While watching news coverage of the 1969 moon landing, I remember my dad saying “this is a total waste of my tax dollars”. There is still resistance to funding the NASA space program even now (not talking about the flat-earthers). The propaganda war between great powers still exists (who has the biggest rocket), and development of controlled fusion would be an historic prize.
Not really. There are known weaknesses in current fusion-reactor model designs, especially the degradation of reactor containment structures that block neutrons, and the strength and control of the confinement field. Private (or government) funding of university studies in these areas would greatly help reactor development, even without a functional reactor. These studies would probably be shared (or leaked). But the application of the science would be carefully guarded.
Your father’s criticism because despite the common notion that the Apollo lunar program had broad popular appeal it never had more than 50% public approval at any time. But my point was that this was not an enterprise that any private company would engage in; despite making vast profits and large expansions and acquisitions during the Cold War era, companies like Boeing or North American Aviation were never going to go off and developed any kind of space technologies on their own because there just wasn’t sufficient return to justify the vast investment of capital and labor.
Well, yes really, you do need the high temperature plasma, neutron flux, et cetera to test and demonstrate materials actually used in the reactor, which again, is why ITER is being built. And regardless, no private company is going to invest hundreds of millions of dollars on technologies for an application that is perpetually “twenty-five years away” (and has been for the last sixty years).
How much does government spend on policy, counterproductive or otherwise? Or do you mean nonproductive spending like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Or defense - well you might have something there.
We might do a lot better with some more infrastructure investment and R&D investment.
Industrial contributions to lots of conferences in my area have declined a lot in the last 15 years, due to internal budget cuts and many in industry not seeing the benefit. When I started AT&T and IBM were big factors, now Apple and Google seem to have policies against publication except for PR purposes, except I suppose research branches of some of the pseudo-monopolies.
When Sandia was no longer managed by Bell Labs their participation went way down.