[light3]

I don't think the provision of public goods are a moral choice, if anything it is an economic choice, where its subsidy is justified by two things: the benefit of the public good outweigh its costs, the general public will not sufficiently fund public goods out of their free will. The degree of benefit for the future is sometimes not measurable, however if the past is any indication than it has definitely provided major contributions to innovation.

[dnautics]

>the general public will not sufficiently fund public goods out of their free will.

May I remind you:

>I'm going to anticipate your answer: because they're too selfish. But is there any reason to believe that our elected officials are any less selfish? Look at the narcissistic idiots we elect - and ask, are these the people whom you really want holding the purse strings?

>The degree of benefit for the future is sometimes not measurable, however if the past is any indication than it has definitely provided major contributions to innovation.

It's not like privately funded applied and basic science is chopped liver here. Applied: Salk and Sabin developed the polio vaccines without a public dime (pun intended) and didn't patent it either. Basic: Peter Mitchell proposed and validated the chemiosmotic effect (1970s) and even won a nobel prize on the discovery, without public help. Obviously, if you go far back enough to where the state was essentially uninvolved in science, most of the discoveries were made with private funding. Yes, of course, publically funded science has made discoveries, but what you are arguing is the broken window fallacy.

[light3]

I agree with you that governments can be very suboptimal, but that doesn't diminish the existence or usefulness research as a public good. Some research can not be readily commercialised, but nevertheless form basic building blocks for other innovation, in such cases government funding is crucial.