This is open to debate. I'm John Donvan. Hi, everybody. There's a kind of scientific research

that gets everybody excited, even non-scientists. It's when a big breakthrough comes because the people

doing research took a chance in a direction where the possibility of failure was really high,

but so was the possibility of something amazing, as the old TV show Star Trek used to put it,

to boldly go where no man has gone before. Classic example, the race to reach the moon. That's why we

call it a moonshot, or the human genome project, or CRISPR that led to gene editing. And of course,

in everybody's recent memory, Operation Warped Speed, which gave us the COVID vaccines. But not all

science represents risk-taking,

and some now complain that in a world of publish or perish

and the need to pass peer review for funding,

too many researchers don't even try to swing for the fences,

to put this in baseball terms,

satisfied to play safe and just get singles and walks.

We went to Johns Hopkins University to stage a debate that

examines whether that is in fact true. It's part of the Hopkins Forum series, which we produce

in partnership with the Stavros-Niarchos Foundation, S&F, Agor Institute. The precise question up for

debate, is the scientific enterprise too risk-averse? Let's get to it. Welcome, everybody. I'm John John Donvan and welcome to open a debate. We are here at Johns Hopkins,

tackling the question is the scientific enterprise to risk averse. And let's welcome our debaters to the stage first.

Please welcome Tyler Cowen, Brandon Obunoo, Kate Bieberdorf, Thethoraman Pajanathan. Welcome all, and I'd like to just take a minute

to introduce you a little bit more in depth. First up with you, Tyler, you teach economics at

George Mason University. You have a hugely popular podcast. You're also well known for your

New York Times best-selling book called The Great Stagnation. You have also been called

...