Abstract in English:
Throughout history, humanity’s successes and failures and the survival of societies and nations have derived in large parts from technical innovations and disruptive technologies that have replaced the status-quo with new and better ways of doing things. It is thus understandable, indeed necessary, that nations and governments ask what mechanisms and instruments they should put in place to encourage scientific discoveries and to create technical breakthroughs, particularly for technologies with a transformative, strategic dimension that a nation can ill-afford to miss or fail to understand, control and
shape.
Many funding schemes and government programs already exist around the world that aim to support scientific discovery and societal innovation. Many are curiosity driven scientific endeavors that -like artadvance our understanding of the world and our lives and our identity as humans. Others attempt to promote more pragmatic goals and improve engineering and development processes. All are important and necessary mechanisms to drive science forward.