The IVS bases its operations on the principles outlined above. It will:

 

• launch promising revolutionary schools of thought into competition with respective prevailing schools of thought;

 

• avoid the temptation to manage science from top down, leaving investigators to determine what pursuits might be most significant;

 

• select reviewers who have no obvious conflict of interest;

 

• reduce unnecessary administrative burdens in order to preserve thinking time;

 

• address issues that ordinarily inhibit investigators from entering into controversial domains.

 

 

These principles are taken as a constitutional foundation upon which the Institute operates.

 

Based on these principles, the working structure will drive toward a single goal: propelling the strongest transformative ideas into mainstream consideration, where they can be debated against the prevailing schools of thought. Competition will sharpen both points of view, thereby setting the stage for the one that prevails. If the winning school of thought happens to be that of the challenger, then a field could be promptly turned upside down.

 

An effective way of launching promising alternatives into consideration is to offer them substantial support. For example, suppose the proponent of an alternative view of cancer etiology is able to show broad consistency with a substantial body of evidence; and suppose this approach has garnered at least a modest scientific following. (This example is more than hypothetical: several cancer-biology investigators are now keeping the alternative idea of “aneuploidy” on life support.) One way of bootstrapping any such alternative approach is to open it to broader experimental investigation. The same approach pursued by multiple groups simultaneously cannot be dismissed with a wave of a hand. The investment in the alternative line of thinking amounts to a bet that the alternative has a reasonable chance of prevailing. Supporting that bet with  sufficent resources gives it a fighting chance.

 

Evaluation of these challenge proposals will involve debates in which proponents of alternative schools of thought argue their cases against the respective orthodoxies. These debates can be carried out in writing and perhaps also orally — all posted on the web for interested parties to witness and perhaps also to comment. A panel of scientists will judge the outcome. Panel members would be close enough to the field to be able to evaluate the material, yet removed enough from the field in order to avoid conflict of interest. Those challenge paradigms judged to be the most plausible and most potentially far-reaching will be selected competitively for funding. This review procedure serves not only as quality assurance, but also as a defense against potential critics, assuring them that those chosen ideas have been carefully and thoroughly vetted.

 

Funding should be enough for, say, a dozen groups to carry forth on the same theme. Duration will need to be sufficient for building traction; yet it should be short enough to avert wasteful spending. Most critical is the multiplicity of efforts, for only if the mass exceeds critical will the challenge be impossible to ignore.

 

With such a funding program in place, promising challenge paradigms should be quickly elevated to competitive status (a process begun with the initial web debate). The sizeable body of scientists reporting on the challenge paradigm will be difficult to ignore, especially among young scientists. Conference atmospheres would be immediately enlivened. Argued in a civilized manner, each paradigm’s strengths and weaknesses will soon become obvious, and the superior one should quickly emerge as a realized revolution. Instead of hanging on the vine to wither, the low-hanging fruit will have been expediently harvested.