title: Stimulating revolutionary science with mega-cash prizes.
abstract: We argue that the most ambitious science is intrinsically riskier science, more likely to fail. It is almost always a safer career strategy for the best scientists to seek to extend knowledge more modestly and to build incrementally on existing ideas and methods. Therefore, higher rewards for success are a necessary incentive to encourage top scientists to work on the most important scientific problems, ones where the solution has potentially revolutionary implications. We suggest that mega-cash prizes (measured in tens of millions of dollars) are a suitable reward for those individuals (or institutions) whose work has triggered radically new directions in science.
authors.forename: Bruce G
authors.initials: BG
authors.lastname: Charlton
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Andras
mesh_terms: D001363:Awards and Prizes; D035843:Biomedical Research / Q000191:economics*; D015510:Clinical Medicine / Q000191:economics*; D006801:Humans; D009042:Motivation; D012109:Research Support as Topic; D013812:Therapeutics / Q000191:economics*