Madam, - Marc Colemam (Opinion and Analysis, Business section, August 19th), is inspired by Peter Sutherland to opine on the dividends to the nation of university reform. He gives us 1,500 words, with but a single mention of research, and that qualified by "however obscure". As an MBA student himself, he cannot be unaware that current university restructuring is much focused on research. So one word in 1,500 cannot be a slip of the pen. Sadly, it exposes an attitude in opinion formers that I had thought we had at last left behind us.
Is he truly unconscious of the impact of university research - once obscure - on most facets of his job as economics editor in The Irish Times? Can he be unaware that much of the industry of finance, just one of the many recent research-driven successes of the Irish economy, rests on the relatively recent (yes, once obscure) Black-Scholes mathematical theorem?
If he is unconvinced by the importance of research, he might do worse than Google his mentor, Mr Sutherland. His support for the Sutherland Centre in TCD, and links therein, suggests that Peter Sutherland has a wider view than Marc Coleman. - Yours, etc,
JOHN HASLETT, Professor of Statistics, Trinity College, Dublin.