OMG science
fromwww.scientificamerican.com
9 hours agoUnlikely paths to discovery
Space hotels have been envisioned since the 1950s, but none have been realized despite multiple ambitious plans and predictions.
Inertia Enterprises burst onto the scene in February with a $450 million Series A, making it one of the best capitalized startups in the industry, aiming to bring laser-based fusion reactors to market.
Wilson theorizes that aggrieved far-right faculty were overrepresented while far-left faculty boycotted the survey. He provides no evidence for either claim and ignores evidence against—such as that only one of 633 respondents identified as 'extremely conservative.'
Modern scientific societies are increasingly vulnerable due to their dependence on membership fees and journal subscriptions, which are being challenged by the rise of virtual networking and open-access publishing.
In 2023, Australia abandoned its expensive and bureaucratic scholar-led research-assessment programme. New Zealand followed suit soon after. The hope, according to a transition plan unveiled by the Australian federal government's Department of Education and the research sector, was to find a "more modern, data-driven approach". In the United Kingdom, where financial pressures on universities are especially acute, there are similar calls to reform the Research Excellence Framework (REF), the country's performance-based research-funding system.