According to 2009 Pew Research Center survey, most scientists are either Democrats or leaning toward Democrat with only 6% confirmed as GOP.  My experience has being that most scientists/math/engineering folks were either Democrats or heavily leaning toward DNC.  I remember reading a WSJ article while back that pretty much confirmed the same thing.

Also, GOP stance on taxes and government revenue, evolution, and gobal warming goes totally against mainstream evidence/stance/consensus in economics/finance/science(AAAS).
E.g., most of the papers in Science/AAAS, esp. during post-2000 papers, support global warming vs. GOP stance of global warming is a scientific hoax.

And most economists/accounting PhDs, based on economic data, don't support the contention that lowering taxes increases government revenue.  

Not to mention if you check latest findings from fields like molecular genetics, evolutionary psychology, and evolutionary anthropology, it goes completely against GOP stance on Creationism/young earth theory.

Not to mention the fact that w/o sound creation and funding of high quality math/science curriculum like in Singapore/Finland/etc., odds of nurturing high quality mathematicians, scientists, and engineers are not good.  

But GOP is a party of math/science/engineering/biology, right?

The good thing is that we can import them albeit quite often, Congress makes it harder to do that for fear of native born Americans losing jobs.  But OTOH, Congress/local state government also doesn't want to implement a high quality national/region wide science/math program like those in Singapore or Finland(US private schools can't hold a candle to public schools in those countries).

Public school educational funding does nothing for the idle rich that own the government.

No, general trend for funding is NOT for it going up. Calling inflation over the span of 50 years an increase in spending is disingenuous. You should only be looking at % of budget, which has consistently dropped. BTW Obama has the smallest percent of funding for NASA since its inception.



This was the biggest load that stunk to high heaven. I'm gonna say right now, you are not in the STEM field. If you were you would know that info was patently false simply taken on face value. But, lets look into it.

That survey? You really should have looked at the poling data. It can be found here. They did not poll a SINGLE engineer and by their own volition they overpolled academia. Not to mention what are they even consider "scientists." Half of the damn poll respondents were nurses. Yeah, no shit you're gonna get "scientists" leaning left when its basically a poll of leftists. But, that goes with the overall theme of the poll itself; attack bush. By looking at who was polled and how they were polled, it becomes very evident this poll had a clear agenda.  PEW has stuff that is left tilted and right titled, so it's not an attack on PEW itself or implying that its a leftist organization. It isnt. I'm simply calling this poll, a load of misrepresented shit; that isnt up to PEW typical standards.

If you believe the results of that poll, you probably believe that the bag boy at the local supermarket is a "scientist" as well.



Most economists say the exact opposite of that. But then again based on your info above, I dont think your vetting skills are up to snuff.



I would be very interested to know even a single politician, left or right, that believes in young earth. Let alone seeing an official stance.




Without question the highest funders of DoD, DARPA, and Defense initiatives have always been republicans. The vast majority of scientific advancement occurs in this arena, not at NASA. NASA is just one part of the scientific puzzle. Which btw, I would like to see them get WAY more funding than they do now.

So yes, being an actual engineer and having actual experience interfacing with dozens and dozens engineering companies, the GOP is infinitely more friendly to the advancement of STEM.

FYI - One of Obamas first executive orders was to cancel about half of SMART (on of the biggest government program to advance science, mathematics, and research initiatives) as well as almost every program in the DoD that promotes STEM advancement.


Sorry bro, you need to go back to the Democratic Underground with that load of crap you tried to pass off. Pretending hard science is the domain of the leftist? Lol... Might as well tell us leftists love guns and hate abortions.

Yeah that part on republicans being young earth part was a mix between LMAO and gee was he actually serious about that?  What would I know, I'm only a dentist, not a real scientist.

Similar here
Undergraduate degree :BS Chemistry
Graduate degree: MD
Post graduate training: Board Certified Emergency Medicine
More conservative than republican, but I can usually sit in that tent.

Both figures have taken inflation into account(inflation adjusted).

The NSF funding data that I quoted is from the link http://dellweb.bfa.nsf.gov/NSFHist_constant.htm.  That table reflects the amount adjusted for inflation, using fiscal year 2012 as base year.  The numbers in that table are basically, real, inflation adjusted figure.

Nominal amount that is unadjusted for inflation is available here: http://dellweb.bfa.nsf.gov/NSFHist.htm.

If you have question about these figures, you can contact Elizabeth M. Velo at National Science Foundation.  If you like, I can provide contact information for her.

Using inflation adjusted numbers from http://dellweb.bfa.nsf.gov/NSFHist_constant.htm, one can see that:

2008 NSF(National Science Foundation) budget under last year of Pres. Bush was.................... $6.46B
2009 NSF budget under Obama was...........................................................................$9.29B
2010 NSF budget under Obama was...........................................................................$7.86B
2011 NSF budget under Obama was...........................................................................$7.04B
2012 NSF budget under Obama was...........................................................................$7.03B

I believe the NSF funding under Obama would have being bigger under 2009 ARRA(American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009) were it not for political opposition to increased government spending in areas of science, technology, and infrastructure, among other things.



The NASA budget link I listed is from http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/feb/01/nasa-budgets-us-spending-space-travel.  Since it's in percentage of GDP, inflation is already taken care of.

Here is a table listing the NASA budget during last year of each president with party accounted for, except for Obama:

Year.............President..................Party................NASA budget %GDP
1960.............Eisenhower...............GOP.................0.5%
1962.............Kennedy...................DNC................1.18%(+)
1968.............LBJ..........................DNC................2.65%(+)
1973.............Nixon.......................GOP................1.35%(-)
1976.............Ford........................GOP.................0.99%(-)
1980.............Carter......................DNC.................0.84%(-)
1988.............Reagan....................GOP.................0.85%(+)
1992.............Bush Sr....................GOP.................1.01%(+)
2000.............Clinton......................DNC................0.75%(-)
2008.............Bush Jr.....................GOP.................0.60%(-)
2012.............Obama.....................DNC.................0.5%(-)

If you check the NASA budget, the general tendency is if it goes up under one party or president, it will go up under next party or president.  And vice versa.




I appreciate your thoughtfulness in trying to point out what you thought was nominal data(includes inflation) when both data set was real, inflation adjusted figures.  Thank you for your kindness.

There is a very strong tie b/w Intelligent Design, Creationism, and Young Earth theory.

According to 2009 Gallup poll, 60% of GOP believed man was created 10,000 years ago compared to 38% of Democrats.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/108226/republicans-democrats-differ-creationism.aspx




As for GOP politicians, according to 2007 Gallup poll below, GOP politicians reflect the belief of GOP voters in doubting evolution and that man's evolutionary history spanned millions of years ago.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/27847/Majority-Republicans-Doubt-Theory-Evolution.aspx

I appreciate the education.  

I believe McCain also stated something similar to that effect(tax cut=increased government revenue) but actual fact check came out the exact opposite here: http://www.factcheck.org/taxes/supply-side_spin.html

In fact, I believe 2003 Economic Report of the President and some of the chairs of Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers via Hill 2006, Mankiw 2003, and Milbank 2003 also found that tax cut doesn't result in increased government revenue.

In fact, you can increase government deficit in 2 ways:
- by reducing government revenue by tax cut
- by increasing spending

Gregory Mankiw, former chairman of George W. Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers, did a study(published in The Journal of Public Economics in 2006) which showed that the economic growth caused by a tax cut can offset, at best possible scenario, only a portion of the revenues lost by the tax cut.  That is in most scenario, tax cut results in increased budget deficit.

Not only that, in 2005, CBO head by GOP appointee, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, calculated that the 10% cut in income tax would offset only 1% to 22% of revenue loss during 1st 5 years.  It would basically never pay for itself.  About the only case it might be true is if the rate of taxation was extraordinarily high, like 100% but 100% rate is not normal nor is it representative of tax rate in general.

Basically, if you cut tax which is revenue to government, government revenue tend to decrease.  

In fact, real(inflation adjusted) GDP growth rate was higher during 1950-1969 when rate of taxation was much higher than during last 20 years.

This is a good article in Economix blog which explains it.

However, let's say that every one of these sources, including Bush's Council of Economic Advisers, CBO, etc. is lying and/or is wrong.  You can do a rough equivalent of what if simulation(crude Monte Carlo simulation) by using a range of nominal historical GDP growth rate and taxation rate as percent of GDP and see under what circumstances, federal revenue(% GDP) grows.

According to 2007 Gallup poll and many others, lack of belief in evolution and doubt about humans evolving millions of years ago(Young Earth theory) is prevalent both among GOP voters and politicians representing them, for good or bad.

In general, both Creationism and ID(Intelligent Design) adherents tend to be much more focused among GOP.  Also, folks who believe in Creationism/ID exhibit higher tendency to believe in Young Earth Theory(YET).

http://www.gallup.com/poll/27847/Majority-Republicans-Doubt-Theory-Evolution.aspx

actually, defense spending varies based on need, not political parties, as you can see in the following chart:

per-capita, inflation-adjusted defense spending of the United States federal government from 1962 to (forecasted) 2014

Source: FY2010 "President's budget" Historical tables (Table 3.2—OUTLAYS BY FUNCTION AND SUBFUNCTION: 1962–2014), adjusted using United States Census population data and forecasts and CPI inflation data


Year..............president.........party
1962............Kennedy..........DNC
1966............LBJ.................DNC
1970............Nixon..............GOP
1974............Ford................GOP
1978............Carter..............DNC
1982............Reagan............GOP
1986............Reagan............GOP
1990............Bush Sr............GOP
1994............Clinton.............DNC
1998............Cllinton.............DNC
2002............Bush Jr............GOP
2006............Bush Jr............GOP

Actually, Vint Cerf who is credited as one of the "fathers of the Internet" by ACM(premier US association of professional computer scientists) and who also worked for DARPA credits Al Gore(Democrat) with support of Internet during its infancy.

Vice-President Al Gore claimed that he "invented" the internet by snopes.com.  Basically, he never did but was instrumental in developing it just like President Eisenhower was instrumental in developing the US Interstate Highway system.


Al Gore and the Internet by Robert Kahn and Vinton Cerf

so how do you know if your personal experience was representative of total number of engineers in US?

In terms of statistical sampling, how do you know if your "personal" sampling data was unbiased?

Also, how many other engineers have you known?

And in terms of total numbers of engineers in US, what percentage of total engineering population does that represent?

E.g., suppose there is 1M engineers in US(suspect it is higher).  Then that means 1%=10,000 engineers.

So in terms of percentage, how many engineers did you meet so far?

Thank you.

What is "Democratic Underground"?  Thank you.

Check Institute for Creation Research (ICR) and Creation Research Society (CRS).  Both promote Young Earth Creationism in US and are strong supporter of GOP.

Institute for Creation Research


Creation Research Society



There is a tie b/w folks who support Creationism, ID(Intelligent Design), and Young Earth Theory.

Current scientific evidence is that earth is several billion years old at least.

When Gallup did a poll in 2007, they found out that majority of GOP doubted theory of evolution/man evolved millions of years ago and ditto for GOP politicians.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/27847/Majority-Republicans-Doubt-Theory-Evolution.aspx

See post above.  Thanks.

do you read "Science" published by AAAS?  It's probably one of the two top premier peer reviewed science journals in the world, along with "Nature."  Consensus opinion in papers published in Science has moved strongly to support global warming and that man made activity is a significant driver of it.

Per reviewed by the true believers.

All models are wrong, some models are useful.

We are still not sure exactly how the sunspot cycle affects earth's weather, but we know it is correlated.

But the climate model is good at raising funding.

Science or bullshit to push an agenda paid for with grant money?

I'm not affiliated with these folks but I found them interesting...

Democrats for Life


Democrats for Gun Ownership


VS these GOP folks:

Republicans For Choice PAC


Republican Majority for Choice


And most of all, top contender for GOP presidential candidate makes Pres. Obama look pro-gun by comparison,....

Mitt Romney's actual record on Second Amendment

This is consistent with my experience.

 

I just checked the polling methodology from the URL you provided.  According to it,

APPENDIX: SURVEY METHODOLOGY


How did you know that they were mostly nurses?  Because I can't tell by reading the methodology section.  Also, that they were primarily in academia?  Since AAAS membership spans both industry, government, and academia?

Also, how did you surmise that "Biological and Medical" equal nurses?  It can't be PhD in biochem or biostatistics or biophysics or bioinformatics or molecular biology?  A typical article in "Science" is usually beyond the interest of most practicing nurses unless they have interest in cutting edge physical, chemical, geological, biological, and/or climate sciences.

The other thing I didn't understand was how did you know that it didn't include engineers?  Believe it or not, some folks at engineering universities like MIT and Cal Tech are actually members of AAAS.  First time I heard of AAAS was from folks at doctoral/postdoc level in biological sciences...these folks weren't practicing nurses BTW.  Their interest was first and foremost in pure research.

In the past, like last year, folks from engineering school like Cal Tech, presented research findings at AAAS meeting.

CalTech researchers presenting at 2011 AAAS meeting


If you think AAAS' membership is comprised mostly of nurses, there is something wrong.  Either the nurses you know are extraordinary physical, chemical, biological, geological, and climate scientists on top of being a practicing nurse, or most of AAAS' membership is not comprised of nurses.

So a model has to account for every variable 100%?  Minor and major?  Otherwise, because the model is not 100% and complete, it's unreliable?

If you create a small scale model or a simulation in which rising level of CO2 resulted in global warming, it's still suspect?  Because it's not 100% or perfect?

Long term geological record documenting rise in global temperature and CO2 is not reliable?

BTW, Richard Lindzen of MIT who has being invited to talk at Heartland Institute, a conservative think tank, and also invited by GOP lawmakers, acknowledge that CO2 is a greenhouse gas and that man made activity is raising the level of it and that it should warm the atmosphere.

However, Lindzen published a paper in 2001 regarding 'iris effect,' a theory that cirrus clouds will act to help lower the temperature.

Dr. Lindzen tried to publish a more recent paper but it got rejected by NAS(National Academy of Sciences) here.  He later published it in a Korean journal here.

So Heartland Institute and GOP politicians inviting Dr. Lindzen to give anti-global warming talk has nothing to do with politics but scientific truth?  Because National Academy of Sciences is a political entity?

And financial contribution from energy industry(gas/oil) to Heartland Institute and GOP politicians had zilch to do with it?

if your experience was representative, then engineering folks at tech center like

- Silicon Valley, California
- Austin, Texas
- Triangle Park, NC
- Seattle, Washington
- Boston, Massachusetts
- add the tech center of your choice here

are all GOP/conservatives/Republicans/Tea Party?

And most professionals/educated folks in hard sciences/engineering voted for McCain, not Obama, in 2008 presidential election?

Just curious.

Why would a local bag boy be a member of AAAS?  And why would he have interest in it?  


APPENDIX: SURVEY METHODOLOGY

in that case, per following 2012 article in "Nature," how come GOP Congress refused to previously back up spending increase for science agencies requested by Pres. Obama?

It seems GOP Congress is more responsible for cuts to science/engineering/technology than Pres. Obama when Pres. Obama wants to spend much more than GOP Congress is willing to OK?  


US president wants to make room for research to grow in 2013 — but faces an uphill battle


Obama’s 2013 budget
Tough decisions

The winners and losers in President Barack Obama’s budget request for 2013 (US$ millions).
Agency..........................2011 actual...............2012 estimated................2013 requested..................Details
Biomedical research
NIH..........................30,470...................30,702..........................30,702...........................11% boost for translational science centre
CDC & Prevention.........5,726.....................5,732...........................5,068.............................efforts in public health and disease prevention bear the brunt of a deep cut
FDA.........................2,403......................2,506..........................2,517..............................surge in industry usr fees lifts overall budget by 17% to $4,486M
Physical sciences
NSF..........................6,806.....................7,032..........................7,372...............................big gains for interdisciplinary ideas — as well as marketable ones
NASA........................4,919.....................5,074..........................4,911...............................fagship telescope still on track, but future of Mars exploration less certain
DOE Office of Science....4,897......................4,874.........................4,992..............................overall increase masks cuts to some basic-research programmes
NIST.........................754.......................761...............................860................................substantial increase, with around half to advanced manufacturing research
Earth and environment
EPA.........................8,681.....................8,450..........................8,344.................................core science and regulatory programmes preserved
Nat Oc/Atmo..............4,727.....................5,014..........................5,179................................modest rise, with satellite programme getting much-needed boost
US Geo Survey...........1,084......................1,068..........................1,102................................Increased money for disaster response and research on hydraulic fracturing
Source: White House Office of Management and Budget

Grant money works both ways as long as you can find evidence to back up your position.  Let's say global warming is BS and rising level of CO2 has no relationship to rising global temperature.

In that case, all one would need is find an era in the past(geological record) where that was true or create a climate model where that is possible.

If the data/theory/hypothesis is sound and it goes against the current consensus/findings/paper, there would be an economic/social/professional incentive to do research and publish such a paper.

Here is a Q&A by the same Neil deGrasse Tyson regarding global warming and process of scientific consensus: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6g-FYa44hiE.

Check support for Science/AAA and British Nature regarding global warming 20 years vs. 10 years vs. 5 years vs now.

The incentive in science is to disprove things if it's flawed or assert new theory if it's sustainable and nobody else has proposed it.

Same Neil deGrasse Tyson on global warming:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6g-FYa44hiE

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/video/tysons-cosmic-tale-global-warming-12880463

http://www.upworthy.com/neil-degrasse-tyson-vs-guy-who-doesnt-believe-in-global-warming

So engineers at places with very high concentration of sciences/engineers at tech centers like:

- Silicon Valley, California
- Austin, Texas
- Triangle Park, NC
- Seattle, Washington
- Boston, Massachusetts

are all conservatives/pro-GOP?

So folks in Silicon Valley voted for GOP?  Ditto for Austin, Triangle Park, Seattle, Boston, etc.?

in that case, per following 2012 article in "Nature," how come GOP Congress refused to previously back up spending increase for science agencies requested by Pres. Obama?  Money for science should be OK since it's a good investment and doesn't waste money on poor/unemployed, right?

It seems GOP Congress is more responsible for cuts to science/engineering/technology than Pres. Obama when Pres. Obama wants to spend much more than GOP Congress is willing to OK?  


US president wants to make room for research to grow in 2013 — but faces an uphill battle


Obama’s 2013 budget
Tough decisions

The winners and losers in President Barack Obama’s budget request for 2013 (US$ millions).
Agency..........................2011 actual...............2012 estimated................2013 requested..................Details
Biomedical research
NIH..........................30,470...................30,702..........................30,702...........................11% boost for translational science centre
CDC & Prevention.........5,726.....................5,732...........................5,068.............................efforts in public health and disease prevention bear the brunt of a deep cut
FDA.........................2,403......................2,506..........................2,517..............................surge in industry usr fees lifts overall budget by 17% to $4,486M
Physical sciences
NSF..........................6,806.....................7,032..........................7,372...............................big gains for interdisciplinary ideas — as well as marketable ones
NASA........................4,919.....................5,074..........................4,911...............................fagship telescope still on track, but future of Mars exploration less certain
DOE Office of Science....4,897......................4,874.........................4,992..............................overall increase masks cuts to some basic-research programmes
NIST.........................754.......................761...............................860................................substantial increase, with around half to advanced manufacturing research
Earth and environment
EPA.........................8,681.....................8,450..........................8,344.................................core science and regulatory programmes preserved
Nat Oc/Atmo..............4,727.....................5,014..........................5,179................................modest rise, with satellite programme getting much-needed boost
US Geo Survey...........1,084......................1,068..........................1,102................................Increased money for disaster response and research on hydraulic fracturing
Source: White House Office of Management and Budget

wow,you have drunk fully from the kool aid

 

I spent time reading about Neil deGrasse Tyson.

I believe he would probably not take the position in the video above if he went through funding struggles Pres. Obama has had with GOP Congress since then in trying to increase funding for sciences.

FWIW, Neil deGrasse Tyson:
- supports global warming http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kijVlez5R9w
- opposes Intelligent Design http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEl9kVl6KPc
- opposes Creationism, Young Earth Theory http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMLBc-IFyes
- supports evolution
- opposes bringing religion to school http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FTSylWy7U8

My understanding is that most folks who believe in Intelligent Design/Creationism/Young Earth Theory are in GOP camp.  Most folks in GOP doesn't support global warming while Neil deGrasse Tyson do.  Also, Tyson doesn't support religion or science affected by religion in schools.  Also, he supports evolution and evolutionary origin of mankind.

 

You have to know if your experience is representative of population at large.  Most folks' experience suffers from inadequacy of sample size and possibility of sampling bias.

My understanding is that in general, high technology areas like Silicon Valley, Austin, Seattle, Boston, Triangle Park, etc. tend to be bastion of liberalism/Democrats, for good or bad.

According to this map, states with more educated folks tend to vote Democratic.

According to this paper, richer folks in poorer states that are GOP tend to vote GOP and this trend exist to a lesser extent in richer states that vote Democrat.

BTW, if my memory serves me right, during 2008 presidential election, McCain won majority of voters only in one category(older white voters).  Tea Party right now is composed of mainly, far right, older, white, GOP members.

The difference 2008 presidential election and 2010 Congressional election which gave GOP Congressional majority and 2012 election is money going into SuperPAC.  That has proven to be a game changer so far.

BTW, I've met folks who worked in medical field in conservative states and to my surprise, they actually believed in Creationism and did not believe in evolution or evolutionary history of man.

I wander who would make better scientists in biological/medical fields?  Creationist or somebody who accepted evolution/evolutionary origin of mankind?