walton@csvax.caltech.edu@ametek.UUCP (12/23/86)
In Poli-Sci V6 #103, Clayton Cramer writes,
I've noticed that many of the opponents of SDI keep talking about
how many "top" scientists have signed petitions denying that SDI is
feasible. The "Nuclear Winter" hypothesis also had a similar
addendum -- 100 "top" scientists signed it. (I say "hypothesis"
because from what I've read, the assumptions involved are
idealized, and consistently idealized in a manner that finds for
"nuclear winter").
The initial results were preliminary and idealized, of course. That's
the way of science. More research shows that nuclear winter depends
to a large extent on time of year and exact geographical distribution
of attacks. Your knife cuts both ways--those employed by DoD
consistently use assumptions which minimize the dangers of nuclear
winter. Please read the last couple of years' worth of Science
magazine articles on the issue.
I'm reminded of what happened in the mid-1930s when 100 "top German
physicists" (or so they styled themselves) issued a denunciation of
"Jewish physics", aimed specifically at Einstein and relativity.
As Einstein said, "It would only have taken one, if I was wrong."
There is a big difference between this and SDI. First, it was clear
that these self-styled physicists were wrong, since anyone could
perform the experiments which proved Einstein correct. Second, it was
clear that this action was taken because of anti-Jewish prejudice, not
out of concern that taxpayers' money was being squandered. And
finally, the petition was signed at the "request" (read demand) of the
government at the time, and was not in opposition to government
policy, as the SDI petitions have been. Scientists are just as
fearful of being carted away by a totalitarian government as anyone
else, perhaps more so, since they tend to be the kind of free thinkers
such governments find troublesome.
Perhaps this is just characteristic of a collectivized approach to
things common in some circles, but this entire "group denunciation"
and "group validation" of public policy issues smacks of politics--
not science.
But that's exactly the point--the decisions now being made about SDI
are being made purely because of political reasons, not because of the
results of scientific research. No one in the Administration wants to
come out and say, "We don't know how to make nuclear weapons 'impotent
and obsolete' and we don't think it's possible," because that would
embarrass the President and cost them cushy jobs in SDIO.
Nevertheless, much comes out. Richard Perle was quoted in the Time
magazine special issue on SDI as saying, "Get rid of deterrence? Who
said anything about getting rid of deterrence?" (Your President, Dr.
Perle.) NO REPUTABLE SCIENTIST believes that a leakproof population
defense against 10,000 Soviet warheads is possible. Even a 99%
effective defense would allow 100 warheads through, ample to make the
United States extinct as a functioning political entity.
Moreover, the entire arms race is largely political. As a
writer in the Opinion section of the Nov. 9 LA Times pointed out, the
English and French have enough nuclear warheads to destroy us too, and
we don't lose much sleep over them. The Administration and the
President, as is the wont of the technologically illiterate, are
looking for a technological quick fix to get them out of a difficult
political problem which they lack the will and the ideas to solve.
Steve Walton
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