The Mythology of Science and
Technology:
Prometheus or Science is in trouble
by Fred L. Smith
Portrayed by the doomsayers as too
risky, science and scientific change (we are told) must be
controlled by political agencies. A potential disaster is
suggested, the media raises the battle flag, and eager
politicians rush in to save mankind.
There was a time when ignorance of
the nature &endash; or even existence &endash; of such
threats, their causes and remedies, would normally block
action. But that was before the politicization of science.
Today, politicians pass a bill but mandate that studies be
undertaken prior to implementation. The politicians are then
free to act, in full confidence that any mistakes will be
caught in the later policy review.
However, science is poorly equipped
to resolve political confusion. This reliance on science as
a tool of politics now threatens science itself.
"Politically correct" thinking dominates the press releases,
the executive summaries, and the policy reports &endash; if
not yet the core substance &endash; of such once respectable
"scientific" institutions as the National Academy of
Science, the Office of Technology Assessment, and the
American Association for the Advancement of Science. Science
policy is increasingly anti-scientific.
The Competitive Enterprise
Institute, with the help of many of the groups and
individuals we work with, examines the "science" behind
numerous environmental concerns (acid rain, global warming,
ozone thinning, dioxin, biotechnology). Science, we have
found, provides weak support for government policies that
seek to "protect" us from these manufactured risks.
Nonetheless, the public is frightened into the belief that
thousands die every year from exposure to trace amounts of
pollution. Of course, the empirical evidence for such
purported deaths does not exist.
People look to reality to vindicate
values, not to determine them. Those values are being shaped
daily in political committees, where protestations and
pronouncements are highly critical of Western society
&endash; particularly of such institutions as technology and
the market. Indeed, the very pretext for convening most such
bodies is that something is wrong and government must fix
it. It should be no surprise, then, that most of those who
testify claim that technology is out of control, that
profit-seeking men threaten the survival of the planet,
etc.
Thus, in a politicized information
market, the answer as to why the majority believes any given
proposition can be traced to politics, and the incentives
that characterize politics &endash; a desire for control
coupled with an aversion to responsibility. When government
assumes control of risk assessment and management, those
political incentives are brought to bear.
As MIT meteorologist Richard
Lindzen has said regarding predictions of catastrophic
global warming: "There are statements of such overt
unrealism that I feel embarrassed; I think it discredits my
science...[and] by ruining our credibility now we
leave society with a diminished resource of some
importance."
Ideally, the value of science is to
advance technologies that benefit mankind and block
technologies that would reduce human welfare. The challenge
is to determine whether that task is best achieved by
allowing individuals freedom to act and holding them
responsible for their actions, or whether this process
should be subject to the political control of regulatory
bodies.
The problem with government
decision making is that a vast asymmetry exists. There is a
regulatory bias toward control, a political bias toward
emphasizing catastrophe and a psychological bias against
change. There is nothing new about the fear of change
&endash; politics merely gives more power to those wishing
to block change.
One way of understanding
bureaucratic incentive structures is to recognize that
regulators are entrepreneurs, too. The bureaucrat who errs
on the side of caution, the side of stasis, does not suffer
from his mistake; the bureaucrat who errs on the side of
permissiveness, the side of progress, may not advance.
Similarly, agencies that tend toward passiveness, that fail
to justify their need, don't get budget increases. The EPA,
for example, has every reason to convince the public that
they alone stand between the citizens and environmental
disaster. Indeed, it appears that EPA has hired Stephen King
to write press releases.
Competing Myths: Prometheus vs. Dr.
Frankenstein
Myths matter. They summarize the
concerns that we have about change and, like stereotypes and
shibboleths, they frame the debate. Two myths are helpful in
understanding science policy. On the one hand, there is
Prometheus: the scientist as entrepreneur, as the innovative
individual willing to challenge the reactionary ruling
orthodoxy to introduce beneficial technology to mankind. On
the other, there is Dr. Frankenstein: the scientists as
villain, as the arrogant individual insensitive to his
fellow Man's concerns, releasing monsters into the world
with self-serving abandon.
Dr. Frankenstein epitomizes the
prevailing view of non-government scientists. Under this
view, if entrepreneurial science is dangerous, we must find
ways of keeping science leashed and controlled. Gatekeeper
agencies are created and charged with deciding whether a new
technology (or a new application, or a larger use of an old
application) should be allowed. In an ideal world, such
agencies would get it right &endash; always. Dangerous
products would be blocked; beneficial products would be
approved.
However, this is not an ideal
world. An agency can make two type of errors: classifying a
dangerous product as safe, or classifying a beneficial
product as dangerous. These two risks &endash; the risks of
technological innovation and that of technological
stagnation &endash; are both serious. But a political agency
won't see them that way. Victims of mistaken bureaucratic
approval are visible; victims of mistaken disapproval are
not. As a result, agencies all to often only respond to the
former.
The policy question is should Man
have fire? Zeus and the other status quo political bosses of
the day thought not. Why, they asked themselves, should we
spread our privileges? "Let humans eat their flesh raw!",
the gods roared. Besides, fire was risky &endash; there had
been no double blind controlled tests on the tendency of
fire to get our of hand. Moreover, mankind (then, after all,
an illiterate cave-dweller) was hardly an informed
risk-taker. The gods had to continue in their paternalistic
role.
Prometheus disagreed. Mankind, he
believed, faced many risks worse than those posed by fire
(weather, wild animals, etc). Prometheus decided to violate
the regulatory guidelines and provide mankind with fire. He
recognized that fire (i.e., technology) was inherently
neither safe nor risky &endash; harm would be contingent on
how it was used.
Of course, having violated
bureaucratic fiat, Prometheus was punished. The political
authorities seized him, and chained him to the side of a
mountain where an avenging vulture would feast upon his
liver every day for all eternity. Such was the price for
pursuing technological progress.
Historically, modern government has
not treated scientists as harshly &endash; Galileo got off
light. America has been strongly supportive of the
Promethean view of technology for most of its history.
Indeed, America was the society of change; it was Europe,
still struggling out of the Dark Ages, that had suppressed
beliefs, endorsed orthodoxies, and forced Galileo to
recant.
But America has moved decisively
away from the Promethean paradigm. Many now act as if they
believe that the risks of change are massive, that the risks
of stagnation are minimal. America seems to have adopted the
once-orphaned Dr. Frankenstein view, that scientists are
dangerous and technology is destructive.
If the world is to become safer,
the Promethean myth must again gain prominence and supplant
that of Dr. Frankenstein. We must remove the restraints from
those who can and will, if allowed to do so, make the world
safer. In short, we must object vociferously to government's
regulation of risk, and make it known that there are also
risks of regulation.
The myth of Prometheus had a happy
ending. Prometheus suffers for eons at the hands of the
vengeful regulatory vulture until mankind, now fully aware
of his great contribution, petitions Zeus to free him. Their
petition is granted and Hercules, as mankind's agent, slays
the regulatory vulture and unbinds
Prometheus.
The Promethean myth is
paradigmatic. If our challenge is to restore science to its
proper role, to find ways to once again legitimize private
regulation of technology, our vision is Prometheus
unbound.
Fred L. Smith Jr. is the
President of the Competitive
Enterprise Institute,
a public policy think tank in Washington DC that focuses on
scientific and environmental issues.
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