I have clearly walked into a long-standing argument whose dimensions I don't understand. Nevertheless. . . Reid Cornwell says: <<I have interviewed and evaluated industrial scientists for decades. Moderate deep learning, creativity and a real world vision is the sought after commodity. This is directly opposite of the institutional hiring and research policies of the Universities.>> The research universities of the U.S. hire scientists whose learning and skill and vision is sought after by industry. Indeed, one of the problems student report is that such faculty spend so much time consulting with business andindustry that there time with students is limited. I am close to the College of Engineering at the University of California at Santa Barbara, and aware of the work its faculties of science are doing. I haven't counted the Nobel Laureates on campus, or the days of consulting they provide for industry. Shuji Nakamurea, the Director of UCSB's Center for Solid State Lighting, has just returned from Finland where he received an award for his work in that field--and a $1.3 million dollar prize. <snip> <<Also in industry the sharing of knowledge is the rule, in academia the ownership of knowledge prevails. I know this is counter-intuitive considering that Universities are centers of learning.>> More counter-factual than counter-intuitive. University scientis share freely, in articles and scholarly journals. The scientists employed in corporate research centers--say, in drug research centers--do not share what they learn: patents and other forms of protection seem to be the rule. Sharing seems to be done only when such sharing is clearly in the best interest of the company. <<One only has to look at disciplinarity in Universities and the difficulty of establishing true cross-disciplinarity. You see the same thing happening in this listserv conflict. Ie. "We own the knowledge" about the internet." You're not an academic so you don't know anything.>> Is it perhaps also "You're not iin industry so you don't know anything of the real world"? <<My views are particularly problematic because I'm a heretic in the "Temple of Phud" and alien with my real world orientation.>> I have yet to see or hear of a university rejecting an overture from a corporation or an agency to co-sponsor research and development, and I would appreciate evidence of such behavior. "Interdisciplearity" has become something of a buzz word among those who are not engaged in university work. What many universities have done is to create "centers" and "institutes," e.g., "The Center for Solid State Lighting and Display" at UCSB, which are truly interdiscipleary, while retaining loose and permeable boundaries between the disciplines for teaching and learning and the preparation of practitioners. Steve Eskow