Robots folding laundry! Rumors gone amok! Shrimp running on treadmills!
These were just a few of the “questionable studies” funded by taxpayers and highlighted yesterday in a new report released by Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., on “$3 billion of waste and duplication” at the National Science Foundation.
“Unfortunately, in some ways NSF has undermined its core mission through mismanagement and misplaced priorities,” Coburn said yesterday.
Among other things, Coburn’s report noted a spate of scandals and improprieties at the federally funded agency, including recent news reports about officially sanctioned Jell-O wrestling matches at the agency’s South Pole research station.
The bulk of the 73-page report, however, focused on several colorful and seemingly frivolous studies funded by taxpayers.
“The overarching question to ask is simple,“ the report said, ”Are these projects the best possible use of our tax dollars?”
But as the details of the study spread yesterday, the scientists behind the targeted projects shot back, defending the propriety of their work and saying that Coburn’s report understated the effectiveness of many of the projects.
“This report is completely wrong,” said Adrian Bejan, a professor of Mechanical Engineering at Duke. An evolution study that he supervised was characterized as an $80,000 look at “why the same teams always seem to be dominating March Madness.”
In fact, Bejan said, the basketball report was an unfunded paper by a student that included a brief acknowledgement of NSF funding for the overall class.
“I would have been happy to explain why I thank NSF, but I was not contacted by any member of his voluminous and well-paid staff,” Bejan said. “Now, who is not spending the taxpayers’ money wisely?”
Becky Bernhardt, a spokesman for Coburn, confirmed that the report was not intended to actually evaluate the utility or effectiveness of any of the studies it highlighted.
“His idea and his objective with all of this is to [ask], ‘Is this spending priority, at a time when we’re facing $14.3 trillion dollar debt?’ ” Bernhardt said. “His objective was to pull the more egregious examples … to call attention to the projects, and say there should be more oversight.”
But the NSF says that all of the studies in the report were closely monitored for design and cost, and served purposes far beyond their characterization by Coburn and his staff.
One study in the report, for instance, spent $500,000 to observe crustaceans walking on tiny treadmills as part of an effort to determine the effects of climate change and toxic sea water on the marine food chain.
Another was described as a $1.5 million project to design “a robot that can fold laundry.”
Dana Topousis, a spokesman for the NSF, said that laundry folding is one small part of a study on robotics that could have life-saving implications for the military.
“What we’re studying is how a robot can go into a battlefield and repair a soldier’s skin — fold back skin when a human can’t get into the field of battle and repair a wounded soldier,” Topousis said. “These are the steps we are trying to take, it starts with a robot folding laundry but can end with saving lives on a battlefield.”
Nicholas DiFonzo, a psychologist at the Rochester Institute of Technology, whose study on rumor networks was described in the Coburn report as a $755,000 federal investigation into how “rumors get started,” said he didn’t resent the oversight, only the mischaracterizations of his work.
“I think the man is trying to do his job. I’m a taxpayer also and I appreciate the checks and balances that we have,” he said. “I do wish for my particular study that the staff had read it a little more closely.”
DiFonzo said his study, which evaluates how rumors spread through various social groups, could have implications for the military in Afghanistan, where counterinsurgency often relies on combating false information about American intentions.
These were just a few of the “questionable studies” funded by taxpayers and highlighted yesterday in a new report released by Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., on “$3 billion of waste and duplication” at the National Science Foundation.
“Unfortunately, in some ways NSF has undermined its core mission through mismanagement and misplaced priorities,” Coburn said yesterday.
Among other things, Coburn’s report noted a spate of scandals and improprieties at the federally funded agency, including recent news reports about officially sanctioned Jell-O wrestling matches at the agency’s South Pole research station.
The bulk of the 73-page report, however, focused on several colorful and seemingly frivolous studies funded by taxpayers.
“The overarching question to ask is simple,“ the report said, ”Are these projects the best possible use of our tax dollars?”
But as the details of the study spread yesterday, the scientists behind the targeted projects shot back, defending the propriety of their work and saying that Coburn’s report understated the effectiveness of many of the projects.
“This report is completely wrong,” said Adrian Bejan, a professor of Mechanical Engineering at Duke. An evolution study that he supervised was characterized as an $80,000 look at “why the same teams always seem to be dominating March Madness.”
In fact, Bejan said, the basketball report was an unfunded paper by a student that included a brief acknowledgement of NSF funding for the overall class.
“I would have been happy to explain why I thank NSF, but I was not contacted by any member of his voluminous and well-paid staff,” Bejan said. “Now, who is not spending the taxpayers’ money wisely?”
Becky Bernhardt, a spokesman for Coburn, confirmed that the report was not intended to actually evaluate the utility or effectiveness of any of the studies it highlighted.
“His idea and his objective with all of this is to [ask], ‘Is this spending priority, at a time when we’re facing $14.3 trillion dollar debt?’ ” Bernhardt said. “His objective was to pull the more egregious examples … to call attention to the projects, and say there should be more oversight.”
But the NSF says that all of the studies in the report were closely monitored for design and cost, and served purposes far beyond their characterization by Coburn and his staff.
One study in the report, for instance, spent $500,000 to observe crustaceans walking on tiny treadmills as part of an effort to determine the effects of climate change and toxic sea water on the marine food chain.
Another was described as a $1.5 million project to design “a robot that can fold laundry.”
Dana Topousis, a spokesman for the NSF, said that laundry folding is one small part of a study on robotics that could have life-saving implications for the military.
“What we’re studying is how a robot can go into a battlefield and repair a soldier’s skin — fold back skin when a human can’t get into the field of battle and repair a wounded soldier,” Topousis said. “These are the steps we are trying to take, it starts with a robot folding laundry but can end with saving lives on a battlefield.”
Nicholas DiFonzo, a psychologist at the Rochester Institute of Technology, whose study on rumor networks was described in the Coburn report as a $755,000 federal investigation into how “rumors get started,” said he didn’t resent the oversight, only the mischaracterizations of his work.
“I think the man is trying to do his job. I’m a taxpayer also and I appreciate the checks and balances that we have,” he said. “I do wish for my particular study that the staff had read it a little more closely.”
DiFonzo said his study, which evaluates how rumors spread through various social groups, could have implications for the military in Afghanistan, where counterinsurgency often relies on combating false information about American intentions.
