Would the Bitcoin community be willing to crowdfund science?

[Squidoogeek]

One of the really annoying things about government funding of science is that taxpayers don't necessarily get much say on where the money goes or what politicians do with the results of scientific experiments. Sometimes politicians misrepresent the results or ignore the results altogether when the data becomes "inconvenient" and might lose them votes. Would the Bitcoin community be willing to take the funding of science out of the hands of politicians by crowdfunding science endeavors that we think are important?

[soham]

Bitcoin community has been funding numerous projects but within the crypto community itself through the ICO route. However, the main factor for their investment is to get returns on it. SO the funding is mainly for personal profit and not for the profits of the mankind. So I really doubt that bitcoin community will be willing to fund a science project which may or may not be successful. However, if the community can get assurance from a government organization about the return from the project, then it can be different story. But a trial and error project will not receive much funding from the crypto community I believe.

[Squidoogeek]

Bitcoin community has been funding numerous projects but within the crypto community itself through the ICO route. However, the main factor for their investment is to get returns on it. SO the funding is mainly for personal profit and not for the profits of the mankind. So I really doubt that bitcoin community will be willing to fund a science project which may or may not be successful. However, if the community can get assurance from a government organization about the return from the project, then it can be different story. But a trial and error project will not receive much funding from the crypto community I believe.

Good point. There may be exceptions; I've heard of one guy who created a minor altcoin called Marscoin in an attempt to help fund efforts to get people to Mars, and of course there's Orbitcoin and Gridcoin. Which is part of why I thought it might not be so very unreasonable to think that there might be a subset of Bitcoin users who might be willing to donate to scientific research, however small that subset might be. But people have been scammed with ICOs because they were greedy and looking for easy profits, so it's a matter of how scientists can talk to the ones who might be looking for a payoff.

[GreenBits]

We are willing to fund bullshit ICOs and coins with our crowdfunding efforts so far, why not?

Although I will concede that this participation is largely due to profit motive. Notice how much investment has backed off since these ICOS started issuing "utility tokens" instead of "equity tokens". We have had some of the largest crowdfunding efforts in the world to date occur as a result of the ICOs; you dont see that so much nowadays.


But seriously, for some reason this has always been an issue. Unless it is publicized, and deals with illness, research funding only really seems to come from the government/ big donors with a personal interest. life is too far removed from something as lofty as this for people to have empathy. attach some kind of "profit" to it, however, and you will sell out, so to speak.

people are always willing to donate money. its just that they only donate to shit they actually care about

[darkangel11]

Sure! I just hope scientists won't bullshit us and be honest about what they're trying to achieve and what chances are for it to be used. I've seen so many bullshit projects that were crowdfunded and ended up totally wasting the money. A great example can be that solar roadway project that even got financed by some towns in the USA. Have you heard of it? It's total bullshit they will never make it work.

[hadang]

The very existence of Bitcoin is the science, the wisdom of man. Traders recognize the benefits and potential of bitcoin to invest in it. I think there will be more Bicoin investors interested in science projects. I also find it very interesting.

[stompix]

We are willing to fund bullshit ICOs and coins with our crowdfunding efforts so far, why not?

Because you won't get rich in 24 hours by this?
Less than .1% here would help or donate for a good cause .

people are always willing to donate money. its just that they only donate to shit they actually care about

And that is how things are supposed to be
You donate for what you care because those are your money. It's the government business to fund things that are needed for the country or for the majority.
But if you like to donate for an association that makes prosthetic legs and tails for cats you're free to do it. Imagine how people would feel if the government would contribute to this while there are thousands of homeless people in the streets.


But I don't see whats so special about bitcoin and science projects.
They need money, they don;t care from where those money are coming, be it bitcoin or paypal.

[Xavofat]

The public aren't necessarily the most knowledgeable people when deciding on matters like this.  If there was no scientific research paid for by tax, it would more likely be industry financed, therefore from an even more drastically biased perspective.

I'm in favour of crowdfunding when necessary, but if the majority of scientific research was reliant on private profit or public support, it seems unlikely that it would have a positive outcome.

The public would likely support whatever is the most publicised thing at the time and therefore the most dramatic rather than the most reasonable.  Corporations would favour whatever allows them to sell the most new products.

[Red-Apple]

the issue with crowdfunding like this is the trust! and bitcoin makes it even harder to trust because of its anonymity feature and the irresponsibility. not to mention that most people won't even understand what that science project is, so why should they even want to fund it?

lets say i tell you i want to start some project, a company for example and work on bleeding edge science. will you be giving me money?
the funny part is that this is not just a theoretical thing i said, i actually have similar plans to start such company

[gentlemand]

Most people can't look beyond the next five minutes so there's no way they have the vision to throw money at something that may or may not pay off 10-20 years down the line.

There are certain areas that the modern mind set doesn't suit any more. Deep long term investment is one of them. That's why governments do it and no one else.

[Palmerson]

The problem is that investment in science is long-term investment that can bring your return in 10 years or more. If we assume that people have invested their bitcoins in a science project that they want to make a profit not lower than the growth of bitcoin price. For 10 years, the growth could be in the thousands of percent. No project of such income will not. This is the reason that bitcoin is not being used in investing.

[Kprawn]

We do not know what science will be done, so it will be difficult to say in advance if the community will support it. A big group

of Bitcoin users are anti-government, so you might get a bit more support than what you might think. The biggest portion of

Bitcoin users wants some return on their investment, so they will want something for their efforts.  

[Berk]

Really does depend on the project if it's encouraging and maybe related to cryptocurrencies that would be ideal.

[clartedscunner]

One of the really annoying things about government funding of science is that taxpayers don't necessarily get much say on where the money goes or what politicians do with the results of scientific experiments. Sometimes politicians misrepresent the results or ignore the results altogether when the data becomes "inconvenient" and might lose them votes. Would the Bitcoin community be willing to take the funding of science out of the hands of politicians by crowdfunding science endeavors that we think are important?

I think ICO's were made for this reason. To make a crypto but spend the money on something interesting

[Paecga129]

The Bitcoin community would be willing to crowdfund science as long as it benefited everyone. Never mind that, you will be able to start a project that can never be coerced to stop in any way because of the blockchain's immutability.

[paolo099]

this would be an amazing way to show that btc community is not only about money, trading and such things, science and healthcare are the two things in life i would support without any problem; with all the money we waste for crap stuff why not?

[jseverson]

I would be. I am of the camp that believes we should all be contributing to make the world a better place. I'm not the type of person who can really directly contribute to science as it's not my forte, but if I can help out in other ways, then why not?

The Bitcoin community as a whole, though, that's a tall order. We are by no means monolithic, so you're only going to be able to get to some subsets. Not everyone would be interested, and not everyone likes giving away money.

[Hydrogen]

The vast majority of scientific research is funded by one percenters. Due to this lopsided precedent, there could be a positive slant to crypto funded science via increasing the quantity of independent research conducted.

People might support independent research conducted on controversial topics like: climate change, marijuana, depression, GMO's, abortion, etc. Research results are often influenced by funding sources. Paving a way towards independent research less influenced by paid agendas or conflicts of interest is something with a real potential to benefit society.

Science of the people, could be a neglected precedent in this day and age. Science for the most part is a thing reserved for corporations and governments. A paradigm shift towards science enveloping the values and self interests of the common man could be a movement that would benefit society.

[krigger]

Why not? Bitcoin is based on science. It only makes sense that the community would want to crowdfund science-related projects!

[Xavofat]

People might support independent research conducted on controversial topics like: climate change, marijuana, depression, GMO's, abortion, etc.

That's the problem.  The people who are likely to fund this research are also likely to be the sort of people who look at pages claiming things that are very sensationalist - claims like marijuana being a cure for cancer and a variety of other ailments, or claims that "the government" is hiding various things from them with very little incentive.

They also may be affected by their religious or personal beliefs about abortion and other controversial topics, which could create divisions and biased studies created by different groups.  So there's no guarantee that there would be no agenda in these studies.

Especially since BTC users are often involved in speculation and are searching for money.