Dope-Smoking, Menstruating Monkey Study Got $3.6 Million in Tax Dollars...

[Fear No Evil]

OP simply does not seem to have a working understanding of what basic research is.

Lacking such, he is buying into idiot right-wing know-nothingism.

Still not as idiotic as probilismatiumaniaphobia.

 

[destrekor]

Lemme check on my bookcase - yup, I did a 5th year thesis in my BSEE degree, an MSEE thesis, and the big kahuna for the PhD. You're right, I have no idea what basic research is. Better go back to 1992 and re-defend my dissertation!
:hmm:

Research for physiology, neurology, and to some extent psychology (for this specific study) is vastly different from EE research.
You cannot compare the two at all. Seriously. Besides the idea that money is thrown at things to try and come up with random combinations of new methods to try and find a better route... that's about the only common thread between research on an animal and research for EE.

 

[Pliablemoose]

I'm all for research etc, but damn, doing that shit to primates is just wrong...

There's plenty of humans to study that do the same thing, although keeping them in cages would piss off someone I'm sure...

 

[Born2bwire]

So the average ATOT poster DOES make at least 6 figures.

 

[JumBie]

I'm all for research etc, but damn, doing that shit to primates is just wrong...

There's plenty of humans to study that do the same thing, although keeping them in cages would piss off someone I'm sure...

I'm actually against the testing of anything, on any animal, primate or rodent, but that's just the animal lover in me. I gotta say though, those monkeys must be TRIPPING, imagine if you were given PCP then locked in a cage. I don't think i would make it out alive.

 

[Whisper]

Research for physiology, neurology, and to some extent psychology (for this specific study) is vastly different from EE research.
You cannot compare the two at all. Seriously. Besides the idea that money is thrown at things to try and come up with random combinations of new methods to try and find a better route... that's about the only common thread between research on an animal and research for EE.

Exactly. There are some aspects of psychological research that I can't even directly compare to something as seemingly-related as sociology or speech pathology, let alone EE.

As someone else mentioned, $3.6M over the course of a decade isn't much at all when it comes to grant-funded research, and the work itself sounds pretty interesting.

And yes, any time you include ANYTHING living in your research, the costs generally go up quite a bit.

 

[classy]

So the average ATOT poster DOES make at least 6 figures.

Of course.

All got model girlfriends and wives to boot.
0 credit card debt.
And they all will...I mean we will all have at least 1 million to retire on.

Life's Great

 

[Born2bwire]

Exactly. There are some aspects of psychological research that I can't even directly compare to something as seemingly-related as sociology or speech pathology, let alone EE.

As someone else mentioned, $3.6M over the course of a decade isn't much at all when it comes to grant-funded research, and the work itself sounds pretty interesting.

And yes, any time you include ANYTHING living in your research, the costs generally go up quite a bit.

To put it in some perspective. As a grad student, a full time research assistantship got me tuition waver and a stipend. The tuition waver was worth around $16K for residents almost $30K for non-residents. Then the stipend was a little over $20K a year. No, I'm not saying that it's a complete 1:1 in terms of dollar given to dollar spent on me, but a year's research assistantship from a grad student was effectively worth $36K-$50K. That doesn't include the cost for equipment, the professor, post-docs, support staff (I know my advisor was charged $XK a year for secretary and other support staff), and so forth.

The university also posts the awards and funding that is awarded to professors. Just looking at the list of recent awards, there is a $440K award to one professor by a private company for research on wireless networks. That's already more than what was put into this study per year.

EDIT: Next on down the list are grants of $500K and $150K.

 

[DrPizza]

OP simply does not seem to have a working understanding of what basic research is.

Lacking such, he is buying into idiot right-wing know-nothingism.

Having read numerous science stories posted by the OP, I've gotta disagree. I think this is just that one time in 1000's of posts where he's posted something that I'm guessing he wishes he could take back. Normally, his science related posts are top quality.

 

[TheVrolok]

So it's a troll thread then?

OP has a pretty solid history of simply posting threads with titles that are slightly misleading, slightly reworded, etc. to get a rise out of people. He's a smart guy, and knows his stuff, he just likes to get a rise out of folks who misinterpret the OP (or fall for his misleading title).

The OP never actually said he disagreed with the article, it may just be subtly (wrongly) implied.

 

[Ichinisan]

OP didn't actually say he was outraged.

 

[Whisper]

To put it in some perspective. As a grad student, a full time research assistantship got me tuition waver and a stipend. The tuition waver was worth around $16K for residents almost $30K for non-residents. Then the stipend was a little over $20K a year. No, I'm not saying that it's a complete 1:1 in terms of dollar given to dollar spent on me, but a year's research assistantship from a grad student was effectively worth $36K-$50K. That doesn't include the cost for equipment, the professor, post-docs, support staff (I know my advisor was charged $XK a year for secretary and other support staff), and so forth.

The university also posts the awards and funding that is awarded to professors. Just looking at the list of recent awards, there is a $440K award to one professor by a private company for research on wireless networks. That's already more than what was put into this study per year.

EDIT: Next on down the list are grants of $500K and $150K.

Being on a similar assistantship myself for the past six years, I can definitely vouch for the accuracy of the figures you provide. Research can become surprisingly expensive, surprisingly fast. The OP, having earned his PhD, likely knows this as well. I'm guessing it's just that the particular topic area of this article was outside his field of expertise, and thus initially seemed a bit more outlandish than it truly was. This is, of course, assuming the OP was actually upset.

There is a LOT of work being done in psychology right now regarding all sorts of phenomenon with relation to the female menstrual cycle (eating, smoking, drug use, etc.). Doing these sorts of studies in monkeys makes sense, since you're never going to get an IRB to approve administering meth/crack/etc. to humans.

 

[Brainonska511]

Research can become surprisingly expensive, surprisingly fast.

Yep. My old adviser once said, for each person in the lab (this was a synthetic bio-organic chem group), figure you need at least $80k-$100k in funds per person. Then you have the overhead that universities charge for space, administration, etc, which can cost you a lot of a grant.... Equipment is also incredibly expensive: our NMR magnet alone is $650,000.