Andrew Jaffe: Leaves on the Line

Today’s obligatory pointer to the latest on the ongoing UK physics-funding crisis: the “Innovation, Universities, Science and Skills” committee has released a pretty scathing report, mostly slamming STFC’s handling of the situation (and refuting most of its arguments for how it got us into this mess to begin with). The BBC’s Today show had interviews confirming these points with Committee Chair Phil Willis MP and Brian Cox.

At this point, the best we could hope for in the short term would be a small amount of emergency funding to close some of the most gaping holes (and as a measure of good faith) and a major change in the STFC management structure. So far, they’ve said they want to “strengthen the management team”, “consult more widely”, and “improve… communication”. We’ll see.

As usual, Paul Crowther collects all the relevant information and news, and Andy Lawrence has good commentary.

I’ve been distracted from preparing a presentation trying to make the sure the UK (and, yes, our group at Imperial in particular) gets its fair share of the dwindling UK astrophysics budget: Newsnight has a pretty extensive package, filmed over the last few weeks, discussing the ongoing astrophysics funding issues. Most impressive was the strong editorial line, starting with always-irascible host Jeremy Paxman’s opening comment that “the consequences [of the funding cuts] haven’t been thought through. And they could be dire.”

From there, Susan Watts presented interviews with luminaries such as Astronomer Royal and Royal Society President Martin Rees (describing the situation as “poor management and poor planning…. ineptitude”), Royal Astronomical Society President Michael Rowan-Robinson, and footage from the NAM Town Hall meeting with the STFC Chief Executive Keith Mason. Watts explicitly asks “Who mismanaged what?” and interviewed Mason, “the man many of them [the astronomers] hold responsible”, who could only say that “we have to think in new ways”. Indeed.

In what I assume wasn’t a coincidence, the government today released the PM’s response to the petition to “reverse the decision to cut vital UK contributions to Particle Physics and Astronomy.” Alas, it just seems to be parroting the comments of the STFC Executive over the last few months. Roughly paraphrasing: “Actually, there’s no cut. Really, it looks great, if you only look at the numbers we tell you to look at. OK, well, it’s not a bad cut, anyway, and maybe the current review will convince us to make it better in the future. Oh, just stop complaining, we really love science.”

As usual Paul Crowther and Andy Lawrence have more extensive coverage than I do here.

Larry David (!) on Hillary Clinton:

“Does anyone want this nut answering the phone?” How is it that she became the one who’s perceived as more equipped to answer that 3 a.m. call?

I only managed to make it to halftime of the Superbowl, but I’m going to try to last through at least a few Super-Tuesday results. (So if you follow this blog to read my opinions on subjects about which I actually know anything, you’ll just have to wait until a future post. And/or you can follow my even less scientific rambling, nattering chatter on Twitter — if it’s good enough for the NY Times, it’s good enough for me.)

I’m still registered to vote in California, so I mailed my absentee ballot about a week ago — I’ll never know if they even bother to open it. Just today, wistfully thinking of the millions of my fellow Americans in their voting booths, I learned that I could have voted online as part of a “global primary”, eschewing paper ballots, chads, and the lovely mechanical voting machines of my youth.

Obama is a fantastic speaker, and the symbolism of a black President Obama might actually remind people in the USA and, equally importantly, around the world, that American ideals still resonate even as America’s hegemony starts to seem less inevitable. He’s inspiring, but, change-laden rhetoric aside, Clinton’s the more classic liberal, and I’d like to think that policy matters in the end. For example, her health plan would actually at least try to cover everyone in the country.

Here in the UK, it’s been easy to follow the election news: local outlets such as The Guardian and the BBC are unashamed to devote significant space and time to the USA, and I’ve become a devotee of podcast versions of America’s Sunday morning politics shows. Sometimes, the talking heads get too much to take, especially when scary left-right politico power-couple Mary Matalin and James Carville talk too much, and I’ve started turning to Steve Gillmor’s Newsgang, an unexpectedly compelling spinoff of Gillmor’s usual tech-oriented podcast, featuring former members of the Firesign Theatre, the usual posse of tech pundits, and even the occasional political expert. They almost made me wish I had voted for Obama…

Many others have been doing their best to disseminate information on the UK Physics funding crisis (especially Sheffield Prof Paul Crowther) but it’s probably worth pointing out the latest repercussion (which has already been picked up by the BBC): despite a bid to remain involved at a reduced level, it looks like the UK will be forced to completely withdraw from the Gemini telescope consortium. This is particularly dangerous for astronomers here, as Gemini-North was the only large telescope (about 8 meters in diameter) in the Northern Hemisphere to which the UK had access. Now, half the sky will be inaccessible, at least at the highest sensitivities and with the most advanced instruments. (Realistically, this will likely force us to collaborate with European, Asian and American colleagues, and probably to give up leadership roles in these projects.)

Meanwhile, committees are meeting, the government is holding hearings, and we scientists are being quietly advised that, essentially, you attract more flies with honey than vinegar, so we’d better not start pondering the thought that, perish forbid, anyone had actually made a mistake getting to this increasingly difficult position. Let’s hope that whatever is going on behind the scenes is better than what we’re seeing out front.

“It won’t be hypothetical if and when it occurs.”

—UK Home Secretary Jaqui Smith, arguing on the BBC Today show for legislation to be able to hold suspects for up to 42 days.

Living abroad, I’ve been following the American Presidential campaign (podcasts of This Week and Meet The Press help). But I’ve got this far without making a choice. I still vote in California, in one of the most liberal (i.e., American parlance for left-wing) parts of the country: Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s district, smack in the middle of San Francisco. So I need to send in my absentee ballot before the February 5 “Super-Duper Tuesday” primary.

According to this poll, I should be voting for a no-hoper such as Dennis Kucinich or the even less likely Mike Gravel, but of course the real question is: Obama or Clinton (or, still, Edwards)? Change (but Obama’s been a politician for a dozen years) or experience (and Hillary’s only been in elected office since 2001 — I find it difficult to take eight years as First Lady too seriously as “experience”)?

Normally I try to finesse my origins and claim to be a New Yorker, but today I am proud to have grown up in New Jersey:

Death Penalty Repealed in New Jersey — New York Times: “Gov. Jon S. Corzine signed into law a measure repealing New Jersey’a death penalty on Monday, making the state the first in a generation to abolish capital punishment.”

This is the Nixon Administration without the competence.

—Senator Joe Biden, This Week with George Stephanopoulos , December 9, 2007.

Today we heard that the (bizarrely agglomerated) UK Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills will be significantly cutting the physics budget that comes through the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC). STFC was formed earlier this year out of PPARC (Particle Physics and Astrophysics) and the CCLRC (which ran big facilities like the Rutherford Appleton Lab). When it was formed, we were told this would enable better science. But it seems we may have been sold a bill of goods: the science program is being saddled with what is, essentially, CCLRC’s debt, in the form of an £80 million shortfall that will fall disproportionately on academic research. And therefore, of course, on physics departments and, inevitably, physics education.

The Delivery Plan has just been announced, but of course the spin is all on the overall increase to funding, not these cuts. Happily (and a little surprisingly) the BBC highlighted the impact on physics in its usual stroppy manner.

Andy Lawrence has been following the news of the impending cuts over the last few weeks. Chris Lintott and Stuart have some more details. The headline cuts seem to be: withdrawal from the International Linear Collider (particle physicists’ next big instrument after the LHC at CERN), cessation of all support for ground-based solar-terrestrial physics facilities (i.e., telescopes and instruments that investigate the sun and its impact on the earth from the ground), and “revisiting the on-going level of investment” in gravitational wave detection, dark matter detection, the Clover CMB experiment and the UKIRT telescope. The UK will pull out of the Isaac Newton Group of telescopes.

Most important for me, so-called post-launch support for existing space missions (such as the Planck Surveyor CMB Mission, although it was never explicitly mentioned in the plan) will be cut by around 30%. This is a very cynical ploy: we will undoubtedly be so excited by the data from missions like Planck that we will donate our time, gratis, just to make sure that it gets analyzed.

There do appear to have been some small victories. Rather than a full termination as mooted last week, STFC plans “to withdraw from future investment in the twin 8-metre Gemini telescopes and we will work with our international partners to retain access to Gemini North.” So at least UK astronomers will have access to a world-class telescope in the Northern hemisphere. Most importantly, “Science Minister Ian Pearson said [on the BBC] funding arrangements would be reviewed,” — which we hope means actual compromises are possible — although of course he “did not promise extra money.”