November 22, 1960

Dr. George A. Derbyshire
Space Sclence Board

1145 19th Street, N.W.
Washington 6, 0.C.

Dear George:

Since you were away when | called you this morning this letter will catch
up with yeu.

This Is In response to your memorandum of October 25 relating to the
preparation of a general survey of Board positions on biological questions.
I think that It Is certainly very valuable to make summaries of this kind
from time to time as It Is the one way of being sure that the miscellaneous
fragments. that we come up with will get some concerted attention. However, |
believe that a new starting point may be desirable at the present time.

NASA Is just completing work on its long range plans and | think that this
document ought to be the starting polnt of any further commentary. {| know that
Homer Newell has had some trouble In getting this cleared but at the present
time | think It Is classified as For Offictal Use Only'' and could certainly be
clreulated to the Board. In fact, | think It quite likely that he will be In
touch with you about this and If not, It probably would do no harm to bring the
mater'up. 1! have been going over this document(in-my—cepecity as a consultant to
the Planetary and Interplanetary Commit tee )and it 18 very obvious that NASA has
benefited considerably from the deliberations that the Beard had made before.
However, so many of the remarks that are included in your summary have already
been Incorporated [nto the genera! plans that there probably would not be too
much point In reiterating these at the present time. instead, | think It would
be desirable to go over the general pians document and to prepare a specific
brief on Board positions on those Items which are not yet represented in the plans.
This would make for a very much briefer and | think very much more effective
presentation. in practice | have actually been doing this as a sort of personal
intermediary since | can hardly help but reuse the specific recommendations that
have come up In Board Committee meetings as the basis for suggestions at the
NASA committees.

To speak to some more specific Issues, | think | would put the problem
In a slightly different way. On matters concerning general policy, the
transmittals to NASA and the other agencles ought now to be on specific questions
that have, In fact, obtained specific Board approval. So | would like to

—
Dr. Derbyshire, cont. 2 November 22, 1960

suggest that yarcirculate the document dated October 25, 1960 as It stands to
Lambertsen and to Pittendrigh and meanwhile, obtain clearance for them, and
possibly thelr full committees as well, to have the opportunity to review the
short and long term planning documents that NASA Is completing. Then the
chairmen of the committees ought to prepare specific recommendations for Board
action on those Issues which they may feel are not yet adequately covered by
the NASA program In Its present form. If the paper that | mention, dated
October 25, were to be transmitted directly to NASA, | think It would lose a
great deal of its effectiveness since the people over there would look at It
and could promptly conclude that most or all of the recommendations included
In It have already been Incorporated Into NASA policy = so we really should
emphasize those Items which we feel need fresh attention or where we feel
that the agencles have not yet come out with sound policy.

As the NASA organization Itself develops In technical competence, [it Is
obvious that the Board should come to function more and more as a Board of
Visitors does to a University, to furnish the sclentific conscience to help
shape the major orientations of the program and, of course, to furnish the
channel from civillan scientists to the pregrams. There Is one other function
which Is compl€mentary to the first one and that is, to put It bluntly, to
serve as a kind of lobby for the promotion of space science as compared to other
activities both In and outside the space fleld. Evidently we still have a
tremendous Job of education to do and |'m not sure that even PSAC has fully come
to grips with the problem. On the whole, | think there Is something of an
analogy between what we are trying to do here and trying to maintain the academic
stature of a university when most of the alumni! and the general public may be
more Interested In the performance of its football team. At any rate, we should
be thinking more and more seriously of what we can do In the realm of political
action in order to Implement the general technical objectives that we are all
Interested in. NASA Itself is unable, of course, to glve any cognizance to this
kind of activity and we will have to do it on our own Initiative to furnish the
sclentific point of view with regard to the advancement of the national interest.

1 also have some rather minor technical polnts concerning the document but
It would not be necessary to go into these If it Is, as | now suggest, to be
circulated within the Board Committees for present comparison with the NASA
program.

Yours sinceraly,

Joshua Lederberg
Professor of Genetics

JL/Jh