Bob, isn't Weinberg certainly right that some pysics research projects require large sums?

Further, while some scientists may want these projects, for the potential salaries, prestige, and research work that accompanies them, it is the contractors who get the big bucks, not the scientists - who might shill for the project but hardly "demand" them.

As for the Nobel, it was the "Big Science shill" himself who argued that Dyson was cheated: "The Nobel physics laureate Steven Weinberg admires Dyson’s physics — he says he thinks the Nobel committee fleeced him by not awarding his work on quantum electrodynamics with the prize". But Dyson himself didn't argue he deserved one: “I think it’s almost true without exception if you want to win a Nobel Prize, you should have a long attention span, get ahold of some deep and important problem and stay with it for 10 years. That wasn’t my style.”

Dyson's opposition to Hansen and to climate policy appear both uninformed (as Hansen has responded here: here）to make sense only from the perspective of reflexive opposition to wide-scale government action and to Western restrictions on GNP growth in China. But this is ironic, as Dyson acknowledges that any remedy must be widescale and involve government. Rather, it seems Dyson wants policy makers to focus on "real problems like the extinction of species and overfishing".

Finally, a further irony that is explored in depth here is that the core of the scientific opposition to government action on climate change comes not from iconoclasts like Dyson but from “big science” physicsts who saw environmental concerns as a threat to big-ticket government items like the Strategic Defense Initiative. But like them, Dyson looks down his nose at those struggling with trying to model climate and to understand past climate change.
 

TokyoTom: Contractors do get the big bucks, but scientists get paid to play with their favorite multimillion (billion, these days) dollar toys. So they definitely demand the projects, even though their profits are mostly non-monetary and thus harder to account for.
 

Luke, I don't think that we disagree. My point is that the real rent-seekers and the ones making campaign contributions, etc. are the construction firms. The scientists are the baubles whose prestige they adorn their requests with.
 

The Blackadder Says:

The excerpt here puts me in mind of an exchange between Richard Feynman and some unnamed fellow scientist recounted in his Caltech commencement address:

"I was talking to a friend who was going to go on the radio. He does work on cosmology and astronomy, and he wondered how he would explain what the applications of this work were. 'Well,' I said, 'there aren't any.' He said, 'Yes, but then we won't get support for more research of this kind.'"
 

aren't some things in physics worth knowing, but perhaps don't have a monetary payoff?

Perhaps the weird quantum physics stuff does have monetary value (non-immediate) think of the science fiction stuff that's theoretically possible and powerful.
 

Zachary, you are asking the wrong question. Are they worth stealing for?
 

Why would it be any more beneficial to have government fund science than for government to fund health care?

Arguably, providing assistance to people who suffer from epilepsy is more desirable than to put a telescope into orbit.
 

TT-

While contractors are big winners in Big Physics, I think this is less true for the other sciences that are more labor-intensive and less infrastructure-intensive (I'm thinking along the lines of The Human Genome Project).

Scientists most certainly lobby for government funding and Big Science, especially if they see a lot of money going to their home institution. Writing grants is a never-ending headache, so getting an earmark in your field makes the grant-writing more likely to pay off.

I'm not sure about campaign contributions, but I wouldn't be surprised to find out that professional associations are doing so on behalf of scientists. Then that professional association has its board appear before Congress to say how important the project is.