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221  Even Scientists Can't Halt Power Shovels
     The Washington Post  November 28, 1970

     The "Love-Hate" relationship of modern culture and science must
have many historical and psychological roots.  Some of them are
mutually contradictory.

     We hear that "scientists are too indifferent about the consequences
of their discoveries," but also that "the technocrats are trying to
run our lives."  This ambivalence may flow directly from the nearly
total dependence of modern life on technology, on which is then
focused every grievance, real or fancied, that human imperfection can
produce. 

     Technology is, of course, a powerful amplifier of those 
imperfections and must share a burden of responsibility, together with
human nature and other human institutions, for the inhumanities of 
modern life.  But if we think of technology as the devil, we will waster
our strength in vain theological controversies over the best ritual 
formula for exorcising it.

     Rather, it is a somewhat wonderful, but often wild and ignorant
creature that we must yet learn to domesticate.  

     Present-Day discussion of the "evils of technology" contains
more angry metaphor than useful diagnosis.  One of our most
constructive, and poetic, critics -- Lewis Mumford -- has faulted
the nuclear physicists who argued against the atomic bombing of
Hiroshima for stopping short of "a general strike of scientists
and technicians."  Should the scientists alone control such
decisions?  What would the further consequences have been if
such a technocratic coup had failed, or even worse, if a scientific 
junta had succeeded?

     Mumford neglects to mention the trial of J. Robert Oppenheimer
for little more than his lack of enthusiasm about developing the
H-bomb.  Oppenheimer's conviction must rank with the inquisition of
Galileo as the Establishment's guideline for a scientist's place.  As
J.D.Bernal pointed out in his "Science and History," the Galileo affair
set the pattern whereby scientists could "carry on their work free
from religious interferences so long as they did not trespass in the
religious sphere ... producing the type of pure scientist who kept out
of controversies of a religious or political kind."

     An Insoluble problem?

     Elsewhere in "The Myth of the Machine," Mumford finds a truer
target in the failure of Albert Einstein and his associates "to mobilize
the intelligence of mankind to prevent such potentially catastrophic
energy from being prematurely released."  But this failure was
not for want of trying. "Politics is far more difficult than physics,"
and the problem may be fundamentally insoluble in a world system of
nation-states.

     Before we call for a new act of martyrdom that might symbolize
the resetting of the balance between private genius and public 
responsibility, we need a better understanding of the political process
by which they can be harmonized.  The problem is no different than the
central dilemma of relating individual freedom to the collective 
welfare in a democratic society.  

     But if the scientist has abdicated a political power he never
had--to control the uses of the technology he inspires--who does have 
that responsibility? The answer to this question is so elusive that it
understandably aggravates the "green rebellion."  A clear allocation
of responsibility could lead to rational confrontation and tolerable
compromises.  As it stands now, we all watch helplessly while the
power shovels denude the earth--and the most sophisticated scientist
can truthfully say, "Who, me? What do I have to do with that clumsy
relic of last century's machines?"

     The confusion of responsibility is well illustrated by the
memoirs of Albert Speer, headlined as the modernday Faust.  The 
confession of his wiser years is a compelling human document. No thirst
for scientific knowledge but rather mediocre architecture was his
ruling passion in bargaining with the devil.  The flawed artist,
turned expert manager, now reflects that "Hitler's dictatorship ...
employed the instruments of communication and command, and above all
to the technology of management by which every citizen was made to
abdicate his sense of personal moral responsibility for the acts of
the State.  He calls this technocracy, but it has nothing to do with
science or technology.  It is, simply, total bureaucracy.

     A Two-Headed Bludgeon

     The metaphors of "1984" that the new technology of electronic
surveillance and computerized dossiers would give a fascist state an
overhelming advantage over its citizens are difficult to challenge.
However, as Speer noted, an autocratic educational system that
smothers skepticism also dulls the technical competence needed to tend
the complex machines.

     Furthermore, the neo-technical society is ever more vulnerable to
disruption by small numbers of urban guerrillas.  The more complex our
vital instruments, the more the tranquility of our daily lives depends
on the consent of all the governed.

     Over 30 years ago, the sociologist Robert K. Merton initiated a 
more systematic line of thinking about science as a social phenomenon.
In writings collected in a volume entitled "Social Theory and Social
Structure," he foresaw a backlash against the very principle of  
dispassionate objectivity. This principle is as essential for the method
of science as it is troublesome in its psychological and social
impact.  He cautioned that "it may salve the conscience of the 
individual man of science to hold that an inadequate social structure 
has led to the perversion of his discoveries.  But this will hardly 
satisfy an embittered opposition. The assumption that the social effects
of science must be beneficial in the long run ... involves the confusion
of truth and social utility which is ... in the non -logical penumbra
of science."

     This is not to say that social utility follows more naturally from
superstition and scientific falsity than from objective research.  But
Merton's foresight was a warning that scientist had better discover
how to justify themselves to the community.  Unfortunately he did not
offer a detailed prescription how they might keep their license, nor
do we have one as yet.  Nevertheless, it is good technical practice to
define your problems as a first step to seeking the solutions.

     To work out such a program will require new channels of cooperation
among scientists, engineers and their social critics.  We can, for
example, compare our own problems of technological change with the 
modernization of less developed societies and thereby learn from those
whom we sometimes patronize.

     We are indeed learning that more careful assessment of new 
technology should precede our commitment to it.  This has already 
provoked much thought about the instruments to make the assessment real
and vital. Better that technology assessment be the habitual function of
pluralistic ongoing institutions than having to invent a new one each
time.  And we are never sure when "each time" really is.

     Regulating Regulators

     The national regulatory agency has an undeniable place; but the
regulator himself needs watching, and innovations inevitably outpace
the formal laws.  Questions like threats to privacy from computer
applications have needed careful study before sensible and routinely
enforceable laws could be written.

     The public interest law firm is a social invention that attracted
much interest when the Internal Revenue Service recently withheld,
then finally approved, its tax-exempt status.  The need for cautions
about possible abuses of this device for private advantage cannot be
disputed.

     After more experience, congress might restudy the legal basis of
these firms together with that of the class action suits that become
their main avenue of effective change.  Properly registered and 
regulated, such firms could eventually finance themselves with fees and
damages collected in successful suits against unfair exploiters of
personal advantage and the collective environment.  They could then
also advance the painstaking research often needed for protecting
consumer and environmental interests.

     But this extension from legal action to aggressive counter-
technology is an experiment for the future.  The public interest firms
already have many challenges whose assessment is all too obvious to
laymen's eyes, ears and noses.  
     
     Another existing device for assessing science and technology is
the university, the fountainhead of most basic research.  Now squeezed
from all directions, including more rigid mission-orientation in many
federal grants, the university may soon lose the vigor needed to 
pursue its historic function of independent criticism.  Yet this is 
perceived as an indispensable part of an institutional environment in
which good research can flourish.

     The indirect cost, or overhead, of any mission-oriented research
contract should then include a tithe for undirected, critical
studies.  (unlike the commercial business, the university cannot earn
a profit as a way of nourishing its own growth.)  First priority
should be given to work on independent critical assessment of goal-
oriented projects, a scrutiny to which the sponsors may not always be
sympathetic.

     this proposal will get short shrift at a time when overall bud-
gets for science are being calculatingly shrunk and remaining funds
are channeled into work with obvious, short-term reliance.  We are to
see many more examples of the second law of technical dynamics-quick 
payoff projects always have the worst side effects for lack of 
scrupulous investigation.  Another principle may keep us more content:
When we keep our heads in the sand, we will be spared knowing what hit
us.  We can always blame it on a devil.
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