Larry Ellison's $200M cancer research gift
Meanwhile, people are arguing that $28 billion dollars are already being wasted each year on research that is not reproducible.
http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/jour...
So that gift may amount to 2-3 days worth of what is already being wasted each year. Yes, that study may be way off. The scientific way to go about this is to actually see what is reproducible or not, rather than assume most research must be reproducible.
Larry is 71. He should be investing way more than this on life sciences research if he wants to move the needle on his own life span. Given his net worth, spending at least a billion a year is a no-brainer. The answer to spending that money effectively is really simple. Invest it in PhD scholarships. There is no better value for fundamental science ROI on the planet. $6 billion could buy him 100,000 new PhDs. Every single one could be working on figuring out how to extend his quantity/quality of life. That's ~10% of his net worth. It's irrational for him to not do it.
Is $200m really one of the largest gifts ever to a university? I thought multiple colleges are funded by huge endowments and this, while incredibly generous, doesn't seem like it would have rated so highly. As a single data point, the Broad Institute in Boston by itself was founded mostly by a single $400m endowment.
Can someone with visibility into cancer research please explain if the results being obtained are proportionate to the massive funding the field has received for decades?
Sometimes I wonder if the bulk of the capital is being wasted. I could be wrong.
I know it's a hard problem.
awesome. always shocked that election candidates don't go here. 'Let's have a manhattan project to cure the most common 3 cancers' moves the needle on everything -- scientific competitiveness, long-term health spending, plus anyone who knows anyone who had cancer will instantly sympathize.
He should have invested in http://gelookahead.economist.com/slideshow/start-ups-fightin...
Does he have cancer ?
Larry Ellison has cancer.