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232  Risks of Hurricane Taming
     The Washington Post  September 12 1971

     The technocrats basic sin, according to the modern demonology, 
is his oversimplification of human problems for the sake of elegant
analysis.  He may then impose his well-intentioned but short-sighted
solutions on an unsuspecting and helpless public.  To be sure, he
may also be motivated by avarice, power-hunger, excessive idealism
or moral cowardice--but these attributes are not special to those
humans who have technical expertise.

     Having been tenderized by critical attacks in this style, the
more conscientious technocrats today may be ensnared by the opposite
vice of technophobia, a paralysis of thought and actions that may lead
to needless waste of people's energies or lives.  The most critical
examples of this surrender may be happening in medical experimentation
and drug development.  Here excessive prosecutory zeal over minutiae
(like a recent furor over blood tests for the XYY chromosome type)
merely obscure large-scale abuses (like the unhindered distribution of
common tranquilizers and other drugs still not properly tested for 
injury to chromosomes) and frustrates research with considerable 
humanitarian potential.

     A good example of a potential conflict between politics and 
technology is emerging in the field of hurricane control.  This is a 
by-product of efforts at "scientific rainmaking" which have had an 
ambiguous success over the past 25 years.  They will certainly be bound
to pose many irksome questions--mainly centered in the law of property
rights in the weather when this does come under engineering control. 
The whole matter has been analyzed with great sensitivity and skill in
a report by D.W. North (project leader), D. W. Boyd, R. A. Howard and
J. E. Matheson of Stanford Research Institute.  Their analysis forms
part of a scientific review initiated by Dr. Myron Tribus, onetime
assistant secretary of commerce for science and technology.

     Limited Trials

     For the past several years, a limited numbers of trials have
sought to influence the progress of tropical hurricanes by seeding
them just outside of the eye with silver iodide particles spewed from
aircraft.  In this "Storm-fury" project only storms judged unlikely to
reach the mainland were seeded, in order to avoid charges of damages
by premature intervention.  This restriction sharply curtailed the 
experiments: Only three hurricanes were seeded between 1961 and 1969.
The seeding, according to theory, provides nuclei on which supercooled
water in the storm cloud can freeze, releasing considerable heat. This
in turn creates peripheral drafts which can diffuse the energy of the
storm.

     Changes in wind patterns, in agreement with the theory, were 
observed in all three cases.  However, hurricanes are notoriously 
variable, and many meteorologists doubt that the effect of seeding has 
been proven.  The Storm-fury project personnel felt the evidence 
supported a 50-50 case that the seeding had been effective in a useful 
direction; they assigned very low odds to the risk that a seeding would
aggravate a particular storm, which would be contrary both to the theory
and to the findings in these few cases.

     It would be easy to advocate operational experiments, or efforts
to temper hurricanes that threatened coastal cities, if we were closer
to scientific certainty about the outcome.  The ethos of the laboratory
calls for cautious diffidence about unproven propositions.  Better
to try again until we're sure!

     This may, however, be an example of technophobia.  Decisions are
constantly demanded of our statesmen where the risks are far less
amenable to scientific analysis than in hurricane control.  We might
hope for a better standard than the world's records in, say, military
or foreign policy; is the batting average there as high as .500?  
Regardless, choices of policy under uncertainty are a democratic rather
than a technocratic responsibility.  It is the technocrat's task to
assay and to expose the magnitude and uncertainties of the risks to
the best of his ability.

     The Stanford Research Institute report points out that U.S. 
property damage from hurricanes averages almost $500 million a year.
(With adequate warning and evacuation, at additional costs, no lives
need be lost; however, the inconvenience and economic disruption of
such precautions is a further charge).  If we had to wait, say another
10 years, to reach a state of perfect scientific assurance about the
usefulness of seeding, we might look back with chagrin on the waste
of the intervening decade.  Or we might have wasted our hopes and a
few million dollars' worth of silver iodide.  There is a very small
chance that a storm would be objectively worsened.

     Perhaps worst of all, the natural variation in storms might 
result in worse damage than was expected before seeding -- which
could sometimes happen even if the seeding were beneficial.  Such
a mishap would blacken the reputation of all meteorologists,
generate endless recriminations against the government, and per-
haps paralyze all future storm modification research.

     The field of decision analysis is a systematic parsing and 
summing of the odds of all the contingencies according to the best 
available knowledge.  The decision analysis of the advantage of seeding,
with the present information, indicates an expected reduction of dam-
ages of about 20 per cent.  This is to say that we throw away an 
average of $100 in preventable storm damage every year that we neglect
these opportunities.  How precious is that certainty that might be
gained from further trials?

     Dr. North and his colleagues suggest serious consideration of
operational trials, in spite of present uncertainties.  Those who 
doubt that seeding influences the storm at all might judge there was
little to lose except for the political risks.

     Political Decisions

     The political risks are, however, very great--and they may 
require more sophistication in achieving honest understanding and 
commitment by the public than we know how to arrange.  And the greater 
the scope of the human tragedy at stake, the worse the risks in this, 
as in other reaches, of politics.

     Suppose, for example, that the catastrophic cyclone that struck
East Pakistan last November had been successfully tempered, to the
extent of saving 100,000 lives, an incredible humanitarian triumph.
Still, would technocracy, having once intervened, been spared an
indictment for genocide of the remaining 500,000 victims?  And if the
storm had swerved to the west, would the blow not have been perceived as
a malicious act of meteorological warfare?

     In a context of profound social disorder abroad any intervention
is perilous; but we should manage better at home.  Or should we allow
the technocrats the luxury of perfect knowledge before action?  Some
form of plebiscite might be thought of for the storm-threatened 
populations of the eastern seaboard.  However, traditional styles of 
political representation have not yet faced the challenge of making 
responsible commitments for or against the gamble.

     The public certainly deserves the benefit of better knowledge
that can be gotten by further research; it also deserves to know what
odds of benefit or harm are on the tote-board today.  Unfortunately,
this is not a private investment that each citizen can make for him-
self, any more than we can bargain with each taxpayer about how much
he personally wants to shell out for national defense or social 
welfare, and what his benefit will be from it.

     The problem of reaching competent political decisions on weather
control is bound to enlarge in the next few decades.  The answer to
operational seeding of hurricanes today may be yes, may be no.  In
either case, we need to develop and exercise the requisite machinery
for "informed consent" without much more delay.

     We see that standing by in the face of incomplete knowledge must
come from as onerous a burden of decision as for affirmative action.
This may be one of the deepest resentments of the mass culture against
the technocracy--less that decisions are being made without consultation
rather that new technical opportunities demand that we make painful
decisions once left to the will of the Furies.  The strain on moral
and intellectual fiber may be more than man can bear.
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