文档介绍：Issue 31
"Money spent on research is almost always a good investment, even when the results of that research are controversial."
I agree with the speaker's broad assertion that money spent on research is generally money well invested. However, the speaker unnecessarily extends this broad assertion to embrace research whose results are "controversial," while ignoring pelling 引人注目reasons why some types of research might be unjustifiable. My points of contention with the speaker involve the fundamental objectives and nature of research, as discussed below.
I concede that the speaker is on the correct philosophical side of this issue. After all, research is the exploration of the unknown for true answers to our questions, and for lasting solutions to our enduring problems. Research is also the chief means by which we humans attempt to satisfy our insatiable不知足的 appetite for knowledge, and our craving to understand ourselves and the world around us. Yet, in the very notion 某种想法of research also lies my first point of contention with the speaker, who illogically presumes that we can know the results of research before we invest in it. To the contrary, if research is to be of any value it must explore uncharted and unpredictable territory. In fact, query 问题whether research whose benefits are immediate and predictable can break any new ground, or whether it can be considered "research" at all.
While we must invest in research irrespective of whether the results might be controversial, at the same time we should be circumspect about research whose objectives are too vague and whose potential benefits are too speculative. After all, expensive research always carries significant opportunity costs--in terms of(根据, 按照, 用...的话, 在...方面) how the money might be spent toward addressing society's more immediate problems that do not require research. One apt illustration of this point involves the so-called "Star Wars" defense initiative, championed by the Reagan administration d