Letter From President Biden to Dr. Eric S. Lander, the President’s Science Advisor and nominee as Director of the Workplace of Science and Know-how P
Standing Report
From: White House
Posted: Wednesday, February 17, 2021
On January 15, 2021, then-President-Elect Biden despatched this following letter to Dr. Eric S. Lander, his appointee because the President’s Science Advisor and nominee as Director of the Workplace of Science and Know-how Coverage, tasking him and his colleagues, working broadly and transparently with the various scientific management of American society and fascinating the broader American public, to refresh and reinvigorate our nationwide science and expertise technique. The letter poses 5 massive questions.
Expensive Dr. Lander:
In 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt authored a letter to his science advisor, Dr. Vannevar Bush, posing the query of how science and expertise might greatest be utilized to profit the nation’s well being, financial prosperity, and nationwide safety within the many years that may observe the Second World Battle. Dr. Bush’s response got here within the type of a report, titled Science—the Limitless Frontier, that may kind the premise of the Nationwide Science Basis and set the course of scientific discovery in America for the following 75 years.
These years have led to among the most consequential scientific developments in human historical past with America main the way in which. However three quarters of a century later, the contours of our lives have modified. Applied sciences and industries have risen and fallen, and the emergence of the digital area has redefined the methods we innovate, talk, and expertise the world. And the character of discovery itself has modified by leaps and bounds—reaching celestial heights, and microscopic complexities, that have been unimaginable not so way back.
Because of this, I imagine it’s important that we refresh and reinvigorate our nationwide science and expertise technique to set us on a powerful course for the following 75 years, in order that our kids and grandchildren might inhabit a more healthy, safer, extra simply, peaceable, and affluent world. This effort would require us to convey collectively our brightest minds throughout academia, medication, trade, and authorities—breaking down the boundaries that too typically restrict our imaginative and prescient and our progress, and prioritizing the wants, pursuits, fears, and aspirations of the American individuals.
President Roosevelt requested Dr. Bush to think about 4 particular questions. Right now, I’m tasking you and your colleagues with 5. My hope is that you just, working broadly and transparently with the various scientific management of American society and fascinating the broader American public, will make suggestions to our administration on the final methods, particular actions, and new constructions that the federal authorities ought to undertake to make sure that our nation can proceed to harness the complete energy of science and expertise on behalf of the American individuals.
1. What can we be taught from the pandemic about what is feasible—or what should be potential— to deal with the widest vary of wants associated to our public well being?
Whilst we work urgently to beat the coronavirus pandemic, we should be taught from this second by grappling with the challenges, inequities, and alternatives we have seen with a view to higher put together for the longer term.
How can we dramatically enhance our capacity to quickly tackle threats from pathogens, together with rising pandemics, potential bioweapons, and antibiotic resistance? How can we dramatically velocity our capacity to develop and conduct scientific trials of therapies for different sorts of illnesses like most cancers? How can we allow the fast sharing, with affected person consent, of well being data to construct a wiser and more practical healthcare system? How can we use telemedicine to enhance well being for all Individuals?
2. How can breakthroughs in science and expertise create highly effective new options to deal with local weather change—propelling market-driven change, jump-starting financial progress, bettering well being, and rising jobs, particularly in communities which have been left behind?
Local weather change represents an existential menace that requires daring and pressing motion. However on the identical time, the need of fixing it additionally presents us with a unprecedented alternative to make groundbreaking investments in our infrastructure, improve America’s resilience, promote environmental justice, and create new cutting-edge industries and thousands and thousands of good-paying jobs that may advance American management for generations to return.
Reaching our dedication of net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 would require deploying present, cost-effective clear vitality applied sciences manufactured in America; drawing on modern options to seize and retailer carbon; and spurring American technological ingenuity to develop new zero-carbon applied sciences that may reshape {the marketplace}. This effort will fortify our financial system for the longer term, create a sturdy stream of good-paying union jobs in communities throughout the nation, and reassert American management on local weather change across the globe.
The US has an extended, profitable, and bipartisan historical past of utilizing federal analysis, buying, and insurance policies to assist jumpstart essential industries—together with, for instance, after we pioneered and led the semiconductor trade. How can we refresh that mannequin to ship a more healthy, safer, extra affluent, and sustainable future for our kids, whereas preserving our pure atmosphere for future generations?
3. How can the USA guarantee that it’s the world chief within the applied sciences and industries of the longer term that can be essential to our financial prosperity and nationwide safety, particularly in competitors with China?
From synthetic intelligence to artificial biology, new applied sciences are rising in more and more fast cycles that promise to remodel our lives. Every arrives with a definite set of guarantees and challenges—and every carries the capability to dramatically affect job creation, fairness, and nationwide safety.
Different nations—particularly China—are making unprecedented investments and doing all the things of their energy to advertise the expansion of latest industries and eclipse America’s scientific and technological management. Our future relies on our capacity to maintain tempo with our opponents within the fields that may outline the financial system of tomorrow.
The suitable technique for the USA will essentially differ from that of our opponents, however it can additionally doubtless differ from our personal previous playbook. What’s the proper degree of nationwide funding, and what are the pillars of a nationwide technique that may quickly propel each analysis and improvement of essential applied sciences? What constructions, infrastructures, and insurance policies are wanted to speed up the trail from analysis laboratories to improvement tasks to {the marketplace}? How can we strengthen and broaden the connections between academia, trade, and authorities, which have traditionally been essential for advancing expertise and defending nationwide safety? And, importantly, how will we make sure that technological advances create quite than diminish high-quality jobs?
4. How can we assure that the fruits of science and expertise are absolutely shared throughout America and amongst all Individuals?
The advantages of science and expertise stay inconsistently distributed throughout racial, gender, financial, and geographic strains. How can we make sure that Individuals of all backgrounds are drawn into each the creation and the rewards of science and expertise? How can we make sure that science and expertise hubs flourish in each a part of the nation, driving financial improvement in each American hometown? How can we make sure that advances in medical science profit the well being of all Individuals, together with considerably decreasing racial and socioeconomic well being disparities?
5. How can we make sure the long-term well being of science and expertise in our nation?
Science and expertise have flourished in the USA due to a wealthy ecosystem of individuals, insurance policies, and establishments. This ecosystem have to be nurtured and refreshed to achieve a quickly altering world.
How can we shield scientific integrity inside authorities—and make authorities a premier vacation spot for scientists and technologists to work? How can we tackle stresses on tutorial analysis labs and promote artistic fashions for federal analysis help? How can we reimagine and remodel STEM schooling, empowering academics and deploying expertise to reinforce the academic expertise? How can we guarantee the USA will stay a magnet for the perfect and brightest minds all through the world?
I imagine that the solutions to those questions can be instrumental in serving to our nation embark on a brand new path within the years forward—a path of dignity and respect, of prosperity and safety, of progress and customary function. They’re massive questions, to make sure, however not as massive as America’s capability to deal with them. I stay up for receiving your suggestions—and to working with you, your group, and the broader scientific group to show them into options that ease on a regular basis burdens for the American individuals, spark new jobs and alternatives, and restore American management on the world stage.
Sincerely,
JOSEPH R. BIDEN JR.
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