So They Say

People on the Private Side I set up the [National Cancer Institute’s biological response modification program beginning in 1980, and I left in February of 1984, and during that time I actually was trying to get more private involvement, to get a closer interface with the biotechnology industry, to get rotating scientists in from outside to try to open up and liberalize some of the viewpoints within the N.C.I. system.... They almost totally rejected it. It was a real closed shop in terms of thought processes. Many of the people have been there all their lives. They’ve spent very little time at the university and virtually none in the private sector. So they’re very focused on what they do at the N.I.H. or N.C.I., and I think they have a little trouble seeing the forest for the trees. They’re very suspicious that things done outside have somehow got a prurient kind of goal and that they really are the white knights. I think they need to get up off that viewpoint and look over the horizon and see that there are good people on the private side. —Robert K. Oldham “Pro & Con: Federal Labs: Might a Link to Industry Aid Research?” The New York Times, Sec. 4, p. 4, February 7, 1988 [NASA’s Solar System Exploration Committee director David] Morrison said that the first objective of NASA science policy ought to be to learn more about comets, moons, rings and asteroids. Morrison’s advice makes sense in light of a long-term goal of commercializing the natural resources of space. The 1986 National Commission on Space report said that one of the best ways to get a return on our investment is to harvest the natural resources locked in the asteroids, and there is a groundswell of support for the vision of NASA as an agency that exists to assist commercial ventures into space. The real future of space in the coming millennium will not be found by passing the hat to taxpayers, but in venture capital, under the protection and guidance of a more mature, more realistic outgrowth of today’s NASA. Isn’t it ironic that the Soviets, with their Phobos mission and their anticipated asteroid exploration mission in the 1990s, will reap the rewards of yet another first in space, and will, in fact, show us how capitalism can one day thrive in space? —Mitch Gould Viewpoint: Probing the Phobian Storehouse” Space World, p. 39 December 1987 Game [T]he greater the number of [AIDSJ researchers, the greater the number who will not themselves succeed in hitting the scientific jackpot. Therefore, the greater will be the number of also-rans likely to pooh-pooh the ‘Eureka!’ claims of the actual winner. Indeed, the spread... [ofAIDS] canbe seen as but one of the many problematic legacies of the age of belief that more equals better. That philoso phy is designed to test the human body and brain to their limits. It is only by exceeding the limits that we discover there are limits, and thence deduce the levels of human activity that may be regarded as healthy, and ‘safe’. There can be no cure for [AIDS] until these limits are understood and accepted by the human population. And there are so many people researching cures and palliatives rather than basic prevention, and so many people dependent on goods and services which ignore the basic limits, that a scientific researcher who produces the scientifically reasoned case for observing the limits tends to find that her results are barred from the scientific literature. —J.M. Pick Letter to the Editor The Listener, p.18 January 28, 1988 Stop the Inhumanity With anticipation I waited in my office for the telephone call that would enable me to rebut the accusations made by Ingrid Newkirk, National Director of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, who had condemned scientists as uncaring and unfeeling individuals who consciously treated laboratory animals inhumanely. She also spoke glowingly to her radio audience of the exploits of terrorists who infiltrate and break into laboratories to liberate animals. To my dismay, her discussion of raids was met by the host’s announcement that he would like to join her compatriots during the next raid. [I] is our responsibility to stand up for the rights of the sick and infirmed who hope for cures through discoveries employing laboratory animals... ...[I]t remains imperative for all scientists to speak up for animal research if we are to continue to work on animals.... [A]ll scientists must take the offensive, dispelling the myths trumpeted by anmal rights activists. The inhumanity of animal rights activists must be stopped. —Martin Frank “Encounter on the Airwaves” The Physiologist, pp. 265, 266 December 1987 Experiments Scientists carrying out experiments on human embryos were compared in a House of Lords debate last week to the Nazi doctors at Auschwitz. Speaking in a discussion on the recent Government White Paper on Human Fertilization and Embryology, the Earl of Lauderdale said:. “Experiments on embryos and so-called pre-embryos differ only in degree and never in kind from the sickening human vivisection done by the Nazi doctors at Auschwitz, Natzweiler and Birkenau and by the Japanese at Khandok.” The earl was, however, in a minority. Out of 21 speakers only four—including Lord Longford—came down firmly against research on embryos up to 14 days old. —Sian Griffiths “Restrictions Imposed on Embryo Experiments” The Times Higher Education Supplemeny, p. 6 January 22, 1988 A Kennedy-esque Call The Materials Science and Engineering study of the National Academy of Sciences is nearing completion. The inevitable call to fund more chemists (and every other group) out of the materials pot is what Mark Twain would have called “olds” not news. In a time of a disastrous national debt, debt service, trade deficit, and total indebtedness of hundreds of bil- lions of dollars, the time for searching, self-critical analysis is upon us. When one sees where the U.S. economy is, it is surely preposterous to claim that by doing more of what we are doing now in the universities will help the nation. As scientists and chemists is it too much to heed the Kennedy-esque call, “Ask not what the country can do for chemistry, but ask what changes the community is willing to make within itself to serve the country better?” —Rustum Roy Letter to the Editor Chemical & Engineering News, p. 3 January 18, 1988 Intervention Enduring exploitation of space will occur only under the banner of free enterprise and individual activities, which NASA (or any other government agency) cannot control and can only hamper with intervention. The disasters of government intervention will only be multiplied if our government “cooperates” with the Soviet regime. If and when our government decides to actually defend the U.S. against missile attack, the resulting space transportation technology will do much to encourage private development of space, much as World War 1 and 2 planes played roles in developing our air trans- portation technology. This should be the limit of government intervention. It does seem that ignorance can be cured, but devotion to government handouts and control still seems very difficult to cure. —Lannon Stafford Letter to the Editor Aviation Week & Space Technology, p. 90 February 1, 1988 Route Hard times in the quest for federal grants? In general, yes, and especially so for putting up university research buildings, a role shunned under Presidential policies for over a decade. But among those centers of the higher learning that took their brick-and-mortar yearnings directly to Capitol Hill, 1987 was a banner year, perhaps the greatest ever. The establishment dresses its opposition to earmarking in pious arguments about the integrity of science and the necessity of professional peer review for maintaining quality. But the reality is that, with rare exceptions, pork-barrel money is for putting up buildings from which researchers in lesser institutions can compete for peer-reviewed research grants. Without proper facilities, they are, in Catch-22 fashion, deemed unqualified to compete. Since White House pol- icy provides virtually no money for campus laboratory construction, the earmark route provides the most direct solution to the problem. —“It Was a Great Year for Pork Barrel Funding” Science & Government Report, pp. 3-4 February 1, 1988 Science Ed In order for our colleges to educate our future economic and political leaders in scientific matters, the colleges will have to involve the most important element in any liberal-arts student’s education—those few professors of literature, history or philosophy who inform the students about what is important for a full life, and inspire them to continue their intellectual development after their formal studies are complete. It may be ironic that a key to a lifelong education in science is an inspiring teacher of the humanities, but irony is a common motif in modern life. Ask any English major. —Stephen M. Cohen Letter to the Editor The Wall Street Journal, p. 25 February 4, 1988

So They Say

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