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Outrageous Editorials

The day you stop writing your sometimes outrageous editorials is the day I cancel my membership in the APS. Without your stabbings front and rear we'll never think our way through the messes we are in. If my life and religious beliefs can't withstand your "anti-religious, anti-life agenda" (October 1994, page 3) then they don't amount to much. For me they can and do, and I find your remarks challenging and stimulating. Thanks for voicing what we need to keep us honest.

Sumner Davis

armd@physics.wm.edu

Arms Control Options for Delivery Vehicles

Lora Lumpe

(This is the fifth and final paper based on the invited session on Theater Ballistic Missiles, held at the APS meeting in Washington, DC, on 18 April 1994. The other four papers were published in the October 1994 issue of Physics and Society. )

During the past decade, the issue of "ballistic missile proliferation" has become high politics. With the end of the Cold War, American defense and foreign policy officials now routinely identify the spread of weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles as a, if not the, primary threat to US national security. The usual reasons cited for this focus are: the inability to defend against missiles and to call them off once they are released in an attack; the terroristic and indiscriminate nature of missile attacks; and the historical pairing of nuclear and chemical payloads with missiles. However, to date ballistic missiles have only been used to deliver conventional payloads, even when chemical warheads were available (in Iraq); most developing countries are no more able to defend against advanced fighter-bombers than against ballistic missiles; and, as bombing raids from World War II to recent Israeli strikes in south Lebanon have shown, aircraft also indiscriminately kill and wound non-combatants and destroy civilian property.

While policymakers have fixated on limiting the spread of ballistic missiles, they are at the same time liberally selling combat aircraft and munitions. The preoccupation with ballistic missiles appears to have much to do with psychological factors: President Reagan---during whose administration the missile focus was initiated in ernest--had a visceral dislike of ballistic missiles. And many in his and later administrations deplored the idea of the US being deterred by Third World missiles from taking military actions believed necessary.

But accepting that the "threat" of ballistic missiles is as grave as purported, I believe the present approach to limiting their spread--a technology denial regime in combination with costly efforts to develop weapons and doctrine to counter them--is not adequate. I survey here several arms control/disarmament alternatives to inhibit both horizontal and vertical missile proliferation.

Missile Technology Control Regime
The Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) is the current approach to limiting the spread of ballistic missiles and associated technologies. Initiated in 1987 with seven members, the MTCR has grown to 25, mostly European countries. The addition of Hungary and Argentina in 1993 marked the entry of developing countries. Several others--including Russia, Israel and Brazil--"adhere" to the regime but have not been invited or do not seek to become full members.

MTCR members and adherents pledge to abide by common guidelines on exports of dual-use missile-relevant technologies and missiles themselves. The original threshold for control was ballistic missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles capable of delivering at least a 500 kg payload to a range of at least 300 km. In early 1993, this threshold was lowered to include any missile believed to be intended to deliver an unconventional (nuclear, chemical, or biological) payload. Adherents to the MTCR are to attach a "strong presumption to deny" such exports, but the guidelines permit transfers of the technologies if adequate end-use assurances are obtained. Transfer of production capabilities for these items, however, is expressly prohibited.

The MTCR has been extremely successful in establishing a norm against missile sales. Prior to the initiation of the regime, sales of ballistic missiles were routine and considered fair game. But by 1992, former CIA Director Bob Gates testified that North Korea was the only remaining exporter of ballistic missiles (although in 1993 China apparently exported missile components). The MTCR has also succeeded in dissuading some countries from pursuing indigenous missile development, but this success only extends to primarily economically-driven programs (i.e., countries that were hoping to become missile exporters). Argentina, Brazil, South Africa fall into this category. The MTCR has not and is not likely to succeed in countries with security-driven missile development programs, such as Israel, North Korea (driven by both economic and security interests), India, and Pakistan.

The MTCR is ultimately limited by the fact that it is a discriminatory export control regime, rather than an even-handed arms control/disarmament regime. For developing countries to become formal members of the MTCR, they are required, among other things, to renounce possession of ballistic missiles. The developed-country members of the regime are not required to do so. From most developing countries' perspectives, the MTCR does nothing to delegitimize or create a norm against possession by them of ballistic missiles. In fact, the continued hyping of the Third World missile threat on the one hand, and continued possession of ICBMs/SLBMs by the great military powers on the other, only serves to fuel perceptions of the political if not military utility of ballistic missiles by developing countries.

Given the failure of the supplier-oriented export control approach to deal fully with the spread of this type of delivery vehicle, a fundamentally new approach to the problem may be necessary. With the global political changes of the past several years, a cooperative arms control approach--involving the developed and developing world--would likely provide better results and might now be possible.

Multilateralize the INF Treaty
In 1987 the US and USSR signed the INF Treaty, eliminating the two sides' intermediate-range ballistic missiles. The US and Russia could introduce a draft multilateral treaty at the 39-nation Conference on Disarmament (CD) to ban INF-range missiles globally. Such a treaty would be non-discriminatory in the narrow sense that everyone would give up missiles of this class.

Nearly all of the systems currently deployed by developing countries, however, would fall below the 500-5500 km range prohibition of the Treaty. The ubiquitous Scud-B, for example, would not be included. In the Third World, only the Israeli Jericho, the Saudi CSS-2, the Indian Agni (under development) and North Korean extended-range Scud missiles (under development) would be covered. A regime that left their adversaries' missiles in place would likely be unacceptable to the Israelis and Saudis. And without Israeli participation, Arab countries' acceptance of such a regime is doubtful. If the former Warsaw Pact and NATO countries agreed to eliminate their short-range (110-500 km) missiles, the US and Russia could present a draft treaty banning short and intermediate range missiles to the CD.

Several problems remain with this proposal, however. Internationalizing the INF would delegitimize only missiles of a certain range. Retention by the Permanent Five members of the UN Security Council of longer-range missiles makes such a regime less compelling; it would still be viewed as discriminatory. And, although it would be difficult to achieve without first developing IRBMs, the INF would leave open the possibility that countries could develop ICBMs above the 5000 km INF ceiling, which could pose a real threat to the continental US. Also, a few developing-country ballistic missile programs are related in part to arms races or tension with ICBM-possessing countries (e.g., India's concern with China).

A costly verification mechanism would have to be devised to implement and verify this treaty. Such an expenditure would be better justified in the case of a total ban, which would result in greater global benefits. Verifying a partial ban would also be more complicated than verifying a total ban on ballistic missiles.

Regional Missile Free Zones
It may soon be feasible for the major actors in many regions to negotiate ballistic missile-free zones. In the Middle East--where such a ban is the most difficult to envision--Arab and Israeli cooperation in the Gulf War and in the on-going Middle East peace process make such a possibility at least conceivable.

In May 1991 President Bush called for a missile ban, beginning with a halt to further acquisition, production and testing of ballistic missiles of any range by states in the region, and leading to "the ultimate elimination of such missiles from their arsenals." And in January 1993 Israel proposed that "all countries of the region...construct a mutually verifiable zone, free of surface-to-surface missiles and of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons." Egypt, which has long supported a similar goal through the "Mubarak Plan" for a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery vehicles, reportedly sought to discuss bilaterally the Israeli proposal.

Iranian, Iraqi, Israeli, Saudi, and Yemeni civilians, have all come under indiscriminate missile attack in the past decade, thus likely increasing public support for such a ban. Further improving prospects for a ban is the fact that Iraq and Libya--two of the most worrisome ballistic missile states from the US perspective--are currently under UN arms embargoes, and therefore unable to purchase missiles or related technologies.

In South Asia, the security community in Delhi has recently discussed proposals for a regional ballistic missile ban, and Pakistan's foreign ministry has stated its intention to introduce a resolution in the UN General Assembly calling for the creation of a missile-free zone.

Many other regions of the world--including South and Central America, Sub-Saharan Africa, Australasia and Antarctica--currently remain free of deployed ballistic missiles and apparently free of intentions to deploy them. Missile free zones could easily be established in these regions.

Unlike the MTCR, a regional approach would directly and actively involve Third World states in the preclusion of further ballistic missile deployments in their respective regions. Politically, this is a more stable basis for arresting missile proliferation than the present cartel approach. But in many cases these regional missile races are interconnected with superpower military holdings.

Zero Ballistic Missiles
A global zero ballistic missile (ZBM) regime, establishing a world- wide prohibition on stockpiling and deployment of ballistic missiles down to a very minimal range, of say 100 km, would effectively deal with inter-locking missile races.

Under a ZBM regime, the entire world would benefit by decreasing the possibility of accidental or intentional nuclear war. Certain developing countries would benefit from reduced anxiety about US and Russian ICBMs being re-targeted on them, as has been suggested recently. Finally, a ZBM regime would alleviate the perceived need for anti-missile systems, lessening global tension associated with defenses and freeing up a vast amount of resources to be spent on continuing to develop and deploy such systems.

This approach would encourage an interactive process of world disarmament, in which willingness by the Third World to forgo ballistic missiles would be combined synergistically with actions by the global military powers toward the ZBM goal. This proposal would reorient great-power arms control toward eliminating ballistic missiles, rather than warheads, and unlike past and current bilateral strategic cuts, it would also involve the United Kingdom, France and China.

Continued superpower possession legitimizes missiles as symbol of military, technical, economic and political prestige, and provides psychological impetus to developing countries to acquire missiles. A ZBM regime completely delegitimizes ballistic missiles and would deny countries the cry that current missile control efforts are discriminatory.

How to get there from here? Some initial bold step by the US, Russia and the other declared nuclear states to demonstrate their intention to go down to zero would be necessary. Such a move could be a 50 percent reduction in ballistic missile launchers deployed (and stockpiled). Further cuts, down to zero, would be made contingent on agreement by the other missile states to verifiably disavow ballistic missiles.

The US and Russia (or the P-5) could hold an international missile conference at which the proposal would be presented to the global community; comment and concerns would be elicited; and a sounding taken of which countries would agree in principle to eliminate their ballistic missiles if all others in their region would do likewise. At such a conference or following it, a negotiation based on a draft treaty produced by the two could be opened at the CD.

A ZBM regime would permit the development of an indigenous, independent space launch capability by any ZBM adherent in good standing. This would leave open an important, non-weapons avenue for Third World countries to develop and demonstrate scientific and technical prowess. While international space cooperation may be more desirable from the point of view of avoiding waste and redundancy in global capabilities, some nations are going to want independent SLV capabilities for military, economic, and political reasons. Moreover, movement toward large-scale international space cooperation has not been forthcoming in the past two decades.

Ballistic missiles and SLVs are very similar. However, differences in trajectory, rocket size, guidance, propulsion, launch facilities and infrastructure and payload do exist. These differences provide the basis on which such a regime could be verified with sufficient confidence.

In order to ensure that ballistic missiles or key technologies are not being tested under the guise of an SLV development program, an international body analogous to the IAEA would probably have to be created. This inspectorate would verify destruction of existing missiles, verify end use of dual-use materials for SLV programs and inspect and observe space launches and flight tests.

Flight Test Ban
Limitations on testing US and Soviet ballistic missiles were considered throughout most of the cold war, and restrictions were eventually adopted in the ABM, SALT II, INF, and START treaties. Flight testing limits (or a ban) might now prove to be a politically feasible and effective means of limiting the further proliferation of ballistic missiles.

The need for some flight testing in the development of any complete, modern missile system is indisputable. As Farooq Hussain (a test ban skeptic) concedes: "Certain problems--such a those associated with the prediction of ballistic trajectory bias, MIRV manoeuvering and warhead re-entry into the atmosphere--can only be resolved confidently by actual flight tests." The procurement route, range and sophistication, mission and payload of the delivery vehicle all dictate varying needs for flight testing.

The US Navy and Air Force put new strategic nuclear missiles through an elaborate testing sequence. For several reasons, developing country testing programs are not nearly as sophisticated or extensive as those of the US. A primary limiting factor is cost. A testing infrastructure is expensive, and so are the missiles expended in tests. Many developing countries' missile inventories are wholly imported, and it is increasingly difficult to find resupply because of the emerging norm against missile exports. A meaningful test program could easily deplete the limited missile supply of a developing country.

Second, given that the vast majority of developing country ballistic missile systems have been imported, flight testing is less necessary. Thirteen countries have imported the Soviet Scud- B, a simple, proven design, based originally on the V- 2. It does not require tight tolerances in its manufacture and handling and, therefore, perhaps a purchasing country could deploy it with little or no testing.

But missile flight testing is essential to achieve any degree of confidence that a ballistic missile system under development will work as intended. Once the system has been tested adequately, operational reliability can be assured to some degree with methods other than flight testing.

Although media reports often refer to the improved accuracy of third world missiles, without a significant and highly visible testing program, such claims must be treated with skepticism. The measure of accuracy, circular error probable (CEP), cannot be determined by a single test; CEP can only be estimated by firing a substantial number of missiles at predetermined aim points. Accuracy can be compromised by subtle imperfections in machining, calibration or system engineering, and most developing countries do not have or do not produce missiles in quantities sufficient to support testing at the rates required to assess progress in the refinement of guidance systems, or even to iron out all the bugs and glitches that may cause catastrophic failure.

What a Flight Test Ban Could Accomplish
A few third world countries are steadily developing substantive space launch vehicles and long-range ballistic missiles. India and Israel (and to a lesser stage of development, Brazil) have missile development programs, demonstrable through serial flight testing. Israel and India are not particularly politically worrisome to the US, but both have nuclear weapons. Eventual development and deployment of nuclear tipped (or possibly nuclear tipped) ICBMs by them would have far-reaching implications.

In addition, China continues to develop more advanced strategic nuclear weapons. In the 1990s, China is expected to deploy three new ICBMs/SLBMs, as well as its first MIRVed missiles. This eventuality would also be globally destabilizing. The perilous political fate of pro-Western politicians in Russia increases the desirability of a ballistic missile flight test ban.

A flight test ban would preclude continued movement by the US and Russia toward exotic first strike weapons, such as high-accuracy usable capabilities, defenses, depressed trajectory/short time of flight weapons, maneuvering reentry vehicles (MaRVs) and precision-guided RVs. Such research continues even while the two sides' missiles have reportedly been targeted on the oceans.

As part of its recent counter-proliferation initiative, the US Department of Defense is reportedly considering fitting some Trident II D5 missiles with small nuclear weapons, as well as with conventional warheads. A long-range, kinetic energy penetrator is intended to destroy underground command and communication bunkers of potential (third world) adversaries. This plan appears to be driven by the search for a new mission for the D5, which was to have been targeted primarily on the hardened SS-18 silos, now scheduled to be eliminated under START II. The bunker-busting mission would require accuracy of 5-7 meters, which could not be achieved without testing; on 18 November 1993 the Navy conducted a classified test of a D5 missile equipped with at least two conventional warheads from a Trident submarine off the Florida coast.

This recurrent talk of converting ICBMs or SLBMs to engage third world targets from intercontinental range will likely spur developing countries to pursue their own long range missile development. In addition, the development of ultra-high accuracy needed for conventional SLBMs could destabilize the US-Russian nuclear relationship and re-energize the qualitative nuclear arms race.

A global FTB would freeze existing ballistic missile developments, and gradually erode those holdings over time. In order to ensure that clandestine development of ballistic missiles was not occurring under the guise of space launcher tests, some special provisions would have to be made. However, an FTB would be more easily verified through satellite and aircraft reconnaissance than any other arms control agreement imaginable.

Conclusion
Each of the arms control regimes outlined above would entail costs to the great powers in terms of limiting their military options. The main question relevant to the feasibility of any of the above approaches is whether the US and Russia (and perhaps France, UK and China) are sufficiently concerned about developing country missiles and each others' missiles that they would be willing to enter into a limitation regime. That is, do they really believe that countries of concern are likely to develop and deploy long-range missiles in the next several decades; do they fear that deployment of long-range missiles by undeclared nuclear powers will have a destabilizing enough effect to warrant limiting their own options?

If the dangers posed by the spread of ballistic missiles are a great as claimed, and merit the expenditure of several billions of dollars per year on anti-missile systems, the above measures ought to be worth exploring, especially given the end of the cold war.

In addition to potentially eradicating the missile proliferation threat, near-term movement on any of these regimes would demonstrate much-needed progress on the commitment to nuclear arms reduction which the superpowers promised in the 1969 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. In 1995, adherents to the NPT will decide whether and for how long to extend that treaty.

The author is with the Federation of American Scientists, 307 Massachusetts Ave, NE, Washington D.C. 20002.

Physicists and Public Policy

H. Keith Florig

(This article is a brief synopsis of one of the invited talks at the invited symposium "Employment Issues for Physicists," held at the March 1994 APS meeting in Pittsburgh, PA.)

Technical issues play an enormous role in modern public policy decisions. Yet most policy makers lack both the time and the technical training to learn more than the rudiments of complicated yet important problems such as the effect of greenhouse gases on global climate or the effect of export controls on nuclear and missile proliferation.

Physicists can help policy makers understand these technical problems, thereby contributing to policy decisions that are more consistent and less prone to error. Public policy areas that can benefit from systematic technical analysis include environment, energy, risk management, national security, information and communications, technology transfer, and science and technology policy.

Activities that physicists might pursue range from quantitative modeling of physical and economic systems to quantitative analysis of technology-dependent systems. Opportunities for public policy-related jobs can be found inside and outside of government. A variety of fellowships are available to give science professionals an opportunity to work in the US Congress and a number of Executive Branch agencies, within some universities, and in consulting firms. Non-government organizations such as the Federation of American Scientists and the Natural Resources Defense Council have been home to physicists working on environment and international security. Opportunities abound at consulting firms that are contracted by the federal government to analyze various technical issues. Finally, some universities occasionally have open post-doctoral positions in energy, environment, or other policy-related fields.

Public policy work does not only involve analysis and writing. Like physicists, policy professionals also share their research at professional meetings. Policy work provides opportunities for many other types of public speaking ranging from giving congressional testimony, to media interviews, to talks at the local Rotary Club.

If you have never worked on policy issues before, you may wonder where to start. The best advice I can offer is to start reading about policy problems that interest you and talk to other scientists who do policy-related work for a living. Perhaps you will find yourself drawn to a particular issue and, with enough enthusiasm and diligence, will soon find yourself making a contribution. For those who prefer a more directed approach, there are many graduate schools in public policy in the US that offer one- or two-year masters programs.

The author is with Resources for the Future, Washington, DC

Candidate Statements

We present here the backgrounds and statements of the candidates for the offices of the Forum on Physics and Society. Election ballots are enclosed in the newsletter.

John F. Ahearne, Vice-Chair
Twenty-five years government service in the Defense Department, White House (under President Carter), Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Energy Department, and Government Accounting Office. Chair of the National Research Council Committees on Risk Communication and the Future of Nuclear Power, Co-Chair of National Research Council Committee on Opportunities in Plasma Science and Technology, Member of the National Research Council Committee on Risk Characterization and of the Reactor Panel of the Weapons Plutonium Disposition Committee of the National Research Council. US Representative and Chairman of the Program Committee for the International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA). Currently, Executive Director of Sigma Xi. Member of APS, Society of Risk Analysis, American Nuclear Society, Sigma Xi, Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and Adjunct Scholar of Resources for the Future.

Statement: The scientific community faces major public issues: why should the public fund science, what is the interaction of science and public policy, and how can science best meet future needs? For nearly 50 years physics has been seen by the public as 'the' science, only recently replaced by biology. FPS is an opportunity for physicists to help develop a new paradigm to replace Vannevar Bush's "Science: The Endless Frontier." The physics community can take the lead in meeting the issues which have been raised by Congressman George Brown, Senator Barbara Mikulski, Frank Press, and others. Also, population growth, the widening split between the rich and poor countries, the push for development, and pollution of the environment are initial conditions that have placed the world on a trajectory that will lead to unfavorable results in the middle of the next century. However, science can modify the initial conditions. There is a need for physicists (and all scientists) to devote some of their time to these issues. Other major issues involve changes in the former Soviet Union, related questions of former weapons scientists and radioactive contamination of the Russian weapons complex, the US defense transition, especially of the weapons labs and industrial defense labs, and new models for PhD education. Our Forum can be the APS venue for such discussions.

Caroline L. Herzenberg, Vice-Chair
Physicist at Argonne National Laboratory. Ph.D. in physics from the University of Chicago. Taught at Illinois Institute of Technology, the University of Illinois Medical Center, and California State University at Fresno, and worked as a research physicist at ITT Research Institute. Fellow of both the APS and the AAAS. Chaired the APS Committee on the Status of Women in Physics and served as FPS Secretary-Treasurer. Organized and chaired a variety of invited science and society sessions at both APS and AAAS meetings.

Statement: FPS has a uniquely valuable role in providing physicists with an arena in which to examine and discuss the influences of physics and society on each other. FPS helps the physics community consider policy issues and understand and respond to the significant challenges that American science is now facing. We can be proud of our excellent newsletter, the many outstanding symposia that FPS has organized at APS meetings, the numerous special studies we have organized, and many other endeavors. I want our Forum to continue these valuable activities, and to continue its important role of enabling APS members to examine and participate in issues mutually affecting physics and society. With the major problems facing our profession, the FPS role is in many ways even more important for physicists than it has been in the past. As vice-chair, I would work with the executive committee and FPS members to identify and raise important issues, to strengthen and facilitate our means of addressing issues, and to further efforts to develop new approaches to understanding and resolving contemporary issues impacting physics and society.

Paul P. Craig, Secretary/Treasurer
Professor Emeritus in the Applied Science Department at UC Davis (as of July 1994, due to UC's "golden handshake" windfall). Continue to teach and serve as Chairman of the UC Davis Graduate Group in Ecology's Environmental Policy Emphasis Area. Interests are in social decision-making on issues with large technological components. Recent work is on environmental accounting systems appropriate for intergenerational time frames, for use in the global warming and rad-waste management debates. BA Haverford (1954), PhD Cal Tech (1959). Worked at Los Alamos and Brookhaven. Physics career mostly in cryogenics and the Moessbauer Effect. Worked in Washington DC on energy policy, and at UC since 1975. Served as FPS Chairman a half dozen years back.

Statement: Our Forum plays a unique role within APS of providing a meeting ground for physicistsinterested in using their physics background in non-conventional social policy areas. FPS serves both as a support group for physicists who have moved into such areas, and as a way for physicists considering changing their careers to learn what others are doing and to get their feet wet. All indicators suggest that interest in career changes will continue to grow, and that increasing numbers of physicists will use their physics training in non-traditional ways. FPS is on the right track. The job of the Secretary-Treasurer is to help keep it there.

Michael I. Sobel, Secretary/Treasurer
Professor of Physics at Brooklyn College of CUNY, member of Doctoral Faculty of CUNY, Board of Directors of Long Island Alliance for Peaceful Alternatives, member of FAS, UCS, UCS Speaker's Burea. PhD Harvard 1964. Research on nuclear theory, few-nucleon problems, heavy ion collisions. NATO Postdoctoral and Senior Fellowships. Visiting positions at the Niels Bohr Institute, Weizmann Institute, Hahn Meitner Institute, Center for Energy and Environmental Studies, Princeton, others. Authored Light, a book for a general audience, developed and taught courses on energy, on the nuclear arms race, and (for the Ford Colloquium) on science and civilization. FPS executive committee and other committees. Organized an FPS symposium on missile technologies. Current interests: collaboration with faculty in science education in developing an NSF-supported hands-on curriculum for elementary education majors; science education in elementary schools; new national math education standards; critique of math instruction from the perspective of science teaching for both scientists and non-scientists.

Statement: The Secretary/Treasurer should take the lead in Forum funding issues, especially in view of the reduced APS contribution. It may be worth approaching some of the numerous small foundations for support, e.g. for a particular Forum program that falls within a foundation's area of interest. Forum activities will follow the interests of active members as in the past. In my experience, the short courses that the Forum has sponsored have been particularly valuable. I would also encourage a program to prepare accounts of science and society issues for nonscientists and for public school teachers. Negative and distorted views of science and of its impact on society have become widespread in the academic world. College politics being what it is, these views are not likely to affect the science curriculum, but they do have an insidious effect on student attitudes. I think FPS may play a role here, not only in demonstrating good science, but also by documenting the growth of anti-science.

Tony Fainberg, Forum Councillor
PhD UC Berkeley 1969, research in experimental high energy physics at LBL, CERN, Brookhaven, Research Assistant Professor at Syracuse University. Switched to applied research in 1977, joining a Brookhaven group working on nuclear safeguards and nonproliferation. APS Congressional Science Fellow in 1983, working for a year as a Senator's legislative aide, then permanently relocated to Washington, becoming a staff member and now Senior Associate of the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment (OTA). Worked on many technical issues at OTA including ballistic missile defenses, terrorism and nuclear proliferation. Currently studying the role of technology in international peace support operations. Past FPS Chair and a member of the APS Panel on Public Affairs.

Statement: The past few years have seen major changes in world politics and in the public's view of science and scientists. The end of a bipolar world has removed a major argument to heavily fund scientific research. Thus, the scientific community must rapidly adjust to new realities. We always knew there were other reasons to fund science; we must now articulate these more effectively. Economic competitiveness is one argument, but if we rely on it too strongly politicians will emphasize engineering rather than science. The community will have to emphasize that it is vital to maintain a scientific infrastructure, e.g. to support university and college laboratories, while not overproducing new PhDs in areas of limited work opportunities. The SSC debacle has taught us that unlimited shopping lists are not always requited; we will have to reset our sights accordingly. Astronomers were able to prioritize their wish lists and physicists may have to as well. Finally, while "strategic research" has become a shibboleth in the research community, we had better get used to the idea that some research funding will be targeted in this time of fiscal constraint.

Since the Councilor represents FPS on the APS Council, I suggest that FPS take a higher profile within APS, e.g. by organizing sessions at more than the current two meetings. As one of the few centripetal forces in US physics, we should try to make the divisions more aware of the need to interface with the world. We also need to generate more studies, with books as a final product, as we used to do. Further, I agree with those in our Forum who are distressed by the negative and ignorant view of science that is increasingly generated by "New Age" mystics, fundamentalist religious ideologues, deconstructionists, and old-fashioned luddites. Improved science education at all levels is one excellent approach. In addition, science's perspective needs to be more broadly communicated to the public. The APS Council should join with other societies in activities, especially via television and CD-ROM/PC, to inform the public about new scientific developments. Such opportunities should also be used to explain how and why science is done, and why it is good to try to better understand the universe.

Dietrich Schroeer, Forum Councilor
Professor of Physics, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. PhD in nuclear physics from Ohio State University, NATO postdoctoral fellowship at the Technical University in Munich, Fulbright and NEH Fellowships at Deutsche Museum in Munich, Research Associate at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, Visiting Professor at the Department of War Studies at King's College in London, and APS Fellow. Organized various FPS symposia and short courses, often with AAPT, on teaching physics-and-society courses, on the physics and technology of the nuclear arms race (AIP Proceedings #104 and #178), and other topics. Secretary/Treasurer and Vice-Chair and Chair of the Forum, 1980-84 and 1986-88 respectively. Developed and taught courses on the relationship between science and society, resulting in the textbooks Physics and its Fifth Dimension: Society (Addison Wesley, 1972, AIP-US Steel Science Writing Award) and Science, Technology and the Nuclear Arms Race (Wiley, 1984). Current research is on arms races in conventional weapons, including the transfer, dual use, and conversion of military technologies.

Statement: FPS's primary role should be to help the physics community understand and respond to the significant outside challenges it is now facing--challenges about the relationship between basic and applied research and between physics and other sciences, and about the input physicists can have into public-policy debates. Although our Forum should not impose conclusions, it can stimulate and facilitate discussions. FPS is also the home within the APS of who are following some alternative physics career path. It should be supportive of these teachers, applied scientists, policy analysts, and administrators, and help improve their integration into the physics community. The Forum Councilor plays four roles related to these Forum functions: (1) representing the Forum on the APS Council, (2) monitoring Council activities and reporting them to the Forum, (3) participating in FPS governance as an executive committee member, and (4) participating in APS governance as a Council member. (1) I would be able to represent FPS because of my long-time participation in its activities, and because of my understanding of its role within the APS. One critical issue coming up in the Council is FPS funding. This funding needs to be preserved. To ensure the broadest participation, APS members should continue to be allowed to join the Forum at no charge, yet APS should provide enough funds to the Forum to let it operate at a reasonable level. (2) I can make useful reports back to the Forum because my science-policy experience will help me understand how the Council works. (3) I could make a useful contribution to the FPS Executive Committee, as proven by my long-term active FPS participation. (4) My long-time interest in science policy would allow me to make a useful contribution as a Council member.

Steve Fetter, Executive Committee
Associate professor, School of Public Affairs, University of Maryland; teaches and writes about scientific aspects of security, energy, and environmental policy. Previously special assistant to the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy, Council on Foreign Relations Fellow at the State Department, postdoctoral fellow at Harvard UniversityUs Center for Science and International Affairs, and the first Rarms control fellowS at LLNL. PhD in energy and resources from UC Berkeley, and S.B. in physics from MIT.

Statement: I no longer consider myself to be a practicing physicist, in the sense of working to extend the state-of-the-art in a particular field of physics. I do, however, make constant use of my physics training to understand security and environmental problems and to analyze potential policy solutions. It is essential to ensure, through our teaching, research, and outreach activities, that current and future policy makers know enough about the scientific dimensions of security and environmental issues that they are able to ask the right questions and craft sensible policies, and that they understand both the promise and the limits of scientific knowledge and technology. FPS has made valuable contributions in this regard in the past, particularly in security policy, and I would work to keep it relevant in the future, especially in the areas of energy and environmental policy.

Laurie Fathe, Executive Committee
Assistant Professor of Physics at Occidental College since 1989. APS Congressional Science Fellow; 1993, as science advisor to Congresswoman Anna Eshoo and working for the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee. Member of APS Panel on Public Affairs, 1994. Member of 1994 APS Congressional Fellow Selection Committee. Current research includes laser-surface interactions and science policy. Senior Faculty on Los Angeles Collaborative for Teacher Excellence, a multi-year, multi-million dollar program to revise pre-service training for math and science teachers. Past executive board member of the LA Chapter of the Sierra Club (66,000 members) and also of its Charitable Foundation.

Statement: The Administration's document Science in the National Interest states that "This country must sustain world leadership in science, mathematics, and engineering if we are to meet the challenges of today...and tomorrow." The physics community must be an active participant in defining the actions that will manifest from the Administration's policy. The end of the cold war has fostered a shift in priorities that will affect all scientists, perhaps physicists most of all. As the perceived need for more sophisticated weapons of destruction is displaced by concerns for health and the environment, so will the perceived need for physics be displaced. Our Forum is the ideal body to examine this sea change, and determine strategies for dealing with it. One strategy is to inform young physicists about the situation, and offer advice and assistance on multiple career paths. Another strategy is to better educate those who formulate the broad policies affecting the community. The entire physics community must become more aware and more involved with society and government. The persistent image of the scientist in an ivory tower retains a basis in reality; but it can no longer be supported. The same society that provides the dollars to support our research now demands tangible returns on that investment. This accountability should not mean that every research project must yield a marketable product, but it may mean that fields must think harder about why what they do is important to the world, and how a decreasing funding base can be distributed within the community. FPS can also be a bridge to the broader community of physicists who have branched out into associated areas like biophysics, geophysics, engineering, and environmental science. We need the perspective and the council of all our members. In this vein, FPS can address the concerns of the less strongly represented members of our community, and help give voice to their unique perspectives. With the input of the entire community, FPS can continue addressing a broader range of concerns and embodying a wider viewpoint. FPS can serve physics and the general society by motivating discussion, encouraging debate and analysis, and distributing the points made. Isn't that what our Forum is all about?

Alex deVolpi, Executive Committee
APS Fellow, sponsored by FPS, for contributions to arms control verification and public enlightenment on the consequences of modern technology. Elected to national council of Federation of American Scientists (1988-92). Active in arms control issues for over 30 years: Participant, joint FAS/NRDC projects with Soviets/FSU on nuclear-warhead dismantlement (1985-); Co-founder of Concerned Argonne Scientists; Member, Executive Committee, Chicago Alliance to End Repression (1969-1985); retired Lt. Commander USNR; physics PhD, Virginia Polytechnic Institute. Argonne National Laboratory physicist; technical manager for physics and engineering, ANL Arms Control and Nonproliferation Program; principal investigator for treaty verification analysis and technology; nuclear-weapons detection and counting, non-destructive evaluation, foreign verification technology, on-site inspection, radiation detectors, Pu demilitarization. Author of book Proliferation, Plutonium, and Policy and co-author of Born Secret: The H-Bomb, the Progressive Case, and National Security.

Statement: My current extracurricular and professional activities are focused on preventing a recurrence of the Cold War and cleaning up its debris, with particular attention to nuclear weapons and plutonium. This seems to irritate DOE officials. Twice in the past year my articles on nuclear issues have been banned through unjustified classification (and confiscation of my computer and files): first, an encyclopedic update describing public information on nuclear weapons; and now a document and article on the subject of demilitarization of plutonium. In previous Administrations I had been blackballed from DOE projects because of attendance at NRDC/FAS meetings on nuclear disarmament. From my viewpoint, the APS should continue to conduct independent qualified evaluations of technical-policy issues, particularly to keep pressure on the elimination of surplus nuclear weapons and materials. For example, the NAS has described a standard for nuclear fuel rod self-protection; but what would be an equivalent standard for messing up plutonium so it couldn't be replaced in existing nuclear-weapons casings? Rather than keep weapons-conformable plutonium around for many decades, preventing its quick substitution in proven weapons designs might be possible in the meantime. In order to evaluate public-policy on sensitive subjects, residual Cold-War-secrecy by the DOE classification bureaucracy will need to be decreased, and professional societies will have to continually defend scientific inquiry.

Daniel M. Kammen, Executive Committee
Assistant Professor and Co-chair of the Science, Technology & Public Policy Program in the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University. Research on energy resource management, technology policy and environmental issues in developing nations. Interests include gender and community based development, technology transfer, risk assessment, and regional and global environmental change. Weizmann Postdoctoral Fellow at Cal Tech 1988-91, Post-doctoral fellow and Lecturer in Physics at Harvard prior to current position at Princeton. Currently also a Research Fellow of the African Academy of Sciences, and a Visiting Lecturer in the Physics Department of the University of Nairobi, directing a field program on sustainable development. This program, supported by UNESCO, trains 30-60 African researchers, community activists, and students each year in technical and policy areas of energy management and development. Author of over 50 publications, featured on NPR and BBC radio, and PBS and NHK (Japan) television. Received the 1993 21st Century Earth Award, recognizing contributions to rural development and environmental conservation. Elected a 1994 APS Fellow, sponsored by FPS. Physics B.A. in 1984 from Cornell, M.A. in 1986, and physics PhD in 1988 from Harvard.

Statement: The past few years have seen our Forum evolve and diversify the dialog on the relationship between physics and society. This process must continue with FPS playing a greatly expanded role both to foster interdisciplinary research, and to inform physicists and non-physicists about the technical content of emerging issues of social and policy importance. One way to do this involves publishing topical issues of Physics and Society and providing them to an audience beyond the APS community. These expanded special issues or supplements would provide technical background and contrasting views on topics such as the measures and meaning of risk assessments, the environmental impacts of new materials, methods to diversify physics education, and discrimination in the natural and physical sciences. One use of these documents would be as educational memos for public officials. Further, FPS could coordinate outreach efforts to contact a wide variety of educational, industry, and policy organizations that could benefit from technical advising, also leading naturally to new ways for Forum members to address social problems. A second critical FPS role is to not only to encourage, but to take action to increase, the ethnic and intellectual diversity and gender balance in physics and related fields. Schools could introduce disadvantaged students to the problems of science and technology in which FPS members are active. We could also work to obtain sponsorship for fellowships for physical scientists wishing to train and teach at the primary and secondary level. Success in these efforts would then suggest additional avenues to increase and support diversity within the physics community, and to expand our Forum's utility to the wider community.

Today Then: America's best minds look 100 years into the future on the occasion of the 1893 World's Colombian Expositions

Compiled and introduced by Dave Walter

American and World Geographic Pub. Co., 1992, ISBN 1-56037-024-6, paper, pp. 226

One of the standard jobs of the policy analyst is speculation. "What if" scenarios are a main stock-in-trade. Thus it's fun, and humbling, to read how leaders in 1893 imaged America today. How wrong they were! The 1893 Colombian Exposition in Chicago celebrated the 400th anniversary of Columbus' arrival. It was an optimistic age, and the Exposition a landmark event. As a part of it, 74 prestigious Americans were asked to speculate about the future. Here, I've focused mostly on technology.

Transportation and electricity are major themes. Westinghouse Corporation founder George Westinghouse (1846-1914) believed in trains: "Experiments have shown that, with a perfect brake acting under the most perfect conditions, it is impossible to procure a greater retarding effect than would be equivalent to stopping a train going at the rate of 3 miles an hour in a second of time. It is, therefore, easy to make a computation of the effect of such a brake upon a train running 90 miles an hour within 1000 feet. ...A steady speed of 40 miles per hour would enable a train to run from New York to Chicago in a little over 20 hours and with greater economy and far less danger. It is my impression, therefore, that railway travel in the next century will take on this development rather than high rates of speed. ...I am also satisfied that the immense cost of furnishing power for electric railways, which some persons seem to think can secure and maintain a speed of 100 miles and hour and more, will make such a development commercially unprofitable. Although there is no doubt that electricity as a motive power for passenger traffic will be extensively used in the next century."

Charles Foster, said to have amassed his fortune in the banking and petroleum industries, saw electricity and trains as the energy and transportation forms of the future: "One hundred years from now, the people of the United States will be traveling at a rate of 100 miles per hour...on electrical railways. ...To be conservative and within the limits of the probable, I will estimate that in the year 1993 it will be a common thing to travel form New York to Chicago in 7 or 8 hours. ...I remember reading...that Thomas A. Edison, the greatest genius of this century, says that electricity is terrestrial magnetism and that the universe is full of it. ...Edison believes electricity may be pumped out of the earth, or the sea, or the air, just as water is pumped out of a stream" (p. 59). How Foster profited from oil is not indicated; he surely doesn't mention it as an energy form of the future. Most likely his main business interest was kerosene for heating.

Electrical engineer John J Carty was "inclined to think that the development of the trolley railroad is going to be one of the mightiest factors in the urban civilization of the next century. ...It may solve some of the problems of overcrowding that have vexed the social economists. And, on the other hand, it may give to those who live in rural districts just that relief and recreation of which they are now deprived and which they so greatly desire".(p. 167).

Thomas Alva Edison's innovations had elevated electricity to special status. "Tesla has discovered that an electric current...may be passed from one conductor to another, without any intermediary connection, like a wire. ...The possibilities which lie in this discovery are simply enormous...for instance, it may be a powerful influence in the conduct of wars. ...It might be possible to direct [electric current] from a proper motor on shore to the iron sides of a great war vessel. This might be done with such intensity as instantly to melt the iron or steel plates, as though they had been struck by lightning. ...The use of the flashlight and great electric reflectors is sure to be very general in military operations in the next century" [Carty, p. 169].

John Ingalls, a judge and later US Senator, saw dirigibles replacing trains: "Man, having conquered the earth and the sea, will complete his dominion over nature by the subjugation of the atmosphere. ...Long before 1993, the journey from New York to San Francisco, and from New York to London, will be made between the sunrise and sunset of a single day. The railway and the steamship will be as obsolete as the stagecoach. And it will be as common for the citizen to call for his dirigible as it now for his buggy or his boots" [p. 144].

A forecast for the future of aluminum proved more prescient. John Clark Ridpath, Editor in Chief of the 25 volume "Ridpath Library of Universal Literature" wrote that "The present civilization of the world is founded on iron. ...Just as stone and bronze have given place to iron, so shall iron give place to aluminum. ...The age of power and conquest shall give rise to an age of glory and enlightenment. Aluminum will be the shining symbol of that age."

This was an age of servants, at least for the wealthy. Almost no one thought this might change: "Women will be financially independent of man, and this will materially lesson crime. No longer obliged to rifle her husband's pockets for money, she will not give birth to kleptomaniacs or thieves. ...The government will establish colleges for the training of servants. ...Better instructed...and more plentiful, the servant of the next century will be more useful" [Ella Wheeler Wilcox, p. 37].

Affluence and peace were anticipated: "By the end of the Twentieth Century, taxation will be reduced to a minimum, the entire world will be open to trade, and there will be no need of a standing army" [Erastus Wiman]. So too was television: "Each reasonably well-to-do man [and there will be lots of them in the 1990s] will have a telephote [sic] in his residence. By means of this device, the entertainment of any place of amusement in that city may be seen as well as heard" [Octavus Cohen].

Some omissions seem impossible to understand. The work of James Clerk Maxwell (1831-1879) seems unknown or irrelevant. Automobiles and road systems are absent. So too are aircraft. Though 34 years had elapsed since "Colonel" Edwin Drake's well hit oil in Titusville, PA, oil is a bit-player and the idea that oil would soon dominate the nation's energy was beyond imagination.

Today Then closes with an essay "All prophecy is futile." In it journalist J. H. Beadle pontificates that "One thing may be said with tolerable certainty: Not one of [these forecasts] will be verified in its essential details." Beadle's skepticism failed to deter him from his own forecast: "It is possible--nay, it is quite probable--that the next invention will be a method of storing energy, so it can be shipped in small packages and applied wherever wanted. ...In that case, Niagara Falls may supply power to run the manufactories of Texas. ...The farmer may plow his fields and heat his dwelling with a storage battery no bigger than a common brick."

Maybe so--perhaps in 2093!

Paul P. Craig
Department of Applied Science,
University of California
Davis, CA 95616

Upcoming Sessions and a New Open Forum

Topic (not necessarily the title) Organizer Sponsors
March
Jobs and Education Tony Nero FPS, FED
Energy Efficiency in Buildings David Goldstein FPS
Sustainable Technologies Tina Kaarsberg FPS
Debunking Pseudo-Science Larry Rubin FPS, GIMS
April
Forum Awards Session Tony Nero FPS
North Korea-Nuclear Aspects T. Fainberg, P. Zimmerman FPS, FIP
Alternative Careers in Physics Brian Schwartz FPS
Human Radiation Experiments Mark Goodman FPS, FHP
International Physics David Kelland FPS, FIP

Phys Dept Site Visits to Improve the Climate for Women

What is the Value of Science?

M. Dresselhaus CSWP, AAPT, FED

The Forum on Physics and Society (FPS) is sponsoring, or co-sponsoring, or cooperating on, several invited sessions at the March APS meeting in San Jose and the April APS/AAPT meeting in Washington, DC. Here is the latest information about these sessions:

New open forums. Our Forum will try something new at the March session on "Jobs and Education," and probably also at the April sessions on "What is the Value of Science?" and "Women in Physics." The invited speakers will give very brief talks intended to frame the questions and points of view about the topic, and the bulk of the session will then turn into a forum where members of the audience or panel can pose questions, make statements, or respond to questions or statements of others. Comments and questions will be limited to three minutes. The Forum on Physics and Society plans to transcribe these discussions in order to initiate a broader continuing discussion among APS members over the internet.

Call for Nominations for APS Fellowship

It's time again to think about who should be honored with APS fellowship for distinguished work of interest to the Forum on Physics and Society. The 1994 fellowship awardees were Frederick Bernthal, Anthony Fainberg, Daniel Kammen, Joseph Martinez, and Thomas Neff. Nomination forms are in the APS News for January 1994, pp. 8-10. If you cannot locate that edition of the APS News, then please request a form from the Office of the APS Executive Secretary, 301-209-3268. Send the filled-out form directly to the APS Executive Secretary, who will in turn send the nominations for candidates working in areas of physics-and-society to our Forum's Fellowship Committee for consideration. Nominations must be received by April 1 for consideration in the current year. When you send your nomination to APS, please also send a copy to the Chair of our Forum Fellowship Committee, Edward Gerjuoy, Department of Physics, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260. Contact Edward Gerjuoy if you have any questions, at 412-624-9099, fax 412-624-9163, email GERJUOY@vms.cis.pitt.edu.

Conference Report: NRC Science and Society Workshop*

During the second weekend of June, the National Research Council's Commission on Physical Sciences, Mathematics, and Applications held a workshop on science and society in Vail, Colorado. The roughly 40 participants came not only from the laboratory, but also from backgrounds in business, media, government, and academia (including legal anthropology, philosophy, and policy science). The workshop consisted of invited presentations followed by both large and small discussion groups. The general goal of the workshop was to examine the interaction and relationship between the research community, government, and society. What actions should be taken "to transform changes in the environment for science from problems into opportunities?" The issues involved are diverse and the discussions were correspondingly wide-ranging. However, the inter-related themes of communication and sustainability seemed to pervade the weekend.

The workshop began with a discussion of the changing societal context for science. Although the achievements of science are widely considered to have been the key to winning the cold war, the place of science in the new world order of economic competitiveness seems less certain. The public's faith in the ability of science to solve pressing problems is diminishing, while distrust of elite institutions, including science, is increasing. Federal budgets for all activities, including science, will continue to be tight for the foreseeable future.

"Sustainable science" was suggested as an appropriate new paradigm, sustainable science being defined as: (1) enhancing society's capabilities, including the ability to further science, and (2) enhancing science's potential to make further contributions to society. Thus, sustainable science is automatically relevant to society. Changes need to be made to protect present strengths while making science more productive for society. The need for better communication with the public was often mentioned. Public faith in science can be renewed by honestly but avidly communicating the benefits of science and avoiding the overselling of what can be accomplished. The communication must go both ways, with scientists listening to public viewpoints and concerns.

Even though scientific literacy in this country is extremely low, public interest in science is still surprisingly high. This interest is a reservoir of support that the science community must not drain without working on replenishment. Perhaps every scientist should consider communicating with non-scientists his or her second job. In any event, academic scientists need to be rewarded for such service work as well as for classroom teaching and research.

Rather than specialized training, a science degree should be considered general education for a technological age. At the graduate level, Ph.D. programs may need to be modified so that graduates are prepared for nontraditional careers involving use of their knowledge of science. On the workshop's final day the participants discussed a number of specific suggestions for where to go from here. Perhaps the most important point was that this sort of dialogue should continue, so that the science community can reassess and restructure its relationship to society.

*A report will be forthcoming from the NRC on its regional science-and-society workshops held in Vail and in Burlingame CA. This article does not necessarily represent the views of the National Academy of Sciences or of the workshop's sponsors. The Vail workshop was cosponsored by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the University of Colorado, and UCAR's Walter Orr Roberts Institute.

On Being an APS Congressional Fellow, and the Job Market

It's been six years now since I received a Ph.D. in physics. In those days, it wasn't trivial to get a job--there were 10 other applicants for the research faculty job I got--but it was doable. Now I hear there are hundreds of applicants for each academic physics job. This and the cancellation of the SSC makes me worry that my Ph.D. in experimental high energy physics has lost value on the labor market.

While I firmly believe that a Ph.D. in physics offers something more than specialized training for an academic career in that sub-field, breaking out of specialization requires extra work. But most of those with a degree in my field will have to do so. AIP statistics show that even before the SSC was cancelled, 75% of Ph.D.s in particle physics left that field after doing postdoctoral work.

I began the process of leaving high energy physics by applying for an American Physical Society Congressional Science Fellowship. I had to be able to explain how my physics Ph.D. experience was relevant to something which seemingly was completely different. But I won the fellowship as a physicist judged by physicists. My experience searching for a job at the end of the fellowship inspired me to do some creative thinking about how physics research experience is applicable outside physics. Now, as a member of the Forum on Physics and Society's Executive Committee, I find this is a topic of great general interest to new physics Ph.Ds.

As a Fellow in the office of Senator Pete V. Domenici, where my duties and responsibilities were like those of most of his other aides, I gained a new perspective on the relative importance of my various skills. Probably the most important physics skill I used during the fellowship was asking questions. This seems to be a primary activity for members of Congress. They ask questions in hearings--for the record, in letters, and in briefings. But while it was an advantage to have a physicist's confidence in asking questions, I had to learn that a normal style of questioning for a physicist may appear rude and threatening for a Congressional staffer.

Another skill I used was being sensitive to politics. That is politics with a small "p" as in turf battles and office politics. This is far more important in Congressional offices that big P (Democrat and Republican) politics. As someone who had been part of experimental high energy physics groups, I already understood the concepts of "turf" and rivalry between groups. A key skill was learning to represent someone else. When a Congressional aide expresses an opinion it is taken to be the opinion of his or her boss. I had to be careful not to express my own opinion (if my boss's was unknown or different). As a physicist from a large collaboration I may have had a similar feeling at a conference right before we were to announce a result. But such instances were rare and even then I would have been representing the group of which I was a member, not my boss.

The most important skill I had to develop was to be a translator between my boss and scientists. This was especially difficult when I had to face the extremely politicized (for a scientific topic) issue of global climate change. I learned from this experience that policy makers use and trust information differently than physicists. Senator Domenici was named to the official delegations which were to observe the United Nations negotiations for a Framework Convention on Climate Change and the negotiations for the "Earth Summit". He asked me to prepare him a briefing book on global warming. My first attempt, full of tables, charts and diagrams, was an utter failure. A fellow staffer advised me to first give him my judgement of the issue and recommendation for action, then write only about one or two of the "facts" which were most important to me, and finally, to quote from experts to whom I had spoken in person. This last task was made much easier by Senator Gore. As the chair of both delegations he held briefings almost weekly at which expert scientists, such as Bob Watson from NASA, and high-level people, such as the head of the Earth Summit and the Science Advisor to the President of Brazil (who was also Brazil's Environment Minister), briefed the delegations. I usually attended on Domenici's behalf. This approach worked much better. In the end I was able to give the Senator what I thought was a reasonably objective consensus view of global warming, but he listened because I believed in it.

From this experience I decided that my physics training had actually hampered my communication with the Senator. Being a physicist accustomed to purely technical arguments, I at first thought that his "gut" approach was irrational and uninformed. Policymakers, however, do have a structured way of obtaining and prioritizing information--it is based not on any disciplinary training (Senators who deal with many broad issues are far too busy to develop much expertise), but rather their judgement of people, and who they know and where they come from. Physicists might tend to listen more to a Nobel prize winner, but most would not admit it or even be particularly aware of it. Since those aides and Congressional advisors I met during my fellowship seemed extremely intelligent and knowledgeable, their method works better than many scientists would expect.

So how does this all tie back into the job situation for physicists? First, as a practical matter, having been a Congressional Fellow is another "union card" on top of my Ph.D. But more importantly, I learned to adapt physics experience and develop skills useful for providing technical information to any policymaker. Maybe it is because I now have kids and worry about the world they will inherit, but after my fellowship I wanted a career that involved using science in areas more immediately applicable to the tremendous health, economic, energy and environmental needs of this country and this planet.

The Congressional Science Fellowship is important because it recognizes, supports and rewards scientists whose skill is in translating to policymakers. I'm not saying everyone should get into policy, but there are some major problems looming which will need all of us--scientists, engineers, policymakers, and those affected by the problems--to work together. We will need more translators.

Tina Kaarsberg
7101 Woodland Avenue
Takoma Park, MD 20912

Education in Global Change, Part 2

[The following article is the second installment of a paper presented at the Rio Followup Conference on Science Education in Global Change, held in Eger, Hungary, 22-27 August 1994. It will be published in the Proceedings of that conference, and is reprinted here by permission. The first installment appeared in the October 1994 issue, and the third and last installment will appear in a later issue.] Do include ozone depletion and global warming in your science courses. They are great science teaching vehicles, they are important issues, and they are a fine example of something called the "precautionary principle."

Begin with ozone depletion. By treating it historically, bring out its social dimensions while still focusing on the fascinating science. The societal history of this issue is in a sense finished: Because of the Ozone Treaty, humankind has done nearly all the damage it is going to do to the ozone layer. The treaty is a revolutionary victory for human rationality, representing responsible action taken on the basis of the scientific investigation of a global environmental issue.

And yet--and yet--we have waited too long: The ozone layer is wounded and will not soon recover. During the recovery, humankind may suffer millions of excess skin cancers and hundreds of thousands of excess cancer deaths, not to mention damage to other natural systems such as the micro-organisms that stand at the base of the Antarctic food chain.

But we acted so well on the Ozone Treaty! How can we have gone so wrong? The answer is that we were not sufficiently cautious in the early days of chlorofluorocarbons, the days when air-conditioning made boom-towns out of places like Houston and Dallas and facilitated our modern cathedrals--the shopping malls. While we were all out shopping, the CFCs were slipping up to the stratosphere, and the ozone layer sprang a grim surprise.

Perhaps, in the future, we will heed:

5. The precautionary principle: Be conservative. Technologies of uncertain risk should be presumed harmful until proven otherwise, in order for society to avoid being surprised.

It's a simple and powerful idea, and it could save us new calamities: Better to be safe than sorry. Better to purchase insurance, even though it might never be needed, than to risk burning your house down. Most of us follow this principle in our personal lives, but we have not yet begun to apply it globally.

Now you are ready to present, to your students, the global warming problem. Again, the science is fascinating. Unlike ozone depletion, global warming is still in its infancy. Because it contains many scientific and societal uncertainties, the applicable principle is: Purchase the insurance.

Don't be overly negative. The good news is that the disasters are avoidable if we get busy, that the solutions involve individual actions that are not necessarily difficult, and that the wise application of technology can provide a route to worldwide prosperity. The path to this bright future has two parts: First, we must begin basing our actions on the world as we actually observe it rather than as we imagine it. And second, before acting, we must think hard about that observed world and the consequences of our actions.

In other words, we must follow something approximating the scientific method. This is surely an idea that we should be teaching to all our students:

6. Because careful observation coupled to creative intellect can guide us toward a prosperous future, scientific methodology must be part of everybody's education.

For example, behold the automobile. It provides great physics examples, and even greater societal examples. We do love our cars. Our love of mobility surely has biological roots. Yet the automobile is behind the pollution and congestion that strangle our cities, behind the oil resource issues that bedevil our foreign policy, and behind the deaths of hundreds of thousands per year by accidents and by pollution. That data is part of the real world of the automobile, yet the public hardly notices.

Nearly every energy analyst who has studied this problem has recommended incentives for alternative transportation, and disincentives (such as high gasoline taxes) for automobiles. This is the solution that scientific methodology suggests. Getting out of our cars would go a long way toward alleviating global warming and other problems. It is not terribly difficult, and some would even say that it would heighten the quality of our lives, to get out of our cars and find healthier alternatives. The problem lies in getting large numbers of people to accept this easy and even pleasant solution. In the US at least, old customs of mobility and freedom prevail, and the rational and easy solution is not taken. The rational solution is, I repeat, easy and even pleasant. The difficulty lies in motivating large numbers of people to change their automobile habits, habits that are actually difficult and expensive and even unpleasant (e.g. being stalled in traffic or searching for a parking space), and follow the rational solution. Therein lies our dilemma.

Will exposure of our citizens to the observations, data, hypotheses, conclusions, predictions, theories, open-mindedness, rationality, and amazing successes of science help to resolve such social issues? --In a word: yes.

Modern culture came to us on the wings of science, and if its problems are to be solved at all, they will be solved by the methods of science. Now, science is rather demanding. It asks us to give up our age-old intuitions, and accept odd new principles such as "a body that is subject to no external influences will move with constant speed in a straight line." Who ever heard of such a thing? It's a very strange idea, which is why science historian Herbert Butterfield describes the law of inertia as the greatest intellectual breakthrough in history. The law of inertia is non-intuitive, in just the way that a clear-headed societal analysis of the automobile is non-intuitive. In both cases, I opt for rationality rather than intuition.

Art Hobson