Tide of International Science Moving Against US, EU

explosivejared writes "The Economist has a story on the increasing scientific productivity of countries like China, India, and Brazil relative to the field's old guards in America, Europe, and Japan. Scientific productivity in this sense includes percent of GDP spent on R&D and the overall numbers of researchers, scholarly articles, and patents that a country produces. The article notes increasing levels of international collaboration on scholarly scientific articles in leading journals. From the article: '[M]ore than 35% of articles in leading journals are now the product of international collaboration. That is up from 25% 15 years ago — something the old regime and the new alike can celebrate.'" Note that the "old guard" are still firmly in the lead on these measures of scientific prowess, but the growth rate is higher in the newcomer states.

Chinese science

[AnonymousClown]

FTFA:

But citation of English-language articles in Chinese journals by other publications remains low.

Maybe it's because Chinese science isn't trustworthy enough? [bbc.co.uk]

Re:We don't need no science

[LetterRip]

We have Sarah Palin and she can see Russia from her front porch

What Palin actually said was

"They're our next-door neighbors, and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska."

http://www.slate.com/id/2200155/ [slate.com]

Which is literally true since from Little Diomede part of US territory and Alaska you can see Big Diomede which is under Russian control.

A legitimate critique of Palin would be that she considered Russia being visible from an island of Alaska, as saying something useful about her international experience and foreign relations.

Re:patents/capita

[Beetle B.]

I completely agree with your comment.

Yet, when I look at universities in the US, they play a similar game. In the last university I was in (top 5 in engineering), the faculty were consistently pressured to produce patents, and many of the faculty agreed it was the right path to go on.

And heck, even quantity of publications is a dubious measure...

Re:Just too bad

[gman003]

You seem to be overestimating how "united" the US actually is. Really, it isn't - saying "Louisiana is banning evolution, the whole US is next" is like saying "Serbia is banning evolution, all of Europe is next". Yes, we're united militarily and economically, but many things are decided at the state level or lower. As far as education is concerned, it's pretty much as follows:

• The Federal Gov't sets certain basic standards such as "what basic skills need to be taught", and provides some funding.
• The State Gov'ts set standards like "what textbooks can be used" and "what specific things need to be taught", and provide some more funding.
• The County Gov'ts control most practical things like "how much do we pay teachers" and "what textbooks do we use", and provide the majority of the funding.

Besides, it is extremely likely that, should Louisiana "remove" evolution, it will be challenged in courts, and thrown out. The case Epperson v. Arkansas did so back in '68, with a rather strongly-worded decision.

Re:PacRim Jim

[Anonymous Coward]

The halls of research are filled with Chinese for the same reason the back of construction trucks are filled with Mexicans (my apologies for the gross generalization). Grad school pay is very low compared to what degreed engineers can make straight out of college, most Americans want to start making money NOW...not 2-5 years from now. So the "Americans" choose not to go to grad school.

  I've heard professors answer your question this way, "it is very hard to find an American graduate student, so I just hire Chinese" this perpetuates its self to "...it is hard to find an American post-doc" or "...it is hard to find an American PhD."

When my institution submitted its "Diversity Report" to our funding agency....we were told to revise the upbeat report because the Chinese "don't count" for our minority headcount!

If we want American Students to go to grad school....we need to push the graduate student and post-doc pay much much higher.

Re:patents/capita

[Anonymous Coward]

There's something similar in India where, I think, you're required to publish at least one refereed paper as an undergrad to get your degree. The result is a tsunami of really, really low-quality papers.

I dont know where you got your incorrect facts from?
The requirement for completion of an undergraduate course in India is one of the three.

1. A Hands on project work: People in my time (15+ years back) did stuff like traffic light controllers using ttl logic,robotic arms, implementation of Image processing algorithms etc.Now a days I have seen students who have implemented stuff like Ethernet/WiFi MAC's, controllers etc. in FPGA.

2. Improvement to an existing process: Hardly anyone goes for this as it requires a deep understanding of the existing process.

3. Paper in a reputed journal: Again this is something which is a risky way of completing your course as your line of research may not lead to publishable papers.

Some students do present/publish @ college level conferences. But most of them stay clear of IEEE and others.
To support your claim of a referred paper being a requirement for graduation IEEE and equivalent should be flooded by around 400K (number of engineers graduating every year in India) papers from India.
@ 20 paper per Issue(monthly) we would have 1700 Journals solely dedicated to Indian students.