Gov't plan to cut tech budget sparks criticism from scientists

Thursday 26th November, 07:18 AM JST

TOKYO —

Scientists severely criticized Wednesday a government body’s recent instruction to slash science and technology-related budget allocations, with a Nobel Prize winner warning that Japan could lose out to its rivals in this area.

Stating that Japan’s investments in the fields of science and technology have seen only a minor increase compared with those of some other countries, Nobel laureate in chemistry Ryoji Noyori said that Japan ‘‘cannot fight well if this situation remains like this.’‘

‘‘In the field of science and technology, we don’t call it ‘costs’ but rather ‘investments,’’ Noyori, president of private research foundation Riken, said at a meeting at the Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Ministry.

The Government Revitalization Unit, tasked with eliminating wasteful spending of taxpayers’ money, has urged the science ministry to slash by a considerable amount its budget allocations for Riken’s development of supercomputers.

In reference to the unit’s decision, Noyori said that supercomputers are ‘‘tantamount to brains’’ and that if the state stops making progress in the development, it would easily put Japan way behind other countries. ‘‘The repercussions will be immeasurable,’’ he said.

Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, who heads the revitalization unit, shared the concerns.

‘‘Even when it (research and development) may not produce immediate results, it could lead to a great discovery over the years,’’ the prime minister told reporters in the evening. ‘‘Research and development is Japan’s great intellectual property.’‘

But he added, ‘‘We have to think if there is no room for reductions even when we talk about important research. It is worth discussing.’‘

Concerning this matter, Deputy Prime Minister Naoto Kan, who is also in charge of science and technology, has also voiced concerns over a hefty cutback in that area, and indicated that a political decision should be made separately from the unit.

Since earlier this month, three working groups of the unit involving lawmakers and private-sector experts have reviewed and screened projects to be funded in the state budget for the new fiscal year from April 2010.

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Latest 15 of 27 Total Comments Show All

JeffLee at 07:26 AM JST - 27th November

Peeping, the article is not about the computer industy, let alone the supercomputer industry. It's very odd you cite it.

In fact, it supports my statement. To whit: "(Japanese tech companies) conquered their markets partly by adopting and improving on foreign (largely American) technology."
Peeping_Tom at 08:52 AM JST - 27th November

"the article is not about the computer industy,"

Oh really? "The process of making computer chips illustrates Japan’s dominance. Among the many steps are four in which the Japanese are indispensable: wafer processing; thin-film formation; coating, lithography and developing; and contact and packaging". Didn't know you could have a computer industry without chips!

"In fact, it supports my statement. To whit: "(Japanese tech companies) conquered their markets partly by adopting and improving on foreign (largely American) technology."

Why not go the whole hog and paste the full sentence which adds "They conquered their markets partly by adopting and improving on foreign (largely American) technology, first with low cost, then better quality and finally with technical superiority. The operative part here being 'finally with technical superiority'. Get real, Americans didn't invent everything. Most "American" was borrowed/stolen/improved from technologies from elsewhere, or developed by foreign researchers working in the US.

To cap it all the Economist Intelligence Unit places Japan as the world's most innovative nation, which only goes to show they're far from finished, as you and many on this board want to make us all believe.

http://www.eiuresources.com/mediadir/default.asp?PR=2007051403
5SpeedRacer5 at 01:29 PM JST - 27th November

Haha. You are all wrong!

Science is not just about computers and the very very bleeding edge of technology. Frankly Japan got out of the processor biz when the getting was good, so not having INTELS and AMDS is actually a GOOD thing. Japan is doing its own work in development and is leaving the commodity businesses to Korea and Taiwan. That is natural.

Supercomputers have a lot of good trickle down effects in various fields. Models for all kinds of things keep improving, and computers have to improve to keep up.

But in so many other fields, Japan is doing useful basic research: medical treatments, agriculture, robotics, nanotechnology, new energy sources, transportation, logistics... the list goes on and on. And if you think that we can just skip this because the economy is tanking, you are ... wrong again!! If you increase productivity just a little bit, that means higher profits, better output, lower costs, and higher standards of living.

Go into a family restaurant. That little hand held device that waitresses use was made possible by wireless technologies and networks. Those businesses would fail without those devices. When was the last time you got a wrong order? I think it has been years for me. Fewer employees doing better work, but there are still a lot of small restaurants. What did we give up? Nothing! Everybody is better off with better technologies. All it takes is one little idea... not even a big one... to make all the difference. If we could boost photosynthesis by 10%, we could solve all environmental, energy, and climate problems in one stroke. Can you imagine? Have you ever imagined?

Better brakes. Better traffic lights. Better batteries. Better crop spacing. Better medical procedures. Better temperature controls. Better refrigerators. Better queueing. Better satellites. Cheaper. More efficient. Less energy-consuming.

I have mixed feelings about where this all leads, but certainly in the short and medium terms, which is what we are discussing here, cutting "tech spending" is a game for luddites.
5SpeedRacer5 at 01:33 PM JST - 27th November

Pardon me for being jaded to the discussion of who invented what.

That is for lawyers and bean counters to decide.

The proof is in the pudding: Japanese society in general invents great things and puts them to use better than any society I know of. If you need another few decades of development to be convinced, fine, just sit back and watch. What I have seen has convinced me.
almondjoy at 03:50 PM JST - 27th November

Hell they can cut the funding for projects like the last "photo of the day", a robot that can play ping pong.
fondofj at 03:06 AM JST - 28th November

About saying Japan is borrowing technology: Technology or knowledge is such a thing that is a family property of any country. If it's a patented invention, any country can buy it with proper negotiation. America is a land of migrants and is full of talents by draining all the best students from all over the world. The best heads of the world have been awarded with American citizens for decades and now as a result America is the no. 1 in every aspect of technology and business.

Now come to the point of wasteful science projects: Yes, Japan has many wasteful tech-projects like robots that can play or dance or something eye catching products that we have been seeing so far in TVs or newspapers haven't come in real life implication yet because those are simply not possible or too much luxurious for practical life. The govt. should distinguish which projects are beneficial in the long run and which have no significance in social life.
5SpeedRacer5 at 06:12 AM JST - 28th November

"The best heads of the world have been awarded with American citizens for decades and now as a result America is the no. 1 in every aspect of technology and business."

This gives me a hint that you do not know what you are talking about. This is certainly not true, but it would take too long to list merely the MAJOR technologies that the US is NOT "no. 1" in, let alone give you a detailed list. We could start at technologies that the US could really use, such as wind generation, storage batteries, and biofuels. In the latter category, Brazil has the US beat cold. Sweden is far ahead. In some ways, Indonesia is a favored rival.

"Japan has many wasteful tech-projects like robots that can play or dance or something eye catching products that we have been seeing so far in TVs or newspapers"

And this confirms that you do not know what you are talking about. Getting a robot to play ping pong is an illustration of a whole slew of technologies. You think it is made of tinkertoys with a monkey controlling it? Can a monkey play ping pong? Can a two year old play ping pong? No. The illustration is designed to enable people who have no clue about the science involved to say, "Gee, that is amazing." I guess it did not work this time, but the technologies work, and they WILL benefit society.

Several years ago, people spoke of a DIGITAL DIVIDE. There are some people who can use new technologies, and some who can't. I suspect that there is actually a COGITAL DIVIDE. Some people can reason and cogitate creatively, and others can't. The latter should not be holding back the former, especially considering the degree to which the latter benefit from the former. Sorry if you can't stomach the elitism. But ignorance is no argument, and if all it takes to be in the elite is not to be ignorant, then I must be a real bluenose.
fondofj at 02:02 PM JST - 28th November

This is certainly not true, but it would take too long to list merely the MAJOR technologies that the US is NOT "no. 1" in

Yes, the brutal truth is the US is no. 1 in the major technologies. Just think in cool head and google for it. Which country has most superfast cars, which country is capable of making largest passenger planes, most-high tech military equipments (including arms, warships, fighter jets, and obviously uniquely nukes), which country has the fastest super computer and which country's developed softwares and hardwares is using the world?

You think it is made of tinkertoys with a monkey controlling it? Can a monkey play ping pong? Can a two year old play ping pong? No. The illustration is designed to enable people who have no clue about the science involved to say, "Gee, that is amazing." I guess it did not work this time, but the technologies work, and they WILL benefit society.

Good job man, you are advocating for the techy showdowns that have merely any contribution to the human welfare. Robots which are not developed aiming any productive purposes certainly eating the floods of money. If you have plenty of people in hand, why you bother to replace the flesh and blood with silicon junks where unemployment is the burning question? Robotic technology is necessary in some special sectors where human action is more prone to errors. Not in Japan all the developed nations have some wasteful scientific projects to stand out against their rivals and to say "See what we can".
5SpeedRacer5 at 03:06 PM JST - 28th November

Fondo. I am not arguing from emotion. Superfast cars? Passenger planes? Military equipment? etc. If you think those are THE list of major technologies, then you are living in the 80s. Super... fast... cars... wow. There is a useful technology. Thanks for cluing me in to that. Japan does not have a military based economy, and in fact, its space agency is forbidden from developing anything that might have a military application, so certainly killing people is not high on Japan's technological agenda. It makes Japan's achievements that much more amazing.

"America is the no. 1 in every aspect of technology and business"

Now the statement above is what you actually wrote. I see that you are backing off from that. Too bad. You wrote it, you own it. Just doing casual googling, I see that Japan is the acknowledged world leader in chemistry, robotics, energy conservation, automotive technologies, ecology-related patents, wireless internet access, earthquake sensing and countermeasures, solar power technology, etc. Now, logically, I do not have to be right about every one of these for your argument to be false. I only have to be right about ONE of them. So please. If you want to support your statement, prove that the America is number one in EVERY TECHNOLOGY AND BUSINESS. Good luck.

I do not think you are qualified to say what tech will contribute to human welfare. You miss the obvious point that a robot that can play ping pong can do other things as well. What do you think? Does that make sense? You think we should just use humans for all jobs just to alleviate employment? Robots are not useful, is that it? By your definition, robots are useful for jobs where "being prone to errors" is not a benefit. But you know, I cannot think of a single job where "being prone to errors" is a benefit at all. Therefore, robots are useful. See how logic works? Scientists use logic.

And there is the crux of the cogital divide.
5SpeedRacer5 at 03:22 PM JST - 28th November

And wait a minute. I cannot let this go. If anyone thinks that military technology is worth spending vast amounts of money to improve (the US spends more for defense related research than on all other research combined), then please open up a newspaper and look at the chaos that a few people with can do with some mixed up cleaning chemicals.

All the predator drones and blockbuster bombs in the world are apparently insufficient to find Bin Laden, and a plane crash in Guam a few years ago set the US back a cool BILLION dollars, which is quite a few happy meals for homeless people.

I sincerely hope that Japan is never a world leader in military technology, either by choice or necessity.
gregoryy at 04:33 PM JST - 28th November

While everybody's debating whether governmental funds should be pulled for "TECHNOLOGY", may I remind people that the government is pulling funds for "Science and Technology". Technology is only a fraction of Science, a body of academia which encompasses numerous other fields of research in biology, chemistry, physics, psychology, medicine, so on.

The press conference held on the 25th specifically called for the reconsideration of JIGYO-SHIWAKE on Science, not supercomputer technology (which has already been axed by the way ... nobody there was trying to reinstate that).

I think the comments for this article brutally reflect the common misconception of what "SCIENCE" is taken for in Japan. No, the government is not putting a stop for robots, computers, and techs; it's pulling the plug for ALL scientific research. In medicine, in chemistry, in physics, in biology. That's what the uproar from the scientific community was all about. Not supercomputers, SCIENCE.

While I can understand the concerns behind the frivolousness of fancy technology, I don't think that is really the issue raised here. Basically, this country is about to lose all its investments in education and research, which scientific community warns, "the repercussions will be immeasurable".
UnagiDon at 01:10 AM JST - 29th November

Wow - the majority of comments on this topic have been far, far above the usual dross on JT. Thank you gregoryy, 5SpeedRacer5, tuftedPuffin, and Peeping Tom for elevating the discussion. Between all of you you've said everything I wanted to post on this topic. Cognital divide, indeed!

Just wanted to highlight the point that when the jefflee and tondofi types brag about US (or other) technologies, they are actually bragging about products, which are comprised of a number of different technologies. Yes Intel and AMD are big companies selling advanced processors, but those are based on the transistor, "invented" at Bell Labs based on previous research by Canadians and Germans (amongst others), licensed to Sony who were the first to develop it into a commercial product through their own R&D money, improved upon by US, Japanese, European, and others to the point where we had microprocessors. That's how technology develops. That's a simplified view but it highlights the false assumption that "technology" springs fully-formed from the forehead of some inventor or company. Any technological advancement is based on a lot of work by others, throughout the world, in both engineering and in basic science.

As someone somewhere said, Japan's only resource is the human one, so cutting basic science funding is shooting yourself in the foot. I suspect the DPJ know that as per their statements and will prevent significant cuts.
UnagiDon at 01:20 AM JST - 29th November

By the way, the ping-pong playing robot was from a Vietnamese company. The Japanese break-dancing robot is far more impressive technologically if you stop and think about it, though I expect few will.
CraigHicks at 01:27 AM JST - 30th November
In Technology things change fast. Especially computing paradigms; many mentioned AMD and Intel, but the big wave already cresting is the GPU (Graphics supercomputing unit) being mutated into a supercomputer. The history is the GPU has nothing to do with science and research; it was developed purely to satisfy the computer market need for high end realistics graphics. Now NVIDIA (the leader) and some other companies have realized they can make big profits by twiddling the GPU architecture and adding some interface (e.g., simple programmability, e.g. in C langauge) and selling to the R&D and science fields.
These GPUs have 256 or 512 processors on a board, and you can add lots of boards. The economy of scale may prove yet again to be the decisive factor, just as it was pushing Wintel to the top all those years ago. You can bet Intel is worried now.

A single GPU contains many CPUs (256, or 512) and many GPUs can be combined. Of course the Sony-IBM CELL is also mutli CPU; the difference is in level of mass production. The CELL required special programming and so a developer base never developed, whereas programmers were already programming GPU's as they continued to evolve while continually making a profit.

Tokyo Institute of Technology recently updated is supercomputer to use GPUs recently.

What does this go show? I'm not sure, but * GPU's were never funded by a government research budget directly, although they are now being funded indirectly as many labs buy the new type GPU's. * Cost performance will always be a limiting factor in supercomputing. When you start having to use liquid nitrogen for cooling, things get expensive. IF there is an easier cheaper way then ... (that is a qualified IF, I dont claim it necessarily to be the case).
Economy of scale has always proved powerful, and Moorse law applied to the speedup of mass produced technology has left many specialized but very sexy hardwares languishing in dust over the decades.
- I do not think cutting back on science spending is a good idea (actully the attitude is self defeating more than anything else)
- Spending, especially on specialized hardware, often does not produce a winning formula.
- As for whats good in 100 years, provide every Japanese kid which an equal opportunity at education. Even fund jyuku's. Encourage science wholeheartedly at the high school level. Dont put a huge burden parents just because they have kids that need to be educated. A million years of evolution provide unquestionable evidence: it's the kids, stupid.
  At least the DJP have the right idea, but will they do enough, and soon enough?
JeffLee at 01:14 PM JST - 30th November

Peeping Tom, yes, MANUFACTURING chips, not developing them. Japan is very good at the kind of client-based manufacturing described in the Economist, but development of supercomputers is another matter. Korea, Singapore and Taiwan are also excellent at high-tech manufacturing of chips, etc., it should be pointed out.

I have a super-hot computer, but none of the components were developed in Japan. That's true of most computer systems. NOte, that I write this on MOzilla browser with a google search box on a PC with Dual-Core INtel chips, NVidea card, Imation memory systems, Samsung monitor,etc, etc. Where is all this superior Japanese computer technology that you others talk about?

The Economist? Increasingly, it's being called the "Ewrongmist" Last time I read it, it was warning of global food shortages. It supported the Bush-Cheney presidency (it now says it was wrong) Its polished articles about Japan are turned out by Oxbridge Englishmen who can't speak Japanese.