Background
“Our society as it is today rests on the foundations of knowledge and technology that the efforts of scientific research have produced. The products generated by research constantly surround us as modern people. This means that we have a need for understanding and relating to scientific research, both as citizens, voters and consumers.
In our modern knowledge society, science and research are closely connected with the everyday lives of all citizens. Growth in society is especially generated within the areas where research is integrated in the development of new products and services. Research often has a direct impact on people’s lives, and political decisions are often conceived and argued on the basis of the findings of scientific research.”
This quotation derives from the report "Research and Tell", which the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation published in May 2004.
The report documents that the Danes’ interest in research is increasing, but nonetheless there is concern both within the industrial community and the universities: too few young people choose to make their career within natural science, and they warn that it will ultimately cost society dearly if research-based enterprises find it increasingly difficult to recruit qualified candidates in sufficient numbers.
It is the opinion of politicians, educators and private enterprises that there is a need for taking the interest in natural science and the understanding of its significance to a higher level and wider circles. The effort to disseminate information on research must be strengthened. This is the recommendation that also the think tank of the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation gave its support in May 2004.
This is the background for sending out a research ship as a platform for relevant Danish research. At the same time, this platform must exhibit research to the people of Denmark, using the media and the Internet as a "display window". By utilising modern satellite technology, the Danes, and, not least, young Danish people still at school, are to be able quite literally to look over the shoulder of the research scientists and share their joy in the work they do.
The idea of sending out a third Galathea expedition has been put forward from several quarters, not least when the new millennium, and thus the 50th anniversary of the departure of the second Galathea expedition, was approaching. However, it was the newspaper Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten that picked up the baton and developed the idea into the concept that has since developed into a broad national event and a poster project for Danish research.
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