A very interesting comment about research in the US and the EU:
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I agree but to give a longer explanation i think we can safely say that European Universities and other EU based institutions (CERN, ESA with PLANCK) and so many other top projects in Europe have gained an incredible strong global reputation the last decade or so on leading and accurate fundamental science (like it actually was in the early days of Albert Einstein and the many other top European researchers) while the US has been unfortunately heavily on the decline on accurate high level research and funding. Just look indeed at all the major cases. Like the false BICEP2 claim and famous fact celebrations: an incredible globally embarrassing an unscientific event it sends shivers down your spine: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZlfIVEy_YOA Remember in contrast the faster then light neutrino experiment which the Italian researchers made absolutely sure to put forth (after long periods of self investigation) as a not understood event, asking for scientists around the world to actually find the mistake in their research or somehow back up their strange results. A slightly loose cable in one of their many computer processing centers was eventually found to be the culprit. Lets remember the NASA world fact claim of a brand new life form, the full arsenic life form, that made world headlines because of the grand NASA hype of an actual new life form. It turned out to be based on completely bogus and misunderstood research. Lets remember the US BOSTON /JAPAN RIKEN claim of the grand stem cell breakthrough (that could easily be transformed into any other cell) that CNN and so many other US channels subsequently reported on heavily in their news as a giant US led breakthrough: http://edition.cnn.com/2014/01/29/health/stem-cell-discovery/ While first mentioning the Boston research heavily again and again on their TV and website coverages like on CNN (while almost never mentioning the Japanese) on the later retractions CNN and others completely skipped mentioning the Boston researchers and only mentioned the Japanese researchers in the retractions. How shameful and disgusting can ““news”” get?, just see the difference: http://edition.cnn.com/2014/07/02/health/stem-cell-study-retraction/ Lets remember the alien life in an asteroid from mars claim by NASA that later turned out to be false. Lets remember the Fermilab claim of almost “finding” the Higgs Boson" while not actually finding it, just before they knew CERN was to announce the actual find. Jet asking for more subsidies. Lets remember the giant globally hyped Lockeed Martin SKUNK works claim of a commercial compact FUSION reactor that later to be totally biased and bogus research that could not actually work for many fundamental science reasons according to all the actual internationally renowned fusion researchers, non the less SKUNK works seeking big funds from the US government to pursue their false claims: http://www.forbes.com/sites/williampentland/2014/10/15/lockheed-martin-claims-fusion-breakthrough-that-could-change-world-forever/http://finance.yahoo.com/news/scientists-share-really-think-lockheed-173000568.html Lets remember the giant NASA scientists claim of finding a second earth planet (Gliese 581G) and even the scientists behind it claiming “100% life” on it. It was then globally reported in almost every major new paper. They used data mostly from a European telescopes to begin with (the ESO HARPS instrument, now the second most productive planet finding device after Nasa’s Kepler, but the main planet finding device before Kepler was launched) to make their claim, yet European researchers who discovered the first 5 planets in that system had not seen any evidence of that planet in the habitable zone and later that NASA planet would also be retracted. Yet that bogus research and even more bogus claim by the scientists of “100% chance of life” thus logically made unbelievable world headlines, that bogus claim and bogus research thus even was used to create the Hollywood blockbuster “Battleship, 2012” in which the planet was used and NASA propped up. The list unfortunately goes on and one with false claims of giant battery breakthroughs and so many other US university and institutional breakthroughs that later turn out to be false yet asking for huge extra research subsidies. Sooner or later it is not that strange more top global researchers are moving to EU based institutions and research centers. Certainly with the EU hugely expanding their investments and cooperations vs the United States. Now even setting up CERN like agencies in dozens of different research fields, all building world leading facilities to support them. The US investing heavily in the military can not keep up. Like through the now 80 Billion EU Horizon 2020. From world leading new telescopes like the worlds largest E-ELT 40 meter telescope, to ever bigger ESA projects including an ever growing influence in leading telescopes (Planck, GAIA, etc) increasing stakes in the still NASA led James Webb (even being launched on Ariane V), to Robots with the EU 4 Billion SPARC program the worlds largest robotics development program, to lasers with the worlds largest laser research centres with the EU- Extreme Light Infrastructure to material research with new world beating facilities being build like European XFEL and the giant European Spallation Source, ESS. To EU hosting, paying and building most of the ITER Fusion reactor, to so, so many other major projects and agencies now being build. Sooner or later the EU influence can then only grow from fundamental to ever more commercial spin-off companies. Especially with the increasing EU focus on commercialization, creating a single EU patent, a single EU banking Union, single telecoms market, single air control system, single energy market, and so many other barriers being taken down in Europe that make working together and building and growing companies and spin-offs easier. And now we might even get Donald Trump or Hillary (i don`t know which is worse) as a next president. Good god.
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