'I III : II I ; I

I ! I : I I I

II I

I I I' IIt I

II II I

THE ORI'ENT29 DAYS $2250

SPECIAL REDUCED ALUMNI RATES

ELEVENTH ANNUAL TOUR PROGRAM-19751915 marks the eleventh year of operation

for this unique program of tours, which visitsome of the world's most fascinating area and

which i offered only to alumni of Harvard,Yale, Princeton, M.I.. , Cornell, Univ. of Penn-sylvania, Columbia, Dartmouth, and certainother di lingui hed universities and to, membersof their familie . The tours are de igned to takeadvantage of special reduced fares offercd byleading scheduled airlines, fare which areusually available only to group or in conjunc-tion with a qualified tour and which offersavings of as much as $500 over normal airfare. In addition, special rate have been ob-tained from hotels and sightseeing companies.

The tour program is consciously designedfor per ons who normally prefer to travelindependently and covers areas where suchpersons will find it advantageou to travel witha group. he itineraries have been carefully con-tructed to ombine as much as possible the

freedom of individual travel with the con-venience and savings of group travel, There is anavoidance of regimentation and an emphasis onleisure time, while a comprehensive program ofsightseeing ensure a visit to all major points ofintere t ,

Each tour uses the best hotel available inevery city, and hotel reservations are made asmuch as two years in advance in order to ensurethe finest in accommodations. The hotels areJi ted by name in each tour brochure, togetherwith a detailed day-by-day description of thetour itinerary.

The unusual nature and background of theparticipants, the nature of the tour planning,and the quality of the arrangements make this aunique tour program which tands apart fromthe rtandard commercial tour offered to thegeneral public. Inquiries fOf further details arcinvited.

A magnificent tour which unfolds thesplendor and fa cination of the Far East at acomfortable and reali tic face. Eleven days aredevoted to the beauty0 JAPAN, visiting themodern capital of TOKYO and the lovelyFUJI-HAKONE NATIONAL PARK and placingspecial emphais on the great "classical" city ofKYOTO (where the plendor of ancient Japan

ha been carefully preserved), together withexcursions to historic NARA, the greatmedieval hrinc at NIKKO, and the giantDaibutsu at KAMAKURA. Also included arcBA GKOK, with its glittering temples andpalaces; the thriving metropolis ofSINGAPORE, known as the "cross-roads of theEa t"; the glittering beauty of HONG KONG,with its stunning harbor and famous free-portshopping; and as a pecial highlight, the fabledisland of BALl. Optional visits are al0 availableto the ancient temples of ancient Java atJOGJAKARTA and to the art treasures of thePalace Museum at TAJPEI, on the island ofTaiwan. Tour dates include special seasonalattraction such a the spring cherry blossomsand magnificent autumn foliage in Japan andorne of the greatest yearly festivals in the Par

East. Total cost i $2250 from California, withpecial rate from other points. Departuresin

March, April, May. June. Julv , September.October and November, 1975 (extra air fare fordeparture June through October).

AEGEAN ADVENTURE22 DAYS $1795

This original itinerary explores in depth themagnificent scenic, cultural and historic attrac-tions of Greece, the Aegean, and Asia Minor-not only the major cities but also the lessacce sible sites of ancient cities which havefigured so prominently in the history ofwc tern civilization, complemented by a cruiseto the beautiful i lands of the Aegean Sea.Rarely has such an e citing collection of namesand places been assembled in a singleitinerary-the classical city of ATHENS' theByzantine and Ottoman plendor ofISTANBUL; the site of the oracle at DELPHJ;the sanctuary and stadium at OLYMPIA wherethe Olympic Games were first begun; the pr.laceof Agamemnon at MY ENAE; the ruir s ofancient TROY; the citadel of P RG MUM; the01 rble city of EPH SUS; the ruins of SARDISin Lydia, where the royal mint of the wealthyCroesus ha recently been unearthed; a well as

ORI TH, EPID UROS, IZMIR (Smyrna) theBOSPORUS and DARDA ELL£S. The crui ethrough the beautiful waters of the Aegean willvisit uch famous island a CRETE with thePalace of Knosso ; RHODES, noted for its greatCrusader ca tie ; the windmills of picturesq ue

YKO OS; and the charming islands of

PATMOS and SANTORJNJ. Total co tis Sl79Sfrom New York. Departures in April,MayJuly, August, September and October 1975(extra air fare for departures in July andAugust).

29 DAYS $2195

MOGHUL ADVENTURE

An unusual opportunity to view the out-tanding attractions of India and thesplendors

of ancient Persia, together with theonce-forbidden mountain-kingdom of Nepal. HereI

truly an exciting adventure: India's ancientmonuments in DELHI; the fabled beauty ofKASHMIR amid the snow-clad Himalayas; theholy city of BANARAS on the sacred RiverGanges; the exotic temples of KHAJURAHO;renowned AGRA, with the Taj Mahal and othercelebrated monuments of the Moghul periodsuch as the Agra fort and the fabulous de. ertcdcity of Fatehpur Sikri; the walled "pink city"of JAIPUR, with an elephant ride at the AmberFort; the unique and beautiful "lake city" ofUDAIPUR; and a thrilling flight into theHimalayas to KATHMANDU capital ofNEPAL. where ancient palaces and templesabound in a land still relatively untouchedbymodern civilization. In PERSIA (Iran), the visitwill include the great 5th century B.C. capitalof Darius and Xerxes at PERSEPOLIS; tllcfabled Per ian Renaissance city of ISFAHAN,with its palaces, gardens, bazaar and famoustiled mosques; and the modern capital ofTEHERAN. Outstanding accommodationsinclude hotels that once were palaces ofMaharajas. Total cot is $2195 from New York.Departures in January, February, March,August, September, October and November1975.

SOUTH AMERICA32 DAYS $2275

From the towering peaks of the Andes tothe vast interior reaches of the Amazon jungle.this tour travels more than ten thousand milesto e .plore the immen e and fascinating conu,nent of South America: a brilliant collection ofpre-Colombian gold and a vast undergroundcathedral carved out of a centurie -old salt minein BOGOTA; magnificent 16th centurychurche and quaint Spanish colonial buildinin QUITO, with a drive past the snow-eapped

'f "Volcano Alley" to visit an Indianthe great viceregal city of LIMA,

f by Pizarro, where one can still seemummy and visit the dread Court of

[uisition; the ancient city of CUZCO,the Andes, with an excursion to the

IS "lost city" of MACHU PICCHU;olitan BUENOS AIRES, with its wideand parks and its colorful waterfrontalong the River Plate; the beautiful

me LAKE DISTRICT in. the lowerof the Andes; the spectacular IGUASSU

), on the mighty Parana River; the sun-ed beaches, stunning mountains andicent harbor of RIO DE JANEIROered by many the most beautiful city inorld); the ultra-modern new city ofL1A; and the fascination of the vast.n jungle, a thousand miles up river atUS. Total cost is $2100 from Miami,from New York, with special rates from·ities. Optional pre and post tour visits to1and Venezuela are available at no addi-. fare. Departures in January, February,

pill May, July, September, October andove iber 1974.

HE SOUTH PACIFIC29 DAYS $2350

An exceptional and comprehensive tour ofU~TRALIA and NEW ZEALAND, with

th tional visits to FIJI and TAHITI. Starting onbe North Island of New Zealand, you will visit

Ie COUDtJ}"Smajor city of AUCKLAND, the1eatbtaking "Glowworm Grotto" atAlTOMO. and the Maori villages, boilingsers and trout pools of ROTORUA, then fly

:'ril~'!!Zealand's South Island to explore the-UJJJg beauty of the snow-cappedSO . RN ALPS, including a flight in a!pecially~uJpped ski plane to land on theT~an Glacier, followed by the mountain and

es of QUEENSTOWN with a visit to a sheep

station and a thrilling jet-boat ride through thecanyons of the Shotover River. Next, thehaunting beauty of the fiords at MILFORDSOUND and TE ANAU, followed by theEnglish charm of CHRISTCHURCH. gardencity of the southern hemisphere. Then it' on toAustralia, the exciting and vibrant continentwhere the spirit of the "old west" combineswith skyscrapers of the 20th century. You'U seethe lovely capital of CANBERRA, seek out theVictorian elegance of MELBOURNE. then flyover the vast desert into the interior and thereal OUTBACK country to ALICE SPRINGS,where the ranches are so widely separated thatschool classes are conducted by radio, thenexplore the undersea wonders of the GREATBARRIER REEF at CAIRNS, followed by avisit to SYDNEY, magnificently set on one ofthe world's most beautiful harbors, to feel thedynamic forces which are pushing Australiaahead. Optional visits to Fiji and Tahiti areavailable. Total cost is $2350 from California.Departures in January, February, March, April,June, July, September, October and. November1974.

MEDITERRANEANODYSSEY22 DAYS $1450

An unusual tour offering a wealth oftreasures in the region of the Mediterranean,with visits to TUNISIA, the DALMATiANCOAST of YUGOSLAVIA and MALTA.Starting in TUNIS, the tour explores the coastand interior of Tunisia: the ruins of the famedancient city of CARTHAGE as well as the ruinsof extensive Roman cities such as DOUGGA,SBEITLA, THUBURBO MAJUS and the mag-nificent amphitheater of EL DJEM, historicArab towns and cities such as NABEUL,HAMMAMET, SOU SSE and KAIROUAN, thecaves of the troglodytes at MATMATA, beauti-ful beaches along the Mediterranean coast andon the "Isle of the Lotus Eaters" at DJERBA,and desert oases at GABES, TOZEUR andNEFTA. The beautiful DALMATIAN COASTof Yugoslavia is represented by SPLIT, with itsfamed Palace of Diocletian, the charmingancient town of TROGIR nearby. and thesplendid medieval walled city of DUBROVNlK.followed by MALTA, with its treasure house of17th and 18th century churches and palaces,where the Knights of St. John, driven from theHoly Land and from Rhodes, withstood theepic seige of the Turks and helped to decide thefate of Europe. Total cost is $1450 from NewYork. Departures in March, April, May. June,July, September and October, 1974 (additionalair fare for departures in June and July).

EAST AFRICA22 DAYS $1799

The excitement of Africa's wildlife and themagnificence of the African landscape in anunforgettable luxury safari, game viewing in thewilderness of Kenya's Northern Frontierdistrict at SAMBURU RESERVE; a night atworld-famou TREETOPS in the ABERDARENATIONAL PARK; the spectacular masses of

pink flamingos at LAKE NAKURU; multitudesof lion, zebra, wildebeest and other plains gamein the MASAI-MARA RESERVE and thefamed SERENGETl PLAINS; the great perma-nent concentrations of wildlife in theNGORONGORO CRATER; tree-climbing lionalong the shores of LAKE MANYARA in theRift Valley, photographing rhino and other biggame against the majestic now-covered back-ground of Mt. Kilimanjaro in the AMBOSELIRESERVE; and the vast and fascinating wilder-ness of TSAVO NATIONAL PARK, renownedfor its elephant and lion and for the unusualdesert phenomenon of the Mzima Springs.There is also a stay in NAIROBI, the mo tfa cinating city in East Africa. as well asfeatures such as a visit to a MASAIMANYATTA to see tribal dancing and thetribal way of life. Total co t is $J 799 from NewYork. Optional visits are available to theVICTORIA FALLS, to UGANDA and toETHIOPIA. Departures in January. ebruary,March. May, June, July, August. September.October, November and December 1974 (extraair fare for departures in June, July andAugust).

* * *Rates include Jet Air, DeluxeHotels, Most Meals, Sightseeing,

Transfers, Tips and Taxes.

Individual brochures on each tourare available, setting forth thedetailed itinerary, departure dates,hotels used, and other relevantinformation. Departure dates for

1975 are also available.

For Full Details Contact:

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2 Technology Review, December, 1974

Edited at theMassachusetts Institute of Technology

Volume 77, Number 2December, 1974

Technology Review, Reg. U.S. Patent Oltlce, Ispublished eight times each year (In October!November, December, January, February, March!April, May, June, and July/August) at theMassachusetts Institute of Technology; twospecial editions are provided for graduate (pp.1-120) and undergraduate (pp. 1-152) alumniof M.I.T. Entire contents copyright t974 by theAlumni Association of the Massachusetts Institutaof Technology. Technology Review Is printedby the Lew A. Cummings Company, Manchester,New Hampshire. Second class postage paid atBoston, Mass., and at additional mailing offices.

Inquiries regarding editorial contents, subscrip-tions, and advertising should ba addressed to:Technology Review, Room E19-430, MassachusettsInstitute of Technology, Cambridge Mass., 02139.Telephone area code (617) 253-4672.

Price: $1.75 per copy, $12 per year in the UnitedStates, Canada and Mexico, $22 overseas.Please allow three weeks for changes of address,and give both old and new addresses in all re-quests.

Technology Review Is represented for adver-tising by: Littell-Murray-Barnhill, Inc., 60 E. 42ndStreet, New York, N.Y., 10017, telephone(212) 667-3660; Cole, Mason and Deming, 221No. LaSalle Street, Chicago, III., 60601, telephone(312) 641-1254; zander, Coughlin and Thompson,5476 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, Calif.,90036, telephone (2t3) 936-0111 and 22 BatteryStreet, San Francisco, Calif., 94111, telephone(415) 396-4444.

PublisherDonald P. Severance

Board of EditorsJohn I. Mattill (Editor), Dennis L. Meredith,Michael Feirtag, Sara Jane Neustadtl,Christine C. Santos, Marjorie Lyon

ProductionKathleen B. Sayre

AdvertisingRichard F. Wright (Manager), Garnette E. Mullis

CirculationJoseph J. Martorl (Director), Dorothy R.Finnerty

Technology Review+

ArticlesThe World-Wide Confrontation ofPopulation and Food SupplyNevin S. Scrimshaw

Massive forces are moving mantoward a world-wide "food crisis."But science and technology are farfrom powerless to moderate itsthreat

Technological Change in the FoodIndustry

Gordon F. Bloom and Ronald C.Curhan

Food travels between farm and con-sumer through an inefficient networkof handlers and distributors in whichtechnology is a virtual stranger.Here are some glimpses of a moreefficient future

The Earth's Climatic HisoryReginald E. Newell

What we can say about the next iceage is only that it is coming, theresult of complex and interactingforces which remain too little under-stood

In Celebration of the Pioneers:To Jupiter and BeyondWilliam W. Ward

A climactic moment in man's firstexploration of the outer planets isabout to occur. Here is a review ofwhat we know from Pioneer 10 andwhat we seek from Pioneer 11

Departments12 Cover

Design by Ralph M. Coburn

Letters 4

Technology/SocietyLife in a marginal ecosystem be-tween the substance of science andthe exhaltation of praiseKenneth E. Boulding

6

20National ReportNothing is simple when science ad-vances on a human problemVictor Cohn

8

Environment/TechnologyBeginning a series on the chlori-nated hydrocarbons in the NorthAmerican environmentIan C. T. Nisbet

10

Trend of Affairs30 Chemistry, 61

Nutrition, 63Transportation, 64Computers, 67Biology, 69

60

Puzzle CornerThe author bruises his readers whilenursing his bruises

46 Allan J. Gottlieb

71

BooksManagement: Tasks-Responsibil-ities-Practices, reviewed by Leo-pold R. Michel and Richard B.Maffei,74The Earnings Conflict, reviewed byDaniel Quinn Mills, 74Physics Fifty Years Later, reviewedby Herman Feshbach, 76Theory of Design, reviewed byDavid Gordon Wilson, 76

74

Institute Informant 78Management invades the midwest,and other news of M.I.T. events

Technology Review, December, 1974 3

LettersWhat Priority for the Breeder?In "The Breeder Reactor in the U.S.: A

ew Economic Analysis" (July/August,pp. 26-36) Irvin C. Bupp and Jean-ClaudeDerian fail to note important considera-tions which, in my opinion, considerablyweaken the authors' negative assessmentof the incentives for early developmentof breeder reactors:-The cost of the nuclear steam supplysystem, the area in which most of thelight water reactor (LWR) and breedercost differences should be concentrated, isonly about one-sixth of total plant cost.Thus the $125/kwe. cost penalty allowedby the authors (which also happens to beabout one-sixth of total plant cost)reaUyrepresents a 100 per cent cost differentialbetween concepts-a not-so-preposterousobstacle to be overcome by the breeder.At the very least there are no grounds forimplying that the land, turbine plant,switchyard, etc., for the breeder will bemore expensive than corresponding L WRitems.-In contrast to their diverse thermal re-actor programs of the past, almost allother major industrialized nations (Russia,Germany, Japan, France, Great Britain,etc.) have also decided (and unless knowl-edgeably contradicted, one would assumeindependently and with some degree ofreasoned evaluation) that development ofthe liquid-metal-cooled fast breeder reac-tor (LMFBR) deserves top priority. In-deed, from all reports, the currently op-erating French demonstration plant,Phenix, has established a cost-effectivenessbenchmark which already gives reasonableassurance of successful commercial pros-pects for the breeder. Bupp and Derian of-fer no rebuttal to this favorable foreignopinion and experience.-No mention is made of alternate breederconcepts, especially the gas-cooled fastbreeder (GCFR), which has a primarysystem design substantially different fromthat of the LMFBR, and therefore offersa much different approach to achievingcapital cost equity with LWR'. Themolten salt breeder (MSBR) offers stillanother fundamentally different route tocompeti tiveness.-Important synergistic effects enter in,which reduce the costs of a mixed economyof thermal and fast reactors. In particular,the breeder can easily produce (as excessfissile product in its radial blanket) 233U,a premium fuel for all thermal reactors.General Atomic bas shown, for example,that by this stratagem a system composedof one GCFR and three high-temperaturegas-cooled reactors (HTGR) can be self-sustaining without recourse to uranium en-richment! Even without exercising this par-ticular option, the breeder will help rr ~evea projected severe excess demand on en-riclunent capacity which will otherwiseescalate future LWR fuel cycle costs.

Important technological considerationshave been omitted from the analysis:LMFBR's operate at a primary systempressure of only 100 p.s.i. or so, while PWRreactors operate at around 2,200 p.s.i.Thus the LMFBR requires much thinnerpressure vessels and piping-a factor

4 Technology Review, December, 1974

which offers prospects for cheaper, ratherthan more expensive, plant costs in thelong run. Attractive trade-offs can also becited for the other breeder concepts:GCFR and MSBR. Indeed, all the breederconcepts have a significantly higher ther-mal efficiency than L WR's-hence lowerwaste heat disposal costs and environmen-tal impact. owhere in the article is anyanalysis presented showing why thebreeder must inherently be more expensivethan a L WR. Novelty and "learning-curve"effects can be cited against any new sys-tem.Michael J. DriscollCambridge, Mass.

The writer is Associate Professor of Nu-clear Engineering at M.l.T. Drs. Buppand Derian respond:Mr. Driscoll's comments focus mainly onthe problem of the capital cost differentialbetween present light water reactors(L.W.R.s) and future breeder reactors.Thus he provides us with the opportunityto discuss a point that, for space andeditorial reasons, we did not develop inour article.

The issue is: On the basis of domesticconstruction experience with LWR tech-nology, how confident can we be aboutthe future costs of the breeder, a similarbut essentially new technology? A relatedquestion is: How can foreign experiencebe taken into account?

The first point to be stressed is that forthe past ten years in the United Statesthere has been a systematic discrepancy,averaging a factor of two, between ex-pected and actual costs (in constant dol-lars) of L.W.R.s There is no evidencethat this discrepancy has begun to nar-row. Indeed, contrary to experience withmost industrial products, we have not asyet observed a "Iearning-by-doing" phe-nomenon in the nuclear reactor business.It is roughly true that L.W.R.s have beenincreasing in cost and still continue to doso today at the average rate of $30/kwJyr.in constant 1973 dollars.

In a separate paper ("Trends in LightWater Reactor Capital Costs in the U.S.,"a report from the Center for Policy Alter-natives, M.LT., ovember, 1974) we andM. P. Donsimoni and R. Treitel have re-viewed the capital cost experience ofL.W.R.s in some detail and proposed aninterpretation of it. The cost of a nuclearplant today has little to do with the costof assembling different pieces of equip-ment and raw, materials on a given site;it is rather highly dependent on the processby which these machines are licensed.The cost of the identical reactors on dif-ferent sites is likely to vary widely accord-ing to licensing difficulties and the localintensity of nuclear opposition. The realquestion, therefore, with respect to thefuture cost of a new and similar productlike the breeder is the response of thelicensing process to the safety issues whichmay be raised. The cost history ofL.W.R.s in' the U.S. suggests that engi-neering estimates may be only a very weakguide, at best, to predicting the eventualcapital costs of breeders. Ultimately, it isthe perception that the public will have ofthis new technology and, as a consequence,the design criteria established by the li-censing procedure that will determine the

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(not printers): Room EI9-430, MassachusellsInstitute of Technology, Cambridge, MA. 02139

5. Loca.ron of l(,e I,,,aequarters or generalbusiness olflces of the publishers (notprinters): Same as above

6. Names and addresses of PUblisher, Editor,and Managing Editor: Publisher: Donald P.Severance. Room 7-206, M.I.T., Cambridge.MA, 02139; Editor: John I. Mattlll, RoomE19-430, M.I.T., Cambridge, MA, 02139; Man-aging Editor: Dennis Meredith, Room E19·430. M.I.T .• Cambridge, MA, 02139

7. Owner (If owned by a corporation, Irs nameand eoorese must ba sta.ed and also Im-mediately thereunder the names and ad-dresses of stockholders owning or holdIng1 per cent or more of the total amount ofstock. /I not owned by a corporation, thenames and addresses of the Individual ownersmust be given. 1/ owned by a partnership orother unincorporated firm, its name and ad-dress, as well as that of each individual, mustbe given): Alumni Association of the Massa-chusetts Institute of Technology, Room E19-437, M.I.T., Cambridge. MA. 02139

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authorized to mail at special rates (Section132.122, Postal Manual): The purpose, tunc-tion, and nonprofit status of this organizationand the exempt status for Federal Incometax purposes-have not changed during thepreceding 12 monlhs.

11. Nature and extent 01 circulation: _Averagenumberat caples01 eachIssue dur-Ing pre-ceding12 months

Actualnumberof coote«of the sin-gle IssuepUblishednearest to?llIng date

A. Total number at 56.150 58,100coptes printed(net press run)

B. Paid circuletlon:1. Sales through 82 63

dealers and car-riers, street ven-dors. and countersales

2. Mall SUbscriptions 53,421 54.966C. Total paid clr- 53,503 55.029

cutettonD. Free distrIbution

by mail, carrieror other means:

1. Samples, compl/- 1.321 1.340mentary, andother free cootes

2. Copies distributed 0 0to news agents,

but not soldE. Total dls'rlbutlon 54,824 56.369

(sum 01 C and D)F. Office use, Ie It- 1,326 1.731

over, unaccounted,spoiled alterprinting

G. Total (sum 01 E 56,150 58,100and F-should equalnet press run shownin A)

I certily that the statements made by me aboveare correct and complete.lsI Joseph J. Martorl, CirCUlation Director

cost of a commercial breeder reactor. Thequestions and objections already raised byenvironmentalists during the recent debateon the environmental impact statementmade by the Atomic Energy Committee

(continued on p. 80)

This · tmas,askfor agift

for a lifetime.

Technology Review, December, 1974 5

Plains of Science,Summits of Passion

The 10 billion neurons of the individualhuman nervous system, and still more, the3 X 1019 neurons of the whole humanrace (about 77 X 1019 if we include allhuman being who have ever lived) makea very large habitat in space-time-onethat has already developed an enormouscomplexity of mental species but has yetrealized only a small proportion of its totalpotential. One thinks of this as a vastecosystem populated by images and ideas,perceptions and beliefs, and one perceivesscience as a small, but very productivesub-ecosystem within this vast habitat.This scientific ecosystem is rather like theagriculture in the Middle West and theGreat Plains, surrounded by a vast ex-panse of the meadows of ordinary experi-ence, the lush forests of religion and art,and the wild glaciers and peaks of ecstacyand agony, mysticism and power, saint-hood and devilry.

I happen to live in a marginal ecosys-tem, where the Great Plains meet theRocky Mountains and cactus blooms underthe ponderosa pine. I have also lived mostof my life on the uneasy margin betweenscience and religion. Prickly cactuses offaith also bloom in the level cornfields ofeconomics, cultivated by the uniform tech-nologies of scientific planting and testing.The often con£l.icting interaction betweenscience and religion has therefore been ofgreat interest to me: I see it in ecologicalrather than in dialectical terms, not as abattle between two armies-one of whichmust win and the other lose-but ratherlike the wavering margin between thecom.Beld and the forest.

In the last century and a half we haveseen an enormous expansion of agriculture,and the forest and the prairie everywherehave retreated before the relentless ad-vance of the field. This is not unrelated tothe similar advance in science, which is akind of mental agriculture, and of govern-ment, which is political agriculture. Sci-ence raises periodic tables, testable equa-tions, and mechanical and evolutionarymodels and routs out witchcraft" and as-trology, alchemy and old wives' tales. Gov-ernment grows-we hope-internal peaceand controlled economies and strives,somewhat less successfully, to rout outcrime, strife, and depression.

Science as MonocultureNevertheless there are limits to our hus-bandry in the field, in the laboratory, andin the legislature. We plow up the Great

6 Technology Review, December, 1974

Plains and they blow away; we push agri-culture too far into the forests and wecreate a precarious ecosystem. Agriculture,science, and government all result in a lossof species: An Iowa cornfield has far fewerspecies than the prairie which it sup-planted.

Science is a world monoculture. Themandala of the periodic table appears inchemistry lecture rooms in Peking, Mos-cow, Rome, Tokyo, Hobart, and Singapore.There is no such thing as Communistchemistry, Catholic chemistry, or Hinduchemistry, white chemistry or black chem-istry. Even economics is practiced some-what furtively in the mathematics depart-ments of socialist universities and Darwin-ian biology in the laboratories of Catholicuniversities.

Government likewise tends to createcultural uniformity, at least enough to en-sure that everybody pays taxes. Only thenation, the religious sect, and the hippiecult stand between us and world mono-culture.

There is something a little frighteningin this. If one ecosystem goes wrong in aworld of many ecosystems, the others donot; in a world of many isolated cultures,one can collapse, like the Mayan, and theothers are quite unaffected. But if theworld becomes a single ecosystem with asingle culture, then if anything goes wrong,everything goes wrong. The Irish potatofamine of the 1840s stands as a solemnrecord of the dangers of rnonoculture.

But as great as was the Irish catastrophe,it was retrievable becauseit was local.There comes a point as catastrophe movestoward universality where it becomes ir-retrievable. In a period of time over whichthe generalized Murphy's Law holds (ifanything can go wrong,it eventually will),there is clearly an optimum degree ofdiversity from the point of view of max-imizing the possibilities of continued long-range evolution.

"A Dynamic Dance of the Mind"For those who live out on the great plainsof science, where the rich square fieldsproduce increasing yields under the be-nign inputs of advancing knowledge, it iseasy to forget that the plains do not go onforever. The scientist who has never dark-ened the door of a church, who has neverread Gerard Manley Hopkins, or St. Johnof the Cross, or George Fox, or evenTennyson's "In Memoriam," may be livingin a more restricted ecosystem than he

Technology/SocietybyKenneth E. Bouldlng

thinks. There is a dramatic moment as onedrives across the Great Plains where theRockies first rise above the endless horizon.Even if one never experiences this momentof exhaltation and lives in the middle ofKansas all one's life, it may be nice toknow that the Rockies are there. Even ifone spends one's whole life raising good,solid, sustaining, scientific wheat, it may begood to know that the fields end some-where.

At th~ margins, life can be difficult aswell as exciting. There is a constant tensionbetween the urge to go off into the plainsand raise solid and nourishing scientificwheat and the contrary urge to disappearinto the great gothic forests of the mindand indulge shamelessly in prayer andpraise, or even to climb to the icy summitsof mystical union. To have a foot in eachworld can lead to a very uncomfortablestraddle, but it does surely lead to a dy-namic dance of the mind which is seldomenjoyed by those whose feet are solidlyplanted in the rich plains. These marginsare a good place to live for those who areagile enough to survive in them, and it isnecessary for some people to live in themif we are to see the great habitats of thehuman mind as a totality and not as a setof totally unrelated parts.

Kenneth E. Boulding, former President ofthe American Economic Association, isProfessor of Economics at the University ofColorado and Director of the Program onGeneral, Sooial, and Economic DynamiCSat the University's Institute of BehavioralScience.

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Technology Review, December, 1974 7

Science Comes toMedicine - Slowly

In Washington, everything is political.This includes disease.

When Richard ixon planned a 1972campaign role for his daughters, he toldhis man Haldeman to have them go outto the "Middle America type of people"and "do the breast cancer thing." Hewanted them to speak of his role in push-ing a federal anti-cancer crusade, (oncehe was forced into it by Senator Kennedyand others).

When Mrs. Betty Ford had breast can-cer surgery at the Bethesda aval MedicalCenter on September 28, and the extentof the cancer's spread showed that herchance for long survival was uncertain, thequestion on political lips was, "Will thischange the President's decision to run in1976]5" (He soon saidit would not. )

When, within weeks, the wife of Mr.Ford's vice president-designate also de-veloped breast cancer, one of the firstreactions was a degree of sympathy forthe increasingly beleaguered NelsonRockefeller. Now he was not just Rocke-feller, the political warrier, millionairedynast and greatest of gift-givers. He wasalso Happy's loving husband whose mainthought was her future.

Because Mrs. Ford and Mrs, Rockefellerand their husbands were all political per-sons at the very top level of Americanawareness, these women's breast cancers-like ixon's phlebitis and Johnson's heartand Eisenhower's gut-were importantnews.

Furthermore, anything pertaining to thisdisease now became news, As it happened,there were in these same weeks some im-portant new things to report. The entirecountry thus got a series of remarkablelessons in breast cancer prevalence, alter-native kinds of breast cancer surgery and,in the process, science and even the ethicsof science.

Still Waiting for the WeddingThere were not yet final answers. Muchabout breast cancer remains controversialor unsettled among medical practitioners,Much of the reason for this unsettledstate-it became clear in those weeks ofSeptember and October-was medicine'slong-standing failure to apply some of thesimplest tests of science to this mostCODl-

mon of women's malignancies and perhapsmost feared of all cancers.

The breast cancer story has implicationsfor many kinds of science and appliedscience.

8 Technology Review, December, 1974

In 1891, when Dr. William Halstedfirst removed a woman's breast at JohnsHopkins University, by what would soonbecome known as the "Halsted radical"operation, there had not yet been any realwedding between surgery and science.Each surgeon mainly did what he thoughtbest.

If enough patients survived the veryonslaught of the knife, the surgeon mightwrite up his results. If the results seemedgood enough, other surgeons might copyhim. Not until the early years of the cen-tury did doctors like the Mayo brothersbegin to look back systematically andassess their results, then gUide their futureoperations by their past outcomes.

And not until the 1920s did more ad-vanced biometrics begin to take hold ineven the leading medical centers, withstatisticians beginning to apply more so-phisticated tests than just looking back-ward and counting.

One of the new biostatisticians' con-clusions was that looking back-in statis-tical language, doing a retrospectivestudy-is often unreliable. For many pur-poses, selecting a proper study population,giving alternate treatments on a random-ized basis, then looking at the results-insbort, making a prospective study-is farsuperior.

Starting 80 Years Too LateBack to the breast. In the United Statesalone, 90,000 women develop suoh cancersand have such surgery every year. Onewoman in 15 can expect to get the diseasesometime.

Yet not until three years ago was agroup of academic surgeons headed byDr. Bernard Fisher at the University ofPittsburgh able to begin what they and

ational Cancer Institute statisticiansconsidered a properly designed prospectivestudy of the true efficacy of Dr. Halsted's1891 operation, compared with a simplerand gentler procedure.

Why so long a wait? Surgeons, says Dr.Fisher, are conservative types. Some op-erate all their lives in the waythey weretrained.

Not until the year 1971 could Dr. Fisherfind surgeons at 34 centers willing to con-cede that they did notknow which kindsof breast operations were better, thereforewilling to compare the highly mutilatingHalsted radical (which removes the breast,underlying chest muscles and the nearbyarmpit's complex of lymph nodes, the

Washington ReportbyVictor Cohn

common site of the first spread of thedisease) with two other methods-a so-called "simple" mastectomy (removingonly the breast and no other structures)and a simple mastectomy followed bypost-operative radiation.

Between 1971 and 1974 Dr. Fisher andhis colleagues (in somewhat over-simplelanguage) found that the results of 1,684operations seem to show-there can beno certainty without longer follow-up-that:-For cancers still limited to the breastalone, the simpler operation with or with-out radiation has the same results as theHalsted.-For cancers with spread to the lymphnodes, the simpler operation with radiationhas the same results as the Halsted.

On Saturday, September 28, three daysbefore Dr. Fisher was to present thesefindings at the National Institutes ofHealth, just across the avenue from theNaval Medical Center, Mrs. Ford's sur-geons, though knowing of Dr. Fisher'sresults, chose to perform on Mrs. Ford(whose cancer, remember, had indeedspread) a full Halsted radical mastectomyA few weeks later Memorial Sloan-Ketter-ing surgeons chose to perform on Mrs.Rockefeller (whose cancer, so far as couldbe determined, had not spread) a "modi-fied" radical, which leaves some of themuscles.

In both cases, the surgeons said thattheir and others' past results showed su-perior survival rates for the more extensivesurgery. Dr, Fisher did not directly com-ment, except to sayit was too. bad thatthe more scientific study bad not startedyears earlier, so the answers would now bemore certain.

One wonders how many other surgicalprocedures are equally uncertain, and howmany future patients might benefit frommore science in surgery.

Ironically, Dr, Fisher-the man who feltso strongly about investigating the possi-bility of a gentler breast operation-duringmost of the time of his study used a con-sent form which did not inform each pa-tient that;-M ost surgeons, though not the academicgroup, still believed that more radicalsurgery was almost always advised;-Her own treatment would be chosenrandomly, from a number list spewed upby a computer.

Dr. Fisher strongly (and probably cor-rectly) maintained that he had taken great