Download - Current needs
Impact Project 05-11-04
Impact Project 05-11-04
SOCI
ETAL
HIE
RARC
HY
National Government(s)
Regional Government(s)
Local Government(s)
Owners
Owner’s Managers
Owner’s Engineers & Scientists
Model Developers
Others (Public, Insurers)
Independent Engineers & Scientists
END-USERS
Impact Project 05-11-04
End Users Owners and Managers of “wet infrastructure”
Flood protection dykes and levees Usually some level of Government
With reactive intervention by higher levels of Government after a failure
Most significant dams are in “public ownership” Relatively small number of dams in private ownership
Public Want to be assured of their safety in the vicinity of the
structure Public policy makers
Politicians want the same assurances as the Public
Impact Project 05-11-04
The form of the problem of interest
Simulation of Tous Dam Failure Type Scenario
Impact Project 05-11-04
Can the problem be solved by science?
Impact Project 05-11-04
To manage catastrophic flood risks
Impact Project 05-11-04
Basis for international co-operation….
Problem often has international dimensions Physical effects can cross national boundaries Effects in one country have “knock-on” effects in other
distant countries Physics of phenomena independent of culture and
politics Possibly local variations of general problem of physics
Problems of concern too large for individual dam owner or authority responsible for integrity of flood protection structures
Impact Project 05-11-04
Scientific needs For general political and societal acceptance
Confirmatory research Independently reproducible: necessary condition
Creation of a sufficiently large body of supporting evidence– Independent review by those who are sceptical
Contradictory research Independently challenged: necessary condition
Demonstration that a sufficiently large search for errors and weaknesses has been carried out
– Independent review by those who are not sceptical Broadly based peer review and acceptance
By the wider scientific community: necessary condition
Impact Project 05-11-04
Simplification
Need to be clear what is being simplified: Are we simplifying
“the problem”, or, “the way of solving” the problem
Uncertainty is a complex phenomenon There is a need to distinguish between
Impact Project 05-11-04
Some sobering thoughts…..
Many of the phenomena involved fall into the domain of “trans-science” “Trans-science”: there are questions that can be asked
of science, but cannot yet be answered by science Research necessarily dominated by “uncertainty”
Making it necessary to work in the domain of probability
Probabilistic reasoning is difficult, Probabilistic reasoning is not intuitive.
Which means that there is no “simple and practical” way to properly formulate a scientific solution!