I am afraid that I do not know enough about the developments to express an informed opinion about the whole thing. However, I have always sternly refused to buy the argument that, unlike other countries, Italy does not have the cash to support universities and research. How can a member state of the G8 elite be short of money to support its future? Let's not mask lack of interest in science and technology as supposed poverty. By way of example, BRICS and the other research centres of the Danish National Research Foundation were richly funded for five-year periods (14 years for BRICS) with the interests resulting from the privatization of an insurance company! The outcome for Danish science is for everybody to see.
Why shouldn't the same type of investment in basic research be possible in a country like Italy? The reasons must be the same that prevent Italy from investing in its schools and universities. Three figures in the article I was reading yesterday paint an amazingly bleak picture. Italy boasts only about 3 researchers every 1000 workers. This is less than each of the other countries mentioned in the list. We (Italians) spend only about 1.2% of the GNP in research. Only Greece, Spain and Portugal invest less. Last but not least, Italy spends only 8000$ a year per university student. This is the same as Hungary, and half of what Sweden spends. Why are we Italians so masochistic?
Still, if I look at Italian research in TCS, I can only classify it as being very strong, despite the lack of money for research and the sub-optimal support. Yes, I know that I am biased. Even though I have never worked in an Italian university myself, I try to maintain good ties with my colleagues based in Italy. It is, however, an incontrovertible fact that there are many very active and very strong Italian TCS researchers. The strongest Italian CS departments are high class, and Italy exports talent. Off the top of my head, I could come up with the following list of Italian TCS researchers working abroad (with apologies to those whose names have not crossed my mind right now):
- Luca de Alfaro
- Roberto Amadio
- Antonio Bucciarelli
- Cristiano Calcagno
- Luca Cardelli
- Ilaria Castellani
- Giuseppe Castagna
- Roberto Di Cosmo
- Luigi Liquori (who is from Pescara like me)
- Giuseppe Longo
- Sergio Maffeis
- Pasquale Malacaria
- Silvio Micali
- Catuscia Palamidessi
- Luigi Santocanale
- Vladimiro Sassone
- Luca Trevisan
- Daniele Varacca
- Luca Viganò
- Francesco Zappa Nardelli
Addendum 19/12/2006: Yesterday I read an article by Princeton philosopher Peter Singer, on the subject of philantropy, poverty and ethics. (Thanks to Luca Trevisan for his post on this very interesting article, which is a must read during the crazy Christmas period.)
The following excerpt from that article struck me as being very relevant to this disjointed post of mine:
The Nobel Prize-winning economist and social scientist Herbert Simon estimated that “social capital” is responsible for at least 90 percent of what people earn in wealthy societies like those of the United States or northwestern Europe. By social capital Simon meant not only natural resources but, more important, the technology and organizational skills in the community, and the presence of good government. These are the foundation on which the rich can begin their work.
If instead of wealth, we consider "intellectual output", how much would Italian researchers produce in the presence of better technology and organizational skills in the community, and in the presence of good government? What if they could devote more of their time to not fighting against the system?
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