Technology, and presumably the theoretical understanding of technology and the experimental data behind it in the form of science, seems to proceed along a smooth exponential curve throughout history independent of governments. Thus is does not seem that government really helps science much, even though it funds a lot of it. I was going to make a long argument about this, but I was pleased to discover today that people have already made arguments for free market science, so I’ll just leave it to them for now. See this article and this book.

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