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[–] Empire_of_the_mind 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

Certainly. The choice by an intelligent person to go into the sciences itself reveals a gap in their creativity.

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[–] Greasetrap 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

Absolutely not, this is the model that science adheres to because we are ultimately interested in building our knowledge as a whole rather than pursuing the newest hot, trendy, or creative idea - this isn't the arts or the business school and we don't reward special snowflake ideas made by charismatic people or snake oil salesmen.

Simply because an idea is not innovative (the use in the article really means 'unsupported') does not mean it is uncreative. There is also a huge issue as to just what creativity is, as it nearly defies categorization by its very definition.

Still,There are many very creative uses of new methods and practices to improve the way we measure effects with the same research ideas, greatly reducing costs of research or accuracy in estimation. I think that science does not look creative to those outside of because it usually isn't as sexy or attractive unless you both really care about and really know about the topics you are studying.

This model we have in the sciences does slow the rate of new ideas and paradigm shifts, but also makes it highly redundant to errors like flukes or one-time effects. There are a whole lot of young career scientists that want to make a big impact but can't produce reliable effects. The result of this process on a macro level is that science gives you the most correct (read: most reliable and most supporting evidence) answers that are currently possible.

Another topic in here that is just a bit insulting is the article's essential thesis:

Tighter budgets, coupled with this approach to peer-review, means that vague but exciting ideas proposed by young, inexperienced researchers simply can’t compete against safe, incremental ideas from established scientists.

This huge, inadvertent shift toward conservatism and safety has created an enormous creativity deficit in science that affects us all. There’s no lack of brilliant, passionate creative researchers; the current peer-review system just doesn’t seem to fund enough of them.

This is not a new trend, and is not attributable to tighter budgets and the peer review process. Peer review has been around for decades in even the most newly established fields, and several centuries in others. Tighter budgets likely does change the research grant process to fund better argued and defended ideas - which we call better ones.

The worst part are the last two sentences. Those safe and incremental ideas by established scientists are there and respected because they work. They continue to work no matter how you change the setting or situation, and those safe and incremental ideas were anything but easy to get and develop- usually taking them 10 or more years to adequately defend and research. This is the equivalent of someone who just got hired saying they aren't appreciated enough for their performance over the past week compared to senior management.

If you want to fix this problem the answer is easy, fund the sciences. You can't have world-changing dynamic research occur at a fast rate when you won't fund the people who create the research. Until then money will continue to talk, and those who want to push ideas they believe to be creative, innovative, or game changers will have to find their own funding if they aren't willing to do the work needed to support a novel propositional idea.