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back to article Aussie synchrotron in doubt after Victoria pulls funding

The Victorian state government has put the future of the Australia Synchotron in doubt by saying it will not continue to fund the operation of the facility. The synchrotron, built in Melbourne by the previous ALP state government, cost A$200 million to build. However, it’s the operational cost that the new Liberal state …

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  1. Mat Ballard

    Build it and they will come

    This synchrotron was a technological and scientific "Field of Dreams", based on the proposition that Australian industry - you know, those "hewers and wood and diggers of soil", would be beating the gates down in their haste to use its marvelousness.

    Oh no they didn't !

    The tragedy was that the several hundred million dollars invested so far could have funded an awful lot of real science and scientists.

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  2. Andrew N

    They do a lot of worthwhile research.

    The AS do do a lot of worthwhile and cutting edge science. Without such facilities a lot of scientists can't actually do their research, but have to go overseas. This facility will more than reap it's investment in terms of scientific output, but that's never attributed to the synchrotron itself but the visiting teams that do the research. These visiting teams do not have to pay to use the AS as it's a free "user facility" for academics. If they paid, then academics could not afford it.

    Besides, the AS will be bringing in a lot of fringe benefits, such as companies that decide to move to a hitech area, or from companies that supply the synchrotron, or highly trained scientists moving to the area, etc.

    By the arguments in this article, and Mat's above, we should cut other facilities such as the Australia Telescope National Facility, etc, or at least charge scientists millions of dollars to use it.

    I'd be interested to know what real science and scientists the money should be redirected to? Medical research? (did you know a lot of medical researchers use it?)

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  3. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Lowest common denominator got them elected

    There's money for circus tricks, footy and sports, no money for research or infrastructure, and the tabloid-reading public lap it up.

    Victorian state government is too busy forking over more than $50 million a year to Bernie Ecklestone to run a gran prix that nobody except the TV channels want in a city park where nobody except the government wants it.

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  4. Tree & Tree = Dirty Tree
    Stop

    we should get the priorities right

    Any cent paid for scientific, peaceful research, no mater how "useless" it might seem at the time, is 100 times better than a cent paid for military equipment, even military inspired technology research.

    And the budget spend WORLDWIDE for all scientific research on all levels together, including big installation like the LHC, are a fraction of what the largest nations spend in military budget EACH.

    When single persons have the power direct such large sums of money according to their personal preferences and believe regardless the wider impact on the common good you KNOW something stinks in the land on Denmark.

    Then again, every nation has a government no better than they deserve... :-P

    ---

    And yes, there is a lot of tax money wasted everywhere for entertainment of the "panem et circensis" variety, for which we pay another premium in healthcare costs (apart from common believe watching sports has NO positive effect on your physiology- and the protagonists' achievements are NOT yours!).

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