Tuesday, August 4, 2015

An attack on science, and a defense in the LA Times: Golden Geese versus Golden Fleece

Tiffany Field, who shared a Golden Goose Award (given "to groups of researchers whose seemingly obscure, federally-funded research had led to major breakthroughs"), comes to the defense of social science, in the Los Angeles Times, in reply to an op-ed arguing that taxpayers' money is being wasted.
Opinion Social science caricature sets back human progress
By TIFFANY M. FIELD

The Golden Goose award arose in reaction to attacks on Federal funding of science, and takes its name in part from Senator William Proxmire's 1975-88 "Golden Fleece Awards" which were intended to ridicule funded grant proposals with funny sounding names.