"R&D Without Failure Is Dangerous"

KAST Explores Defining and Leveraging R&D Failure
Seeking Systems to Promote Challenging Research

Triggered by the president’s remark that “failure will be tolerated,” an in-depth discussion has begun on the fundamental structure of South Korea’s national research and development (R&D) system. The debate centers on whether South Korea’s R&D, which has long valued a “low failure rate” as a virtue under performance-based evaluations, is truly suited for challenging research, and how failure should be defined and accumulated.

The Korean Academy of Science and Technology will hold the 247th KAST Roundtable Forum on the theme “What Is R&D Failure: Definition, Responsibility, and Future Design” both online and offline at The Plaza Hotel in Seoul on the morning of January 16. This forum will examine policy and cultural issues from multiple perspectives to shift the perception of failure from something to be “managed” to something to be “learned from and considered an asset.”

Web Invitation to the Forum: What Is R&D Failure? Provided by the Korean Academy of Science and Technology

“Science Operates Through Failure”

The keynote lecture will be delivered by Stuart Firestein, Professor of Biological Sciences and Neuroscience at Columbia University in the United States. Professor Firestein, under the theme “Failure: Why Science Is So Successful,” will emphasize that the progress of science begins with “ignorance” and that failure is an essential way in which science operates. He will also present the paradox that a system that does not allow for failure actually reduces the chances of scientific success.

In the main presentation, Yeom Hanwoong, Professor of Physics at Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH) and Director of the IBS Research Group, will discuss the structural limitations of the recurring “failure discourse” in Korean R&D. Professor Yeom plans to point out that the perception that Korean R&D avoids failure largely stems from distorted data interpretation, and that the real problem lies in the system’s inability to accumulate failures as knowledge and data for use in policy and research design.

Connecting Failure: From Evaluation and Learning to Commercialization

The comprehensive discussion will be chaired by Hong Sungwook, Professor at Seoul National University, with panelists including Lee Jeongdong, Professor at Seoul National University; Kim Myungki, CEO of LSK Investment; and Kim Minsu, Head of the Daily News Team at Dongascience. Key issues to be discussed include evaluation structures that enable challenging research, learning from failure, linking research to commercialization, and methods of policy and social communication.

Chung Jin-ho, President of the Korean Academy of Science and Technology, said, “This forum is an opportunity to consider how to design research processes that include failure and how to accumulate the results as national knowledge and policy assets.” He added, “Beyond performance-centered discussions, this will be a chance to review the direction of evaluation systems and research culture that make challenging research possible.” He further stated, “The Academy will continue to provide a platform for public discourse to re-examine the goals and learning structures of national R&D.”