This was looking like a reasoned, plausible argument right up until the inclusion of the blatantly ignorant, political statement,

"Thus CSIRO researches timber production from indigenous forests but not its huge impact on the long-term survival of the forest biota".

Come again, the overwhelming body of evidence leads reasonable men and women to conclude that most wildlife actually prefer the increased leaf, bud and sap based food chains that result from selectively harvested regrowth forests. The highest concentrations of Yellow Bellied Gliders are found in stands that have been extensively modified in the past. Ditto Koalas for similar reasons.

The reason CSIRO does not conduct research into the supposed "huge impact etc" is that this has been done to death already. If Mr Tyndale had not spent the past 3 decades with his head in a paper bag he would have known that some of the largest and most persistent mix of sponsored funding came from the so-called Environmental Protection Agencies who were very, very keen to obtain evidence in support of their ideology.

They found diddly squat. In fact, they found no evidence of a threat to ecosystem health, let alone any "huge impact".

Despite the best efforts of the "Old Growth Cult" to imply that lack of disturbance is the most contributive state for biodiversity values, the real experts, the species themselves, vote with their feet.

The primary impact of selective harvesting is to provide space to the remaining trees. This gives each tree a larger share of the available water and ensures that soil moisture is retained longer between rainfall events. This enables soil microbial activity to continue longer, thus increasing fertility. This mix of improved water, nutrient and sunlight results in an increased volume of fresher, more nutritious leaf, bud and sap, the prime determinants of species populations. These are the facts. They have been around long before R.G. Florence was a lad.

Hugh's notion of "public good research" appears to incorporate an even greater capacity for certain members of the scientific community to indulge their ideology at the taxpayers expense.

I agree, the CSIRO has dissolved into a corporate subsidy.

Let us evolve this idea further and sell off the CSIRO.

The quest to privatize public instumentalities does support market driven employment, within the scientific community, however Dr Tyndale-Biscoe's thesis that the effect of this is to undermine the public good is well argued. Without the necessary basic research in a cross section of science and technology, the underpinning knowledge will not be available for applied researchers, who are market driven, to attack the arrival of unexpected problems. Moreover, contractual obligations to corporate clients divests the public instrumentalities of transparency, and hence unaccountability.

Perhaps the problem is rooted in the nature of copyright/patent law. These concepts are not strictly capitalistic and some prominent libertarians have argued against them.

The arguement or debate over Private and Public is nul and void.

The Labor parties signing of the GATS agreement which states that nothing will be public, it will all be privatised.

Strange that a Labor party supports its medicare system although this agreement that they signed, says nothing will be public.

Unfortunately current governments of the day have continued this agreement toward privatisation of everything that is public. Telstra is the next thing on the line in this blind fire sale.

Working models of systems on smaller, developing countries who had
signed the agreement meant that the very water that came off the tops of their roofs were not theirs, it was owned by someone else.

Civil uprising eventuated in this small country, times were desperate for the people, it was thrown out but left the country bankrupt to do so.