The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge

A short, provocative book about why "useless" science often leads to humanity''s greatest technological breakthroughsA forty-year tightening of funding for scientific research has meant that resou ...

A short, provocative book about why "useless" science often leads to humanity''s greatest technological breakthroughsA forty-year tightening of funding for scientific research has meant that resources are increasingly directed toward applied or practical outcomes, with the intent of creating products of immediate value. In such a scenario, it makes sense to focus on the most identifiable and urgent problems, right? Actually, it doesn''t. In his classic essay "The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge," Abraham Flexner, the founding director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton and the ma