From: clarinews@clarinet.com
Newsgroups: clari.tw.science,clari.news.interest.people,clari.news.issues.conflict,clari.news.election,biz.clarinet.sample
Followup-to: biz.clarinet.sample
Subject: Bomb-maker says fear of knowledge jeopardizes U.S. leadership
Keywords: research, science, people, human interest, war & peace,
	social issues, election, politics
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 92 13:52:08 PDT
Location: southern states
ACategory: usa
Slugword: physicist
Priority: regular
Format: regular
ANPA: Wc: 725; Id: z5196; Sel: xansr; Adate: 4-17-450ped
Codes: ynsrrxa., ynhprxa., ynxwrxa., ynperxa.

	NASHVILLE, Tenn. (UPI) -- A physicist who helped develop the hydrogen
bomb warned Friday that negative attitudes toward science and fear of
expanding knowledge could jeopardize the nation's political and economic
leadership.
	Speaking at Vanderbilt University, Edward Teller said he feared such
negative public attitudes would prompt ``the most talented of our young
people go into business administration, rather than science.
	``Today many young people know or believe to know that science is
dehumanizing,'' he said.
	Teller, 84, chairman emeritus of Lawrence Livermore National
Laboratory in California, has long been associated with development of
the hydrogen bomb and other weaponry.
	He warned that inquiry into the meaning of life and of consciousness
may soon be hampered by a shortage of scientists. The average age of U.
S. scientists is increasing, he said, ``because good young replacements
are not available.''
	``I believe that knowledge is good,'' Teller said. ``People in every
university should hold firmly to the statement: Knowledge is good.''
	Teller urged scientists, intellectuals and others to embrace the
contradictions and apparent absurdities that obscure understanding of
natural phenomena, including the origins of human life, which he said
must be viewed in spiritual as well as in material terms.
	``I'm telling you that the main progress in the next century
hopefully is an understanding of life,'' said the Hungarian-born
scientist who became a U.S. citizen in 1941.
	Teller said it would be ``nonsense'' to ignore the spiritual
components of human life while studying life's physical aspects. Every
aspect of life must be studied in ``exquisite detail,'' he said.
	Teller predicted that by 2100 A.D. science will have answered
questions associated with how matter becomes life and is sustained.
	However, he said he doubted humanity will face any fewer problems
than at present, because men and women are ``problem-creating animals.''
	``I think that in the coming period there are many more dangers than
ever before, but smaller ones,'' Teller said. ``The biggest danger is
becoming exceedingly unlikely,'' he added, referring to nuclear
confrontation between the Eastern Bloc and the United States.
	With recent geopolitical changes, Teller said, there is ``a realistic
process to reduce stockpiles'' of nuclear weapons. He said U.S. purposes
would be served by reduced stockpiles and by reductions in conventional
military forces.
	Still, he said, the prospect of such reductions could weaken the
nation's motivation toward scientific research and development.
	Teller said he is spending much of his time studying
superconductivity, but said he does not believe enormous projects such
as the Superconducting Super-Collider under development in Texas will
provide answers to the origins and nature of life.
	``I don't believe,'' he said flatly. ``I think Einstein tried to
explain everything in his last 30 years and produced nothing,'' he
added.
	Teller also put in a good word for President Bush, praising his
success in rallying the Saudi Arabian government, the United Nations and
other world leaders to take a stand during the Gulf War.
	He said it would make no sense for voters to ``put into the White
House a governor with a colorful past or a Texas billionaire,'' apparent
references to Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton and entrepreneur H. Ross Perot.
	He said if either were elected, ``then I think that the necessary
expertise will no longer be available, and I don't believe in the right
kind of miracles without expertise.''
	Teller said a Bush loss could further destabilize Russia and its
former Soviet Union sister nations, because today it is only ``hope and
not stability'' that holds the remnants together.
	Teller also announced plans to visit Russia in May as part of an
effort to turn the former Soviet space apparatus toward peaceful uses,
including surveillance of the earth's environmental pollution, possibly
through employing former Soviet scientists.
	Teller said scientists at the Livermore lab and at laboratory
facilities in Los Alamos, N.M., hope ``to work with Russians on popular
topics that will bring out more willingness and enthusiasm'' for
cooperation between the former superpower adversaries.
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