As the current administration starkly reminds us, when scientific priorities are reversed, ignored, or corrupted, the problem is made even more difficult. When the direction of our scientific agencies are allowed to be dictated by political ideology, science clearly suffers. Just look at the seesawing priorities of NASA, where launch and interception timelines require decade-long investments, yet are undermined by successive administrations that seek to imprint their priorities (or ideologies) instead.
Absolutely, Barry! Political interference with science is utterly problematic right now. NZ's science funding system has undergone recent overhaul to the absolute detriment of knowledge advancement. Favouring certain disciplines over others and defunding basic research is not helping us come up with the 'solutions' that politicians seem to want developed.
I feel the most difficult challenge is getting funders/governments and the like to actually value long term research. As you pointed out with the 1987 Montreal Protocol leading to the phasing out CFCs it can be done. If there was a more bipartisan approach by governments to fund long term research it may filter down through to other institutions to do the same. I can only hope!
I suppose that this is a problem that can never be resolved completely. There is a question about the future reliability of long term research. If it takes decades to make a conclusion, the rapidly changing future we are facing may have already invalidated or confused it. In other words, as time goes by we will increasingly be flying blind. This would argue for even more long term studies, but probably it will just mean less.
A little of both. We need to learn how to act under massive uncertainty -- also in how to communicate that -- but long-term ecological research has undoubtedly contributed disproportionately to our understanding of how the natural world works.
Undoubtedly. It's really the underpinning of ecological thought. In fact, the breakdown of systems provides a unique opportunity to learn how it works. But if the means to carry out such study is lost, and it seems headed that way as society comes unglued, science will have to fall back on observation and try to make do with limited formal methods.
Well, it is almost as if the short-time clock is the clock of a parasite, and the long-time clock is the clock of the host suffering with it...
My own anarcho-primitivism aside, I wholeheartedly agree, we need proper institutions for the proper problems. In a way, we already can do a lot. Current grads and researchers can (and should) be collecting the next data point from a century-long study none of them will see the end. And at least here in Brazil, this idea still earns grant approvals - even if less than what we need. This is one way to solve the issue: have the short-time clock institution work for the long-time clock one.
Only problem here, and in getting to this conclusion I might be getting to some actionable points to address the issue, is:
- Researchers (including students) shouldn't be forced (as they are today) to be always publishing, to be "always right", to be always "breaking new ground". Some supervisors know this. Some science-funding institutions know that. But overall the academic culture does not behaves as if it knows that. On the contrary. We all live under the "publish or perish" law. And what gets published is another big rabbit hole. This leads to the fact that we need better metrics to measure academic productivity. This idea (better metrics) seems pretty doable, since academics are the sort that usually gather and talk and discuss stuff. We need to keep talking about this, then. Find those metrics and revise our institutions to abide by them.
- We DESPERATELY need politicians and decision makers (the people that decide who runs the academic funding) that think about, accept, and care about the long term, so they don't slash funding for long term institutions, as we've been seeing happening in many countries nowadays (cof cof USA cof cof). One could just say "we need to vote better then!". Well, yes, please do that, but even the best in the current system will always have to pay attention to the current and the next election cycle. They live under a system of short term thinking, their bank accounts and food on the table and yachts in the marina depend on this short clock. So what I'm getting to here is that we need a better System, with a BIG "S". Better Society. Rethink elections. Rethink power structures. Rethink everything. And considering how locked in the System today is about not changing itself, I think we need a revolution, guys.
Completely agree that short-clock institutions can contribute to long-term goals. Most people involved in long-term ecological studies know they're collecting data for questions broader than a 3-y cycle and potentially even broader than what can be answered in the first couple of decades.
And yep, incentives matter. If we primarily reward novelty, rapid publication, and short-term outcomes, it's not surprising that those would become the research foci. As mentioned in the post, some of ecology's biggest contributions have come from long-term research.
More generally, the key is better connecting short-term decisions with long-term outcomes. Funding cycles, election cycles etc. are not going anywhere -- it's about making sure we design the right systems.
This is an interesting perspective. It's as if long-term monitoring projects need their own grant category where there is an option for renewal phases based on KPIs or outcomes.
In my work in social systems and societal change, humans operate in both these timeframes: the rational logic of short-term goals, and the physical reality of being part of a longer timeframe. This plays out in the very many social change initiatives that aim to achieve system change, but they end up unintentionally propping up the existing system. This can look like greenwashing, but often the initial intention was good (not always of course). In conflict resolution, grant givers want short term progress, which often doesn't look like much. Under the surface, over a longer time period, attitudes change slowly. I suppose this is not surprise as humans are part of nature! There are many community initiatives working on a longer timeframe over decades. Maybe the question isn't how do we build them, but more like, how do we value that existing, often hidden, work.
That's awesome, Sheila! So glad to have inspired you to do so. Thanks for the thoughts. Very true re: valuing the existing, often hidden, work. That's a key challenge.
As the current administration starkly reminds us, when scientific priorities are reversed, ignored, or corrupted, the problem is made even more difficult. When the direction of our scientific agencies are allowed to be dictated by political ideology, science clearly suffers. Just look at the seesawing priorities of NASA, where launch and interception timelines require decade-long investments, yet are undermined by successive administrations that seek to imprint their priorities (or ideologies) instead.
Absolutely, Barry! Political interference with science is utterly problematic right now. NZ's science funding system has undergone recent overhaul to the absolute detriment of knowledge advancement. Favouring certain disciplines over others and defunding basic research is not helping us come up with the 'solutions' that politicians seem to want developed.
I feel the most difficult challenge is getting funders/governments and the like to actually value long term research. As you pointed out with the 1987 Montreal Protocol leading to the phasing out CFCs it can be done. If there was a more bipartisan approach by governments to fund long term research it may filter down through to other institutions to do the same. I can only hope!
It’s there but the challenge is keeping it. So many governments are eroding nowadays. The challenge is protecting it.
I suppose that this is a problem that can never be resolved completely. There is a question about the future reliability of long term research. If it takes decades to make a conclusion, the rapidly changing future we are facing may have already invalidated or confused it. In other words, as time goes by we will increasingly be flying blind. This would argue for even more long term studies, but probably it will just mean less.
A little of both. We need to learn how to act under massive uncertainty -- also in how to communicate that -- but long-term ecological research has undoubtedly contributed disproportionately to our understanding of how the natural world works.
Undoubtedly. It's really the underpinning of ecological thought. In fact, the breakdown of systems provides a unique opportunity to learn how it works. But if the means to carry out such study is lost, and it seems headed that way as society comes unglued, science will have to fall back on observation and try to make do with limited formal methods.
Let's hope it doesn't come to that, Brian!
Well, it is almost as if the short-time clock is the clock of a parasite, and the long-time clock is the clock of the host suffering with it...
My own anarcho-primitivism aside, I wholeheartedly agree, we need proper institutions for the proper problems. In a way, we already can do a lot. Current grads and researchers can (and should) be collecting the next data point from a century-long study none of them will see the end. And at least here in Brazil, this idea still earns grant approvals - even if less than what we need. This is one way to solve the issue: have the short-time clock institution work for the long-time clock one.
Only problem here, and in getting to this conclusion I might be getting to some actionable points to address the issue, is:
- Researchers (including students) shouldn't be forced (as they are today) to be always publishing, to be "always right", to be always "breaking new ground". Some supervisors know this. Some science-funding institutions know that. But overall the academic culture does not behaves as if it knows that. On the contrary. We all live under the "publish or perish" law. And what gets published is another big rabbit hole. This leads to the fact that we need better metrics to measure academic productivity. This idea (better metrics) seems pretty doable, since academics are the sort that usually gather and talk and discuss stuff. We need to keep talking about this, then. Find those metrics and revise our institutions to abide by them.
- We DESPERATELY need politicians and decision makers (the people that decide who runs the academic funding) that think about, accept, and care about the long term, so they don't slash funding for long term institutions, as we've been seeing happening in many countries nowadays (cof cof USA cof cof). One could just say "we need to vote better then!". Well, yes, please do that, but even the best in the current system will always have to pay attention to the current and the next election cycle. They live under a system of short term thinking, their bank accounts and food on the table and yachts in the marina depend on this short clock. So what I'm getting to here is that we need a better System, with a BIG "S". Better Society. Rethink elections. Rethink power structures. Rethink everything. And considering how locked in the System today is about not changing itself, I think we need a revolution, guys.
Thanks Felipe.
Completely agree that short-clock institutions can contribute to long-term goals. Most people involved in long-term ecological studies know they're collecting data for questions broader than a 3-y cycle and potentially even broader than what can be answered in the first couple of decades.
And yep, incentives matter. If we primarily reward novelty, rapid publication, and short-term outcomes, it's not surprising that those would become the research foci. As mentioned in the post, some of ecology's biggest contributions have come from long-term research.
More generally, the key is better connecting short-term decisions with long-term outcomes. Funding cycles, election cycles etc. are not going anywhere -- it's about making sure we design the right systems.
This is an interesting perspective. It's as if long-term monitoring projects need their own grant category where there is an option for renewal phases based on KPIs or outcomes.
Thanks! They do exist (e.g. the US Long-term ecological research network), but they're less common than the standard 3-y grant.
In my work in social systems and societal change, humans operate in both these timeframes: the rational logic of short-term goals, and the physical reality of being part of a longer timeframe. This plays out in the very many social change initiatives that aim to achieve system change, but they end up unintentionally propping up the existing system. This can look like greenwashing, but often the initial intention was good (not always of course). In conflict resolution, grant givers want short term progress, which often doesn't look like much. Under the surface, over a longer time period, attitudes change slowly. I suppose this is not surprise as humans are part of nature! There are many community initiatives working on a longer timeframe over decades. Maybe the question isn't how do we build them, but more like, how do we value that existing, often hidden, work.
I have just turned this comment into my first Substack article. Thank you for the inspiration, Jonathan!
That's awesome, Sheila! So glad to have inspired you to do so. Thanks for the thoughts. Very true re: valuing the existing, often hidden, work. That's a key challenge.