1. Who are we?
We are a community of scientists who share common values of knowledge and technology, as well as truth as our main guiding principle, which are symbolically represented in our logo as a book, a gear and a sun. We believe that modern science is in crisis: managerial, economic, ideological. We seek to identify a way beyond this condition.
2. What is the purpose of this community?
The purpose of this community is to develop effective, specific and implementation-ready strategies to overcome the current condition of science. The present challenges of the academic and broader scientific community form a tightly interconnected structure in which each problem is both a consequence of others and a contributing cause. For that reason, any serious attempt to improve the current situation must be systemic: partial or local solutions are liable to be neutralized by the unresolved elements of the wider system. Our approach to strategy development is therefore to map these challenges as conceptual graphs and to identify those problems whose resolution would most effectively disrupt the challenge structure, reducing its capacity to reproduce the same failures. We also seek to identify specific solutions to those key challenges in a form that is mutually coherent and capable of integration into a broader course of action. On that basis, we aim to formulate a concrete and implementable strategy grounded in compatible solutions.
3. Core principles
Truth
Truth is above all. Within this community we affirm its priority over any other value and virtue.
Knowledge
We value knowledge as cumulative and corrigible. We value understanding, conceptual clarity, and intellectual continuity. Knowledge is understood as a partial and revisable reflection of truth and is therefore always open to refinement and correction.
Technology
We value technology as the practical continuation of knowledge, a means of expanding what can be known and done, and as one of the primary drivers of human history.
Intellectual honesty
We aim for clear distinction between facts, interpretations, intuitions, and speculations. We do not pretend certainty where certainty is absent.
Depth
We treat scientific, philosophical, and institutional questions with care. We prefer depth to display. We value rigor over volume and quality over quantity. We prize skill over formal indicators.
Resilience
We reject the reduction and subjugation of science to bureaucracy, metrics, branding, ideological ritual, or career optimization. We believe it is the duty of scientists to stand for the truth and science, and to push back against practices and institutions that subvert our core principles.
Institutional independence
The community should remain unaffiliated with any governments, funding bodies, universities or other external interests.