Previous Seed Grant Winners
Where are they now?
In 1999 and 2000, Robert Crease of the Department of Philosphy was awarded a seed grant for his proposal,"Science Study Forum."
This grant seeded support for an interdisciplinary group of faculty from SBU and BNL to discuss society's reactions to perceived environmental threats, ethics in science, and related topics. The group met approximately biweekly for several years, and included several talks on BNL history and topics related to BNL history, such as the perception of risks especially with regard to radiation. This Forum provided a unique opportunity for SBU faculty outside the sciences to meet BNL scientists. It also provided a forum for work on BNL-related subjects. For instance, Dr. Crease prepared a talk for this group on the history of BNL's accelerator ISABELLE that eventually turned into an article recently published in PHYSICS IN PERSPECTIVE.
There are additional prospects for funding and collaboration with scientists at BNL that may yet grow out of the two grants. In 2000, based on the activities conducted with the seed grant, Dr. Crease began to prepare a grant proposal for an interdisciplinary research project on "trust in science," envisioning a program with the participation of BNL scientists and staff. The grant was submitted to the Mellon Foundation in 2001 and 2002, but was turned down both times. The grant was reworked into a proposal to study "Trust in Science and Religion" and submitted to the Templeton Foundation in 2003 and 2004. Both times it was turned down, but with an invitation to revise and resubmit (it came in 5 out of 22 in 2004) and was submitted the grant again in 2005; meanwhile, Dr. Crease has submitted a smaller version to the Rockefeller Foundation.