The Government's chief science adviser Barry McSweeney has warned of the danger of focusing research spending too narrowly on industrial needs.
Dr McSweeney was speaking on Saturday at a panel discussion on science and the State, organised in conjunction with Rough Magic Theatre Company's production of Bertolt Brecht's play The Life of Galileo.
He said his office is now examining the impact of the Government's decision to establish information technology and biotechnology as the State's research priorities. Only research in either of these two areas is eligible for support from Science Foundation Ireland, the State's principal science funding agency. "We need to spend more on maths. Physics and chemistry are being neglected - this we know," said Dr McSweeney.
He said it would be foolhardy simply to attach an economic agenda to scientific research. "There must be economic advancement. But there must be a greater societal advancement," he added.
Director of the Environmental Change Institute at NUI Galway Emer Colleran said young scientists who are not involved in research with immediate commercial applications are finding it increasingly difficult to obtain research funding. Intellectual property considerations and patents are the factors that are driving research now, Prof Colleran said. "That isn't why I started out to do research and it isn't, I think, why young people start out to do research today."
The head of the School of Communications at Dublin City University (DCU), Brian Trench, said debate on science policy had taken place within "a very narrow sphere". Researchers at DCU analysed 370 science policy documents, including policy statements, reports and submissions.
There has been very little participation in science policy debate by political parties, citizen groups and even the universities as individual institutions, he said. Economic development agencies have dominated the debate. "Very few people are involved in the argument."
Mr Trench also said there has been little engagement with the social or ethical implications of scientific research.
Brecht's play is his version of Galileo's life, said Lynne Parker, artistic director of Rough Magic.
It is intended to challenge the audience's assumptions about Galileo's scientific work and his historic battle with the Catholic Church. The event, which took place in the Project arts centre, Dublin, received support from the Institute of Physics and the British Council in Ireland.