Politics and Research

In light of last year's tragic Challenger disaster, it makes sense to re-examine scientific research and the business of politics.

Research is the process of advancing the frontiers of knowledge. Research, when it is approached as a quest, employing the scientific method, advances knowledge without regard to its ultimate application. But the world is shaped and molded by economics and bottom lines. If the research is conducted in the public sector its ultimate applications should be molded by the public good. Unfortunately the public good is sometimes interpreted as serving the ends of the Party in power, or the needs of particular politicians to get re-elected. Space programs are the babies of international politics, and the United States and the Soviet Union both stage "space spectaculars" to prove some macho point or another. Space research is terribly prone to this kind of grandstanding because even the most peaceful uses of space can be inferred to have military applications, even by the non-technical citizen. Since the advent of space vehicles carrying fissionable material, the peaceful and the military uses of space have become so intermingled that they have become hopelessly linked in the public perception.

The Space Shuttle offered an opportunity to separate the peaceful research efforts in space from the military space research program, but a near-sighted Congress co-mingled the support for the Shuttle by authorizing and appropriating funds for the military to be used in the program. The Shuttle became the centerpiece of the U.S. space program because of its combined civilian and military funding, and many other important space research projects fell by the wayside unfunded. The deep-space probes, which have been the most spectacular tours de force of basic research, opened up the heretofore unimagined vistas of the solar system. With transmission of detail impossible by planet-based methods, we got to look at Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus. We found new moons and studied the rings of the "Gas Giants," saw volcanic eruptions on 10, and in general made advances in astronomy of a scope unequaled since Kepler and Newton applied their minds to the subject. Such programs now lack funding, in spite of the requirement of years of lead time for successful missions. Tremendous amounts of planning and time are needed for space vehicles to reach their appointed places in the solar system and successfully conduct their observations.

All our space research hopes were placed in the shuttle program basket. The shuttle was to be used to put commercial payloads into space: communications satellites were to be plucked from orbit, repaired and reinserted, all at a great savings in the business world. Manufacturing experiments were to be conducted on orbital production techniques, creating ultrapure chemicals for medical research, and flawless semiconductor crystals to be used in the computer industry I and etc... Each launch and landing of the Space Shuttle was a 1V event, and a proud Nation watched each technical triumph.

The cause of the Challenger disaster was predictable from the engineering data. The Morton Thiokol engineers who testified before the Rodgers Commission said they didn't approve the launch and should not be held accountable for it. The engineering data, well established before the Challenger launch -and certainly applicable to every launch using the same booster rockets the Challenger used -were clear: the O-rings used to seal the propellant seams in the booster rocket would shrink at low temperatures, allowing the burning fuel to come into contact with the outer wall of the booster and burn through. This is, in fact, what happened. This information is not arcane -there is no complex mathematical or physical principle involved. It has nothing to do with rate of burn, thrust production, attitude control or vibration. It's more like knowing that if you fill your radiator with plain water and then leave your car out in sub-zero weather overnight it's going to freeze. This could cause serious damage to the engine, and you would certainly take that into account, yes? The shuttle had to be launched above a certain temperature, a temperature at which the O-rings would function properly, just as the temperature would have to be above a certain point if you were going to use plain water as the coolant in your car. Yet the Rodgers Commission said there was no particular person or persons to blame, the fault was with the way the Shuttle was engineered. Much ado was made about the "criticality" of the O-rings. Many memoranda were found which said: we must do something about the O-rings, they're a weak link. ..So, there was some foreboding about the O- ring's performance in any conditions, but it was virtually certain that they would fail in cold weather. Top NASA administrators and the upper-level management at Morton Thiokol decided to launch Challenger when a critical part was at a temperature below which the engineers thought it would function properly. And all previous shuttle launches were executed using the same uncertain-yet-critical subassembly. Unfortunately, Challenger got the double-whammy: deficient O- rings and the proper conditions for their failure. From a research standpoint, could the launch have waited for more favorable conditions? I think so, even though it had been delayed many times previously. The only reason I can detect for failing to hold the flight was that it was a media event with a specific deadline.

Ralph Nader was right, of course. Cars were and are engineered badly. They are engineered to sell in show rooms, not on the road (Japanese ingenuity is making a difference in some of their cars) since the decision of which car to purchase is mostly based on vanity .The space-shuttle is not an American car (or the space program would be plagued with fatal disasters) it is one of the most highly engineered and sophisticated pieces of machinery ever made. The rockets are built and tested piece by piece, and each piece is checked and accounted for in an enormous database as the vehicle is constructed. Each and every engine is tested before being used as part of a launch vehicle. So what happened? Put quite simply, the space program has been 'politicized.' A shuttle mission carrying a civilian school-teacher was going to prove to the world that the U.S. space program was so safe that ordinary citizens could go into space, and that would have been true if proper precautions had been observed. An earlier shuttle mission carried a U.S. Senator. But the Challenger launch was to be part of the State of the Union Address. There is not a Federal agency in existence which does not vie to get into Presidential speeches. It is a fairly safe indication that the Administration will ask Congress tor the money the agency needs. NASA was playing this time-honored game. One can imagine the phrase about "our heroes in space. .."

Research can not and should not be forced to a public relations timetable, certainly not a timetable that has nothing to do with the research and which is nothing more than grandstanding. There is important work to be done in space, damned important work -research and development leading to space stations which could perform a multitude of necessary tasks, and research in astronomy, planetology and physics. But NASA left the 'Tin-Lizzie' out all night with nothing but water in the radiator and it froze. Came the morning -time to show it off- and when they turned the crank it blew up. ..and seven people died. I venture to say that there is nothing wrong with the remaining shuttle, but the Rodgers Commission concluded that the shuttle must be re-engineered, or a new one built at a cost of $3 billion. They found that the blame lay with faulty equipment and NASA's decision system; no particular person, just the system. The Morton Thiokol engineers who testified before the Rodgers Commission have been removed from their jobs. Not fired, not yet. ..They embarrassed the system.

NASA is one of the most valued agencies in the Federal Government. It is without peer in the research and developement of the peaceful uses of air and space. NASA research and development is responsible for the United States' preeminence in aviation and space technology. What more needs to be said? NASA needs to get out of the military research business, out of the private sector, and reassert itself as the agency for peaceful research and devolopement of and in space. The space program need not justify itself in terms of spin-off technology; NASAls real achievments -putting men in space and on the Moon, sending unmanned probes to the Moon, Mars, Venus and the outerreaches of the solar system -are unparelleled in terms of basic, fundamental information gathering: pure research. NASA should not need to pander and play 'pork barrel' to get appropriations. NASA is the Nation in space, expanding our understanding of the universe we live in. The mule-work of putting commercial communications satellites into orbit should be given over to users of those satellites. If such satellites are vital to the Nation's economy, let the FCC go to Congress and obtain the authority to acquire and launch space vehicles with communications payloads. Above all, NASA should not become the jack-mule of "Star Wars."

We have only begun to realize the potential of Near-Earth orbiting platforms, we've only had a tantalizing taste of the astronomical research which may be done in near and deep space. Let's get the military out of NASA. Let's get NASA back into peaceful R&D, and out of public entertainment...and politics.

...Ted Sudia...

Searching for Utopia

When I was living in the Metro Detroit area, I used to frequent the campus of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.

A friend of mine had just moved into the Xanadu Housing Co-op, and one afternoon I decided to pay him a visit. Ann Arbor is a charming old college town, i.e. it's easy to get lost in. After wandering around aimlessly in what I hoped was the general vicinity of the Co-op, I approached a rather distinguished and English-Professor-looking gentleman to ask directions.

"Pardon me," I began, "I'm looking for Xanadu. .."

He interrupted with, "Aren't we all, son. Aren't we all."

...Kevin Kinnell...

© Copyright 1986
Institute for domestic Tranquility