What is the #1 problem scientists are working on today?

[SkyWriting]

What is the #1 problem scientists are working on today?
I know one answer and wonder what others feel is #1.

 

[astein]

Money.

 

[Tomk80]

What is the #1 problem scientists are working on today?
I know one answer and wonder what others feel is #1.

There is no number 1 problem. Given the diverse nature of problems and the inpredictability of science, you cannot rank problems like that.

 

[Joshua0035]

What is the #1 problem scientists are working on today?

The number one problem has always been to feed people. Now it looks like science has solved that problem but have they really? People are eathing but the rich still live 10 years longer because the poor people still can not afford to buy healthy food.

 

[BarryDesborough]

The number one problem has always been to feed people. Now it looks like science has solved that problem but have they really? People are eathing but the rich still live 10 years longer because the poor people still can not afford to buy healthy food.

World Hunger Statistics | Statistic Brain

 

[ameliapond]

World Hunger Statistics | Statistic Brain

"Time between deaths of people who die from hunger 3.6 seconds"

that is too much to handle...

 

[durangodawood]

What is the #1 problem scientists are working on today?
I know one answer and wonder what others feel is #1.

This is a VALUES question. As such, you are the only one who can answer this for yourself.
.

 

[BarryDesborough]

"Time between deaths of people who die from hunger 3.6 seconds"

that is too much to handle...

A holocaust-scale disaster every four years.

What are our descendants going to think of us?

 

[hisgrace26]

Scientists have yet to create life in the lab.

 

[BarryDesborough]

Scientists have yet to create life in the lab.

They're pretty close to doing that.

My #1, if we are talking about pure science, is grand unification - the real ToE, the "Theory of Everything"

 

[Joshua0035]

A holocaust-scale disaster every four years.

What are our descendants going to think of us?

Jesus said the day will come when they turn the sword into a plow. If we spend money on farming instead of war we maybe able to feed a lot of people. That is why we look forward to when Jesus will rule and reign for 1000 years here on Earth.

 

[CabVet]

Are you in the business of re-oppening AV's closed threads now?

http://www.christianforums.com/t7748267/

 

[Strathos]

Yeah, I don't really think this thread needed to be resurrected.

But I agree with the sentiment that more money, research, and effort should be spent on keeping people fed and healthy than it should be on killing people.

 

[BarryDesborough]

Jesus said the day will come when they turn the sword into a plow. If we spend money on farming instead of war we maybe able to feed a lot of people. That is why we look forward to when Jesus will rule and reign for 1000 years here on Earth.

Why do we have to wait for Jesus? This is why I am such a passionate opponent of evolution denialism. The problem lies in human nature. Unless we learn to understand human nature adequately, we have no chance of addressing our problems. That understanding has to encompass an evolutionary perspective. You wait for your Jesus. I'll put my trust in knowledge.

 

[souper genyus]

What is the #1 problem scientists are working on today?
I know one answer and wonder what others feel is #1.

It would be hard to say whether it is developing a theory of mind-as-emergent-from-the-brain or completing the standard model of particle physics with the data they are getting from the LHC. Of course, it is probably just a matter of opinion. As someone who prefers biology and psychology over physics, I'd have to say the former.

 

[Joshua0035]

Unless we learn to understand human nature adequately, we have no chance of addressing our problems.

We DO understand Human Nature. Even taking Nurture VS Nature and all the Biochemical factors into consideration. It all comes down to IF people feel their environment is safe then they prosper. IF people feel that they live in an unsafe or threatening environment they do not prosper. This is clearly a case where science and religion agree. If you feel that there is a conflict between science and religion in this regard then present your evidence.

 

[CabVet]

We DO understand Human Nature. Even taking Nurture VS Nature and all the Biochemical factors into consideration. It all comes down to IF people feel their environment is safe then they prosper. IF people feel that they live in an unsafe or threatening environment they do not prosper. This is clearly a case where science and religion agree. If you feel that there is a conflict between science and religion in this regard then present your evidence.

Even though we took tremendous steps in the last few decades, we are still very far from "understanding human nature". Here is a short list of problems:

10 Unsolved Mysteries of the Brain | World of Psychology

Very simple stuff, like "what is consciousness"...

Want more?

 

[BarryDesborough]

We DO understand Human Nature. Even taking Nurture VS Nature and all the Biochemical factors into consideration. It all comes down to IF people feel their environment is safe then they prosper. IF people feel that they live in an unsafe or threatening environment they do not prosper. This is clearly a case where science and religion agree. If you feel that there is a conflict between science and religion in this regard then present your evidence.

Views of human nature based on guesswork are bound to be a hit-or-miss affair. Those based on evidence are more likely to be accurate, and useful.

 

[OldWiseGuy]

Society could be collapsing around their ears but to an elected politician the biggest problem is how to get reelected. Science thinks much the same way; how to retain control of the 'problems' to ensure the flow of money, position, and reputation.

I will repeat (ad nauseum) this anecdote. My city surrounds a once beautiful lake. It is now a smelly mess due to the DNR's management program which promotes the growth of weeds all along its shoreline (to the consternation of lakefront owners who must put up with the smell and weedy mess, which often prevents them from launching their watercraft). The University Limnology Department attracts huge research grants to study biological communities that only occur in hyper-eutrophic waters, a condition that is scrupulously maintained. They conspire with the DNR to ensure that the lake remains a smelly mess, for if it were cleaned up this money would stop flowing (no one is going to pay to study a 'clean' lake).

So you often have the fox guarding the henhouse. There is often more profit in the 'problem' than in the 'solution'.

 

[Naraoia]

There is no number 1 problem. Given the diverse nature of problems and the inpredictability of science, you cannot rank problems like that.

This.

It would be nice if we perfected the art of growing tissues and organs in a dish, though. Aside from organ transplants without immunosuppression, we'd also gain beef without cow burps!

Society could be collapsing around their ears but to an elected politician the biggest problem is how to get reelected. Science thinks much the same way; how to retain control of the 'problems' to ensure the flow of money, position, and reputation.

I will repeat (ad nauseum) this anecdote. My city surrounds a once beautiful lake. It is now a smelly mess due to the DNR's management program which promotes the growth of weeds all along its shoreline (to the consternation of lakefront owners who must put up with the smell and weedy mess, which often prevents them from launching their watercraft). The University Limnology Department attracts huge research grants to study biological communities that only occur in hyper-eutrophic waters, a condition that is scrupulously maintained. They conspire with the DNR to ensure that the lake remains a smelly mess, for if it were cleaned up this money would stop flowing (no one is going to pay to study a 'clean' lake).

So you often have the fox guarding the henhouse. There is often more profit in the 'problem' than in the 'solution'.

So one anecdote is "often".

BTW, to my knowledge, weeds along the lakeshore have nothing whatsoever to do with eutrophication. Eutrophication is caused by excess nutrients, such as fertilisers or just good old crap. Weeds along the shoreline are probably more likely to mitigate the problem than cause it, since they will a) use nutrients themselves, b) stop soil from eroding into the lake.

Also, is this Lake Mendota we're talking about? The one that could take hundreds of years to recover because the soil all around it is still overloaded with phosphorus?

And does the guy who wrote that paper keep saying that you've got to do something about the soil because he doesn't want to clean up the lake? Since the soil is a huge source of excess phosphorus, that would seem like shooting yourself in the foot if your aim is to preserve the eutrophic state of the lake.

Not only that, but in this document by the UW Madison folks (the grant proposal for this project by the looks of it), one of the objectives is the following:

Question 2: How can thresholds for transport and recycling of [phosphorus] be manipulated to mitigate eutrophication, or increase the resilience of clear-water lakes to eutrophication?

And further to that, the proposal explicitly states that the research will use historical data, i.e. it no longer actually needs the lake to be gunky. The planned data source:

The Yahara lakes and watershed have been studied extensively for more than a century. From the wealth of ecological data available for this watershed-lake system (Brock 1985, Kitchell 1992, Lathrop et al. 2002), we will focus on data collected since 1976 by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and the North Temperate Lakes Long-Term Ecological Research program funded by NSF (Welcome to NTL-LTER | North Temperate Lakes).

And methodology:

Our approach employs two main strategies: (1) statistical analysis of long-term lake data, and (2) analysis of an integrated terrestrial-aquatic phosphorus model to explore linked landscape-lake biogeochemical and ecological processes. Both elements rely on existing data and the adaptation of existing modeling frameworks to the Yahara watershed-lake ecosystem.

Um, yes, I'm sure it's all a vast money-grabbing conspiracy. Or perhaps, just perhaps, this is actually a tough environmental problem that doesn't have a quick and easy solution, and wanting to study eutrophic lake ecology has nothing to do with it.