If welfare benefits were abolished, then the employing class would be able to impose conformity on the populace via “Conform or starve!”

To me, the state always is socialistic in nature; it always has the imperative to grow and control more and all activities within its domain, for whatever reason.

It is, to me, logical that it should be so, stemming from the very being and intent of the state: it exists to regulate society. It starts off with punishing murder and theft, keeping the thugs at bay, but moves on, relentlessly, to banning plastic bags and outlawing personal acts in your own home. The latest boon to the state is regulating breathing (CO2) and energy usage. TOTAL CONTROL.

Now, I understand why the state is necessary, but as a libertarian, I see it as a necessary EVIL, whose ever grasping powers must be resisted.

In summary, I see all state organisations as socialistic; and they become so: BBC? US EPA? Goodness, that last one is even headed now by a member of the socialist internationale!!

Science exists because some individuals have an annoying desire to be right or understand correctly; and, most importantly, to gnaw holes in that other guy’s theory. Basically, it is due to obsessive perfectionism and intrigue in detail and compulsion of same.

Science, as a practice and technique, has evolved, been developed and understood, over millenia of arguing, so that basic mistakes and frauds can be avoided, and rational debate be held over competing theories.

Archimedes, if we believe the tale, was excited by the chance of making a buck by solving a king’s problem.

‘State funding’ is an inadequate definition of it, not least because so many countries that simply couldn’t be described as ‘socialist’ fund things. The funding of education and research in the USA is simply vast. Is it ‘socialist’?

Maybe it is, in your view. But then the term ceases to have any value, either as a pejorative, or to refer to a particular political philosophy.

Grauniad: Well, perhaps we are arguing over the meaning of “running” the rag. Yes, it is a corporation, I guess, with shareholders, but they don’t “run” it, although they get dividends, I assume. I haven’t met a reader (misdirection, sorry) nor read an article by the editors or other contributers, which isn’t socialist and thinks that socialism is the saintly path. The paper’s revenues depend upon state job adverts.

Academia: State funding, unless I am wrong (don’t have the figures) dominates. These funds are distributed by a plethora of organizations funded by the state. The benefit of society is always the clarian call of the advance of the state.

When Moonbat is complaining about research funding, it is because the funsding is not going to his pet projects, but to some other Lysenkoism.

The problem comes in where you make up problems to hock your product. It takes a lot of investment to make a cholesterol-lowering drug. When your research shows that lower cholesterol has such a small benefit that it isn’t tenable in the studies, a scientist should accept it and move on. However, a businessman will attempt to spin the results.

This is where ethics comes in. The hippocratic oath and the engineer’s code of ethics were designed to solve these delimmas. Doing the right thing should usurp all. The problem comes when doctors and scientists abandon their oaths for money, not before.