Open science: a future shaped by shared experience | Education | The Observer - 0 views
-
one day he took one of these – finding a mathematical proof about the properties of multidimensional objects – and put his thoughts on his blog. How would other people go about solving this conundrum? Would somebody else have any useful insights? Would mathematicians, notoriously competitive, be prepared to collaborate? "It was an experiment," he admits. "I thought it would be interesting to try."He called it the Polymath Project and it rapidly took on a life of its own. Within days, readers, including high-ranking academics, had chipped in vital pieces of information or new ideas. In just a few weeks, the number of contributors had reached more than 40 and a result was on the horizon. Since then, the joint effort has led to several papers published in journals under the collective pseudonym DHJ Polymath. It was an astonishing and unexpected result.
-
"If you set out to solve a problem, there's no guarantee you will succeed," says Gowers. "But different people have different aptitudes and they know different tricks… it turned out their combined efforts can be much quicker."
-
There are many interpretations of what open science means, with different motivations across different disciplines. Some are driven by the backlash against corporate-funded science, with its profit-driven research agenda. Others are internet radicals who take the "information wants to be free" slogan literally. Others want to make important discoveries more likely to happen. But for all their differences, the ambition remains roughly the same: to try and revolutionise the way research is performed by unlocking it and making it more public.
- ...10 more annotations...
-
Jackson is a young bioscientist who, like many others, has discovered that the technologies used in genetics and molecular biology, once the preserve of only the most well-funded labs, are now cheap enough to allow experimental work to take place in their garages. For many, this means that they can conduct genetic experiments in a new way, adopting the so-called "hacker ethic" – the desire to tinker, deconstruct, rebuild.
-
The rise of this group is entertainingly documented in a new book by science writer Marcus Wohlsen, Biopunk (Current £18.99), which describes the parallels between today's generation of biological innovators and the rise of computer software pioneers of the 1980s and 1990s. Indeed, Bill Gates has said that if he were a teenager today, he would be working on biotechnology, not computer software.
-
open scientists suggest that it doesn't have to be that way. Their arguments are propelled by a number of different factors that are making transparency more viable than ever.The first and most powerful change has been the use of the web to connect people and collect information. The internet, now an indelible part of our lives, allows like-minded individuals to seek one another out and share vast amounts of raw data. Researchers can lay claim to an idea not by publishing first in a journal (a process that can take many months) but by sharing their work online in an instant.And while the rapidly decreasing cost of previously expensive technical procedures has opened up new directions for research, there is also increasing pressure for researchers to cut costs and deliver results. The economic crisis left many budgets in tatters and governments around the world are cutting back on investment in science as they try to balance the books. Open science can, sometimes, make the process faster and cheaper, showing what one advocate, Cameron Neylon, calls "an obligation and responsibility to the public purse".
-
"The litmus test of openness is whether you can have access to the data," says Dr Rufus Pollock, a co-founder of the Open Knowledge Foundation, a group that promotes broader access to information and data. "If you have access to the data, then anyone can get it, use it, reuse it and redistribute it… we've always built on the work of others, stood on the shoulders of giants and learned from those who have gone before."
-
moves are afoot to disrupt the closed world of academic journals and make high-level teaching materials available to the public. The Public Library of Science, based in San Francisco, is working to make journals more freely accessible
-
it's more than just politics at stake – it's also a fundamental right to share knowledge, rather than hide it. The best example of open science in action, he suggests, is the Human Genome Project, which successfully mapped our DNA and then made the data public. In doing so, it outflanked J Craig Venter's proprietary attempt to patent the human genome, opening up the very essence of human life for science, rather than handing our biological information over to corporate interests.
-
the rise of open science does not please everyone. Critics have argued that while it benefits those at either end of the scientific chain – the well-established at the top of the academic tree or the outsiders who have nothing to lose – it hurts those in the middle. Most professional scientists rely on the current system for funding and reputation. Others suggest it is throwing out some of the most important elements of science and making deep, long-term research more difficult.
-
Open science proponents say that they do not want to make the current system a thing of the past, but that it shouldn't be seen as immutable either. In fact, they say, the way most people conceive of science – as a highly specialised academic discipline conducted by white-coated professionals in universities or commercial laboratories – is a very modern construction.It is only over the last century that scientific disciplines became industrialised and compartmentalised.
-
open scientists say they don't want to throw scientists to the wolves: they just want to help answer questions that, in many cases, are seen as insurmountable.
-
"Some people, very straightforwardly, said that they didn't like the idea because it undermined the concept of the romantic, lone genius." Even the most dedicated open scientists understand that appeal. "I do plan to keep going at them," he says of collaborative projects. "But I haven't given up on solitary thinking about problems entirely."