The Old is New Again . . . Thoughts from the Eisenhower Era

First off, thanks to a top NIH official for telling me about the reports from the Eisenhower Science Advisory Committee, the precursor to what is now PCAST.

Second (this is me talking, not the NIH official): there are a number of prescient observations to be found, even at a distance of over 60 years. [Apologies for any errors in retyping the old PDF docs.]

For example, a 1960 report titled, “Scientific Progress, the Universities, and the Federal Government,” said:

We recognize that many university scientists are strongly opposed to the use of Federal funds for senior faculty salaries. Obviously we do not share their belief, but we do agree with them on one important point—the need for avoiding situations in which a professor becomes partly or wholly responsible for raising his own salary. If a university makes permanent professorial appointments in reliance upon particular Federal project support, and rejects any residual responsibility for financing the appointment if Federal funds should fail, a most unsatisfactory sort of “second-class citizenry” is created, and we are firmly against this sort of thing.

No soft money, in other words. Yes, absolutely.

One wonders how the biomedical research enterprise would look today, if this wise foresight had been heeded.

As a well-regarded scientist at Stanford said to me recently, “Universities are really involved with tracking conflicts of interest like outside funders (pharma), etc. But nobody tracks the real conflict of interest: Part of my salary depends on getting grants! That means putting food on the table for your family. It’s a huge existential threat!”

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Next, a 1958 report titled “Strengthening American Science” said this about the need to support both basic and (what we would now call) translational research:

Also undernourished, along with basic research, is “analytical engineering” or applied or supporting research—the sophisticated scrutiny of available knowledge to determine what sort of “things” are possible to build, or to invent (if need be) and which are not, and what may be the magnitude of their cost.

It is obvious to everyone in “development” that the design of “things” is handicapped at every turn both by lack of basic knowledge and the critical analysis of what it is possible to create with the knowledge available. While difficult to prove, there is little doubt that a more vigorous support of basic research—and “analytical engineering’’—over the past decade would now be paying rich dividends in making “things” easier and less costly to develop. It also would minimize the need for expensive crash programs.

In any case it is difficult to imagine more fruitful and prudent ways to spend the taxpayer’s money than on basic and applied research.

Agreed.

Finally, the 1958 report also made some pointed comments about the need for flexibility in government funding:

While the project system should be continued and strengthened, we need additional methods in order to meet the full range of scientific opportunities ahead. These new areas of opportunity frequently cross the borderlines of two or more sciences (e.g., biophysics, radiation chemistry, geophysics) and call for interdepartmental and interdisciplinary laboratories to provide adequate research facilities.

Research of this type cannot always be most effectively supported piecemeal by a multiplicity of small project grants or contracts.

One of many examples of the difficulties in the project approach is provided by the experience of an important university laboratory doing research in the earth sciences. A study of this laboratory has revealed that its troubles stem almost wholly from the fragmentation imposed on the laboratory by the multiple sources of support, from the short-term nature of contracts, and by the time-consuming reporting required by a large number of contracts.

Since individual contracts are not broad enough to cover all new scientific developments, areas of research which might lead to important new discoveries frequently are not developed. The numerous termination dates in short-term contracts defy any real planning, whereas late renewals cause serious disruptions in the work. In hiring personnel, furthermore, it is often necessary to pay a single salary from four or five contracts. This, in turn, requires troublesome decisions on how to divide salaries among several contracts all expiring on different dates. These decisions are difficult and time-consuming, and they create serious problems as each contract expires. Currently, this laboratory which employs less than 200 people has over 40 contracts and its scientists spend large portions of their time away from research engaged in renewing contracts or writing separate reports at different intervals on each one. . . .

Unfortunately, there is a tendency to believe that in providing a contract or grant for a single specific project, the chance of finding a solution to a problem is being maximized and is also more economical. In reality, however, the overall research effort may be hurt.

Program grants or institutional grants would permit more effective research in broad areas of science and provide greater freedom for the scientific community to give direction to the work undertaken. They might also prove to be an important administrative device for reducing the potential growth of Government administration if, otherwise, a greatly increased number of selecting and reviewing boards were necessary.

Hmmm.

In unrelated news, the NIH has at least 333 “selecting and reviewing boards” that review research proposals: 207 standing study sections, 65 special emphasis panels, 35 small business panels, and 26 panels for fellowships. It’s surely a coincidence that there are so many complaints these days about the burden of bureaucracy.