Letter sent to newspaper editors by members of the CEDENNA center.
Dear Editor:
One lesson we must learn from this pandemic is that governments that ignore scientific advice miss a crucial opportunity to act efficiently and effectively to protect their population.
Charles Darwin had already observed that the species that survives is not the strongest or the most intelligent, but the one that best adapts. And like him, economist L. Thurow aptly commented that in the 21st century the educational skills of human resources would be the dominant competitive weapon. Both statements show the importance of basic science and knowledge for the future of each nation.
Although basic science cannot be evaluated by immediate results, the economic benefits of scientific research are always the consequence of fundamental advances in knowledge rather than the search for specific applications. A clear example is transistors, which were not invented by industrialists, but by researchers working on quantum mechanics and solid-state physics.
Its success requires good, clear and stable policies; long-term planning; and consolidating the successful research groups that develop frontier science, without which it is not possible to transform knowledge into development and well-being. Only then can successful efforts, such as Fondecyt, bear their best fruit.
Dora Altbir D.
Miguel Kiwi T.
National Prizes in Exact Sciences
Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (CEDENNA)
(Read it in La Tercera or Blog El Mercurio.com) 29/05/2021.
