Editor's Page
The handling of uncertainty Roland Schmitt is General Electric's vice president for corporate R&D. He recently addressed a meeting of the Society of Engineers of Eastern New York. Here, verbatim, is part of what he had to say. Contrasting attitudes toward uncertainty on the part of the technologist and other citizens are, I believe, the main cause of the widening gulf between the expert and the citizen on technical questions. As citizens, we all want certainty and security—on our jobs, in our homes, in our lives. But, as technologists, we know that the essence of our endeavor is to venture unafraid into an uncertain future. Science advances by open and candid discussion of all possible alternatives. If the progress of science becomes a center of political controversy, this kind of candid discussion will cease to be possible. If a scientist has to worry about the political advisability of his statements, he'll find it hard to preserve his scientific objectivity. We must conduct our democratic process in a way that doesn't threaten the open discourse needed by science. Twenty years ago, British author C. P. Snow first presented his division of society into two cultures—the "literary" and the "scientific." He proposed that a cure for the "culture gap" was scientific education for the "literary culture." I'd like to suggest that the gap has persisted and widened; that it threatens continued progress; but that the cause and cure are different from those Snow proposed. It's not a matter of knowledge. It's a matter of attitudes toward uncertainty and innovation. It's a culture gap between those who have new ideas, and those who oppose new ideas . . . between those filled with the spirit of adventure, and those who would regulate adventure . . . between those who would explore new ways of doing things, and those who would place a no trespassing sign on the realm of the unknown. I'd like to make some suggestions about how we can bridge this gulf—or, at any rate, make sure that the majority of the public doesn't join that small minority perched on its further side. First, I think we need to change the way our work is presented to the public. We need to put more emphasis on the process as well as the result. We've got to be more honest about our failures—pointing out that the way to invention has been through learning from mistakes. We must remind the public of the truth expressed by the great British statesman Disraeli. "Success," he said, "is the ability to go from failure to failure without becoming discouraged." Second, technologists should avoid displaying a siege mentality toward the public. The public is not antitechnology. We should not confuse the shrill voices of a small minority with the verdict of the people. Virtually every poll result ever taken has come out favorable toward technology in general, and advanced technologies in particular. We've got to make sure that we don't respond so shrilly and irrationally to our minority of critics that we alienate that favorable majority. And, finally, we can learn even from our critics. In particular, we can learn something about the order in which we attack problems. It's the natural instinct of the creative technologist to first attack the problems that are the most challenging. Too often, we tend to leave aside those problems which appear so clearly solvable, and so technically uninteresting, that they can be left until later. Unfortunately, this sometimes includes the type of problems that have the most immediate appeal to the public: where a new power plant is to be sited . . . means of disposing of its wastes . . . long-run effects of low levels of effluents . . . and many more issues of this type. Perhaps we can make our critics become constructive by involving them in the early stages of technical development. We can get hints from them about the problems that might later have emotional responses from the public. We can put those problems higher on the research agenda. D
Views expressed on this page are those of the author only and not necessarily those of ACS
May 14, 1979C&EN
5
