National Science Foundation slashes basic science to fund new tech initiative

15 years ago you could argue that venture capital wasn't funding enough advanced tech, so ideas were failing to cross the gap from pure research to commercial development. But lately there's capital available for quantum computers, fusion, synthetic bio, space exploration, asteroid mining, and lots more. The government is going to suck at funding the right things. They should leave tech transfer to private investors, and focus on funding pure science.

More or less a handout to the tech industry. This is just the STTR program with even less oversight and a questionable funding source.

Curious what the plan is when the academic pipeline for training researchers collapses entirely. AI all the things?

It’s to repay the bribes

Rest assured, this will likely come with no small amount of grift.

The Trump administration has already installed political appointees in America’s federal R&D organizations including the NIH and NSF. They have final say on funding decisions. These appointees override grant peer review and regular agency channels. It’s all part of Russel Vought/Project 2025’s unitary executive theory.

These NSF initiatives could well be the next logical step to channel millions of research funds to politically connected companies and organizations. Something similar happened with the recent Reflecting Pool fiasco where the federal contracts were give to Trump donors.

There’s no reason not to believe this will also happen to America’s federal R&D. Grift aside, there’s no reason either not to believe the funds will be given to Trump administration pet projects of dubious scientific value.

That's not suspicious or anything...

Making an effort so that the tax payers are getting a return on their investment instead of letting it go up in smoke is a good thing.