Alternative to AVR Butterfly?

Others will have to answer about France and Germany.

In the UK, there's a bit of a downturn in the numbers doing science and engineering in higher education which is not good and needs to be addressed, but my perception is that it's more a drift away towards other subjects (ie: the "science is hard!" mindset) than an active anti-science bias.

In contrast, I've developed the perception that in the US, there is more of an active anti-science bias developing in some quarters, including, as larwe points out, the current administration, which seems to be a path that is actively self-defeating in the longer term.

Once again, to be fair, I must point out that these are just perceptions of mine and not based on direct experience of the US education system.

Thanks for the link. That's an interesting and informative breakdown.

Simon.

--
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Microsoft: Bringing you 1980's technology to a 21st century world

Notwithstanding larwe's silly sneer against the current administration (which I despise as much as anyone else), the decline of education in the US is real, and not limited to science and math, and not at all recent. It has to do with

1) the declaration (from the '60's and continuing now) by the education community that standards are counterproductive, and even evil (yes, I have personal experience with educators' opinions). 2) the rise of narrow financial perspective in American management.

3) the decline of compensation and status for those who do more difficult things, giving rise to the justifiable perception that there's no point in bettering yourself.

John Perry

So if you agree with it, why dub it "silly" - unless you are casting yourself as sily?

Personally, I blame the media (MTV, the Hollywood gossip channels, etc.) It's rare that I watch TV anymore for fun - if I do, it's to watch the Military Channel (history of WWII, battle strategy, weapons development history, etc.)

Let's face it... when one says "American", are you more likely to think Paris Hilton or Richard Feynman?

Then again, media is out there to make a buck, no matter the social cost.

It's just one University here, not necessarily one of the best ones. I just was able to find the stats quickly, cuz I went there...

Michael

The sneer about anti-science is what I was referring to. This administration is not substantially more or less anti-science and technology than any of the preceding ones.

There's plenty to despise in Bush's mess without inventing more.

jp

I wasn't comparing it to any previous administration, was I?

Politicians are inherently anti-science because they must cater to large minorities[?] that are anti-science. Stem cell research is the most obvious contemporary example.

As much as I dislike the current administration's foreign policy decisions, I admire the current administration courageously standing firm against using tax dollars to fund embryonic stem-cell research.

are from adult stem cells anyway, not from embryonic stem cells.

There's no need to kill innocent embryoes for research.

(Amazing how far this thread has wandered from alternatives to the AVR Butterfly, eh?)

Michael

To paraphrase that: you admire the current administration bravely buying votes from fundamentalist Christians by exporting scientific breakthroughs to other countries.

(I'm a libertarian and an atheist, in case you hadn't guessed).

I had a feeling you might be.

So, tell me... what "scientific breakthroughs" have other countries accomplished which could not have been accomplished here (because of the, um, fundamentalist Christians, not because of environmental regulations, wage pressures, etc.)?

Michael

"You see, then, that it is by his actions that a person is put right with God, and not by his faith alone." James 2:24

Excellent.

martin

whats that in C ?

martin

Its not that difficult to make a few characters !! Why so many lazy programmers around these days? In my day it was aseembler or nothing !

Does it matter? You don't grasp the underlying point.

There exists a broad spectrum of research activity, at one end being a ragged philosopher staring into a rock, thinking little of import and harming nobody. At the other end is probably someone like Dr. Josef Mengele (in his pre-South-America heyday). Someplace between those two zones, every person who bothers to think about the issue draws a line in the sand and says "beyond this point, it's unethical". A different person who is willing to go a little further is more likely to make a discovery.

A person who lets paternalistic others choose where that line is drawn is being intellectually lazy.

Furthermore, curtailing any sort of research is a very, VERY dangerous step down the road to book-burning. As soon as someone tells you "that knowledge is forbidden; seek it not, my child", that's a damn good reason to try and learn more, in my view.

Of course, this issue is only the tip of the iceberg; the current administration has ignored and/or suppressed lots of good science that was politically inconvenient. As, no doubt, the previous did, and the next will do. Politics and science are incompossible.

So, would you object to a doctor doing a biopsy on a tumor cut off your arm, on the grounds that it contains at least some viable DNA that could theoretically be grown into a complete organism?

// assume runtime environment initialized by higher power void main(void) { // comes from void, returns to void do { follow(); } while (!fCrisisofFaith); halt_catch_fire(); // going to hell }

Both are dirty words in this time and place. Sigh. Where's Howard Dean when you need him... only halfway likeable presidential candidate that has existed in my adult lifetime. And only halfway, at that.

Sure, it matters. You said:

I sense a great deal of anger here. Why be angry?

There's a reason it's unethical; it's not arbitrary by any means. Destruction of a life to save another life without that first life's permission is unethical; it's quite simple.

Seek it if you like; this is a free universe. Forcing taxpayers to fund it is a different story.

No.

Michael

Just how old are you, Marra? I was a tiny baby when Fortran came out (1958).

My philosophy requires that I honor everybody else's right to believe in whatever they need to get them through the day (up to the point that they try to impose their belief system on me directly or indirectly). It does NOT require me to remain tacit about hypocrisy (religion veneered with politics).

And here is an unbridgeable gap. This is not a life; it's a lump. And furthermore a lump that was already destined for destruction. Stem cell research of this type is essentially trash-picking.

My tax dollars are funding religious schools, the war in Iraq, and numerous other minority interests that I don't believe in and, in many cases, I think are morally unjustifiable - where's the difference?

There is no reconciliation possible between your viewpoint and mine; it is computed that in excess of eleven thousand persons have on several occasions suffered death rather than submit to break their eggs at the smaller end.

As far as I can tell (as an outsider, but one who reads about such things - including the opinions of American scientific magazines like Scientific American and National Geographic), this administration is very much more anti-science than preceding ones.

But I agree that the certainly did not start the trend, especially in the education sector, where falling standards in all subjects (and maths/science in particular) is a problem much wider than just the USA.