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WOODS HOLE: A SCIENTIFIC UTOPIAFRANK HERBERT AND THE ILLUSTRATED DUNEA NEW NOVEL BY STEPHEN KINGOMNIS 10-POINT PRESIDENTIAL PLATFORM

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onnruiEDITOR & DESIGN DIRECTOR: BOB GUCCIONEEXECUTIVE EDITOR: BEN BOVAART DIRECTOR; FRANK DEVINOMANAGING EDITOR: J. ANDERSON DORMANFICTION EDITOR: ROBERT SHECKLEYEUROPEAN EDITOR: DR. BERNARD DIXON: -ICTOR fi= ADVERTISING: BEVE". EY WARDALEEXECUTIVE VICE-PRESIDENT IRWIN E. BILLMAN

CONTENTS PAGEFIRST WORD Opinion Gerard K. O'NeillCOMMUNICATIONS Correspondence 1FORUM Dialogue 1EARTH Environment James E. Lovelock 1LIFE Biomedicsne Bernard Dixon 20SPACE - . . _

.

Brian O'Leary 2MIND Behavior Morion Schatzman 24BOOKS/FILM '--: -- = 2UFO UPDATE Report James Gberg 3CONTINUUM Ii i =:- 3WINNERS Susan Mazur 44FIRESTARTER fidwi Stephen King 5PSYCHOGRAPHICS Aracte Bibi Wein 54CHILDREN OF POSEIDON - : r Kenneth Jon Rose 5SIGMUND IN SPACE Refer Barry N Malzberg 6DUNE GENESIS Arfcfe Frank Hertsert 7DUNE - - - ; ,__ ~_ ._ ;-.-- 7ARTHUR KANTROWITZ Interview Monte Davis 8PLATFORM FOR PROGRESS Article i - t I I- -- :ri 88RARE BIRD Article Arcncrty Wtofif 10PEOPLE Names and Faces Oc*le

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FIRSTWORDBy Gerard K. O'NeillQSpace resources are tooimportant to.',beleft to the vagaries ofnational'-politics.

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"telescopes, found that arunvestnlentc fSbblHk -n ;o $deet^s pace-labor;ffldfles, solar-power tJHtan. ne mqre than theocsatellites, or space colonies, thai need : ?t :- "-- - :neA! aska pip

conornicaiiv :: :. : :e e - : jghtc sstabi ish a paithe moon oras - . . . - - .. :-s prod ueingmil endure ;_--.- ::::^TsofprDG mnually.

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Etespite all goodNASA friends, it became dear ;:-: - ie1 970s'thai the' spai:e agency cc .. "." 1 i : : : _ icoei laLcarry this research EprwanrJ a :' :..: ne p - . ::.- - - 3 PrincelgwernmSSdms, continuinggetary crises, and _-:.-. teatt Durpotshots from cnt.

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f% |e weredeiighted thatSwiss1| I I artist H. Ft. G/ger won themm mm Academy Award for out-standing visual effects in the TwentiethCentury-Fox motion picture Alien. Thoughhighly visible in European circles since1967, Giger's art was showcasednationally for the "first time in Qmni. Theprizewinning November 1978 cover, aflaunting Medusa, is typical of Giger'sgenius. The artist's talent has sinceearned him several other merit awards forhis Omni illustrations that accompanied"Found" (October 1978). "The AncientMind at Work" (February 1979). "GalateaGalante" (April 1979), and "Illegal Aliens"(November 1979). "Giger's work." Omni'sart director Frank DeVino observedrecently, "explores the ideologies andmythologies of the human mind. Thisrequires a special kind of vision."

Giger's is not the only art to winrecognition through Omni. The Society ofIllustrators' awards went to Ernst Fuchs for"Invisible Stripes" (October 1978) andDe Es Schwertberger for "Zen" (October1978). Fuchs paints in the style of"fantastic realism," a genre that originatedin Vienna. Austrian-born Schwertbergerhas received critical acclaim for the stonefigures that characterize his art.Omni's editorial content has also earned

several noteworthy prizes. Science writerDennis Overbye was'named the 1980recipient of the American Institute ofPhysics journalism award for improvingpublic understanding of physics and8 OMNI

; _..___. - ^ -^ - -- ; - e. _ = _ .^ z _ , ^_. . 3 pro( s of

= " " :~ '--- = ' ::e.:"' -a.vA/ng.appeared in our February 1979 issue.

Already the recipient of the 1 979 and980 Galaxy awards for most outstandingscience-fiction publication, Omni hasjust received the Nebula Award for'Sandkings," George ft ft Martin's spine-tingling tale of a pet owner obsessed with"feeding time." Marlin has sold more than40 pieces of short fiction, several articles,and two short-story collections. Naturally,the winner of the 1979 Hugo Award formost professional editor of a science-fiction publication was our own, modestBen Bova

.

The fifty-eighth annual Art Directors'Distinctive Merit Award went to twopfiotographers, Michael Somaroff for"Natural Packages" (November 1978) andPete Turner for "Road Song" (October1978), the cover for Omni's premiereissue. Both Somaroff and Turner areNew Yorkers. Somaroff. a photographerwith a penchant for science magazines,has produced portraitures for many ofOmni's interview subjects. Turner, whoseexpertise is special effects, claims hiswork is given shape by his personal vision."I have always been an avid reader ofscience fiction," he fold Omni, "and thiscomes through in my work."The fifly-ninth annual Art Directors'

Award was presented to several Omnicontributors, including former Lookphotographer Dan McCoy for a

conceptual depicfion of artificialintelligence in "Intelligent Machines"(October1979). Frenchman PierreLacombe, who at the tender age ofthirty-eight began his carc-cr as an artist,received an award for our July 1979 cover

"I was crammed into a small booth atFoley's Bar with the New York Giants'offensive team," former fashion modelSusan Mazur told Omni. "They invited methere for an in-depth discussion of futurefootball. Big-as-a-house Gordon King anReggie Van Home told me that after acouple of weeks at coach Ray Perkins'straining camp they were looking forwardthe day when they could send their clonein there to do it tor them." This, month Ms.Mazur takes us through the locker roomsand the labs for a look at how science isshaping the future of sports. Computers,Space Age equipment, and new trainingtechniques combine to turn losers into"Winners" (page 44). A model for nameslike Geoffrey Beene. Bill Blass, and DianeVon Furstenberg, Susan Mazur severalyears ago turned to the typewriter.Beginning as an editorial assistant forGood Housekeeping , she has sinceworked as the environment editor forPopular Mechanics, and her by-line hasappeared in Ambiance. Gentlemen'sQuarterly , and Omni.Stephen King, author of Carrie. TheDead Zone, and The Shining , has penne

a brilliant new chiller, "Firestarter," whichwe've excerpted exclusively for ourreaders (page 50). DO

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Kathy KeIrwin E. BillrAnthony J. (

,.:-; e-president)lent)e (secretary-treasurer)anne r-iowatsor. (sewer woo .o.-osidenr)

EDITORIALEditor in Chief.' Bob Guccione; Executive Editor;

iova; Managing Editor: J. Anderson Dorman-.r Editors: Dick Teresi, Scot Morris, Owens; Fiction Editor: Robert Sneckley; Humor Ert-ill Lee; European Editor: Dr. Bernard Dixon;

Associate Editors: Ellen Datlow Michael Edelhart.Kalhleen Siein; Assfstanf Managing Editor; Paul

i; Assistant Editors: Geoffrey Golson. RichardII!.. Kathleen McAuliffe. Eric Rosen; Copy Chief

R'oberl BoyIan; Copy Editors: Charles J. Attardi.Brian McKernan; Editorial Assistants: SusartCaputo, Francesca Lunzef, Margot Weber; Contrib-uting Editors: Monte Davis, Stuart Diamond. Robert

' ' >. Dr. Patrick Moore. Thomas J. O'Hanlon.Durk Pearson, Sandy Shakodus

ARTAn Director. Frank DeVino; Associate Art Director:Jeffrey Dorman. Assistant Art Director: MargaretRichichi; Photo Editor; Hildegard Kron; AssrsfanfPhoto Editor: Lisa Shapiro: Staff Photographer. Pat

Art.Assistant: Patricia LubinADMINISTRATIVE

V.P./Di'eaor of Advertising: Beverley Wardale; VPJAdministrative Services; Jeri Winston; V.P./ProdoclicnDirector; John Evans; Midwest Advertising Mgr.:

n Kamikow; Southern Advertising Director;r Goldsmith; Western Advertising Director:

. i Remain; Controller: Marc Bendesky; NatMarketing Mgr.: Ralph Perricelli; Nal'l Sales Opera-

nt Mgr: Richard Fogel; Director of NewsstandSafes: Robert Castardi; Newsstand Distribution

. ntDeLisi; Direct Safes Afgt: JelfGiannone;Liquor Sales Mgr.: Paula Fierman; Advertising Pro-

' rfion Director: Toni Wagner; AdvertisingAdminis-ion Mgr ' Leslie Krell Moses; Editorial Productionr: Linda Bogdanoff; Director ot Research and

Marketing Services: Carole RossantADVERTISING OFFICESn York (Beverley Wardale] Omni PublicarionsI., 909 Third Ave., New York, N.Y. 10022. Tel (212)3-3301. Telex no. 237138. Midwest (Normnikow) Omni Publications Ltd., 111 East Wackerve. Suite 2036; Chicago, III. 60601. Tel. (312)

565-0466; Soufh (Pelei Goldsmith) Omni Publica-tions Ltd, 1707 H St., N.W. Washington. DC 30006.Tel. (202) 298-6050; Deiroif Omni Publications Ltd..950 East Maple. Suite 304. Birmingham, Mich.48011. Tel. (313) 646-3646; West Coast (John Ro---'i] Omni Publicalions Lid, 924 Weslwood Blvd..

e 1002, Los Angeles, Calif. 90024. Tel. (213)824-9831. U.K. & Europe (Eleanore Graham) OmniPublications Ltd, 68 Upper Berkeley St, LondonV1H 7DH, England. Tel. (01) 262-0331. Telex no.919865

EDITORIAL OFFICESJew York 909 Third Ave, New York, N.Y. 10022.Tel. (212) 593-3301. Teles no. 23712B. West Coast924 Westwood Blvd., Suite 1002, Los Angeles. Calif.90024. Tel. (213) 824-9831. London 2 Bramber Road,West Kensington. London W14 9PB, England.

il. (01) 385-6181. Telex no. 919B65U.K. & European EditionsManaging Director: Alan Root AdvertisingDirector:

Eleanore Graham; Public Relations: Molly McKeltar;Editorial Assistant: Andie Burland

BUREAUSWashington. q.C: William R. Corson, 1707 H St..N.W, Washington, DC. Berlin: Hans-Hohn, Enzian-strasse I, Berlin 45 Rio de Janeiro: Andre Fodor, 96Rua Mexico. J5th floor, Rio de Janeiro ZC39Budapest: Paul Kirlyhedgyi, 5 Regi posta utca,Budapest5, Hi.!.- r . domir Komijenovic.

Strebrnjak 96, Zagreb, YugoslaviaJULY

OMNI

LETTERS

CDnjiruiuaiicMTonjsTechnological CheerleadingReferring to Ray Bradbury's "BeyondEden" in the April [1980] issue, one cannothelp admiring Mr. Bradbury's optimismregarding the space shuttle and itsspin-off technologies, beneficial to manyaspects of our society. But perhaps heis guilty of technological cheerleading ifhe truly believes the spin-offs will reduce,for example, our phone bills.

It is true that shuttle technologies willlaciiitate telecommunications andpossibly even reduce the cost of providingthese services, but it is equally true thatthose cost reductions will be passed on asdividends to shareholders, not pricereductions to consumers.Technology may change, after all, but

people remain the same.R. Wardle

Langley, B.C., CanadaThanks to the article "Beyond Eden," byRay Bradbury. I have been able to shut alot of skeptical mouths about our spaceshuttle program.

It seems like everyone I know who doesnot understand the purpose of the shuttlesystem has nothing but gripes about ourspace program. Articles such as "BeyondEden" help these small-brained peopleunderstand its actual significance.

Tim B.TaylorKennedy Space CenterCape Canaveral, Fla.

In His ImageA number of investigators are studying theShroud of Turin to determine whether itmay have once covered the body of JesusChrist. I have a suggestion that will cutthrough fhe rhetoric about the Shroud. Itwill be possible in Ihe very near future toclone human beings. The Russiansalready have an experiment under way inwhich they intend -to clone a mammoth(Mammoth Country Safari, anyone?).Cloning is a small technical step from thisachievement. All that would be required toclone the man who was wrapped by theShroud is a loose skin cell, of which thereshould be many trapped in the clothfibers. If this cloned human turns out to be

Jesus (we should be able to tell by themiracles he performs), it will revolutionizereligion. Imagine the opportunity torheresies and schisms with 100 clones ofJesus! Cloning a god makes man a god.Hence, this experiment is sure to turn offthe religionists.

Sandy ShakociSpectrum Technology Servi

Palos Verdes, CaliLast WordsYour Last Word column [May 1980] did aterrible injustice to a good science-fictiomovie. Alien . In the article you call thecrew of the shin Nostrcivo ioiotic for notopening all the hatches to let the creatureblow out at the beginning of the movieinstead of watting until the end. They counot have blown the creature into space atthe beginning because the main body ofthe ship was far away from any portal. Atthe end of the film it was in the small,one-roomed shuttle, and only then was itclose enough to a door to be sucked outinto space.

John MoraSpringfield, V

We of Battle Creek are sensitive to theneeds of our community including itsmonsters [Last Word, April 1980]. Aidedby the research of a special committeeand certain allocated funds, we arecurrently constructing a sewer thatpromises to be the ultimate insubterranean comfort. Certainly a monstewill harbor little desire to prowl our fair citwhen it can bask in sunken luxury.More cities should adopt this concept

"peaceful coexistence" within theirincorporated boundaries. We of BattleCreek are proud of the example that weare setting".

Chuck AshBattle Creek. Mic

I must make some correction in the April1980 Last Word.

Specifically. I am referring to the part o\hePunxsutawney Parallelogram. Havinglived in Punxsutawney for a while myself,and having many friends and relatives

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DIADGUEFDRUfUlIn which the readers, editors, andcorrespondents discuss topics arising outof Omni and theories and speculation ofgeneral interest are brought forth. Theviews published are not necessarily thoseof the editors. Letters for publicationshould be mailed to Omni Forum, OmniMagazine. 909 Third Avenue, New York,NY 10022.Support Our Space ProgramI am directing this letter to collegestudents. Having learned of the death ofboth the Galileo and Halley'sComet/Tempel II missions and theembarrassing delay of the shuttleprogram and having seen the spaceprogram pushed aside by our governmenton every account it is about time thatthose of us who support our spaceprogram, our future, address the issue.The method ior letting the government

know how we feel is simple. Begin apetition at your college, collect signatures,and submit them to the proper offices ofthe President and Congress; Adviser to the President on Space

Affairs: Benjamin Hubberman,Executive Office Building, Washington,DC 20500

Director of Space Science andApplications; House Subcommittee:Don Fuqua, Room 226. Rayburn OfficeBuilding, Washington, DC 20515

Director of Science, Technology, andSpace; Senate Subcommittee: Adlai E.Stevenson, U.S. Senate, Washington,DC 20510.There are nearly 1,000 colleges and

universities in the United States, with anaverage of 2,000 students per institution.We represent a powerful force, and we canchange ourfutu re.

Peter H. DiamandisGreat Neck, N.Y

Self-Righteous or Good Gardener?Most of James Randi's comments inOmni [Interview, April 1980] seem correct.Yet, as Randirails against the show-manship of a Uri Geller, he's busy grand-standing with his own Uri Awards and theRandi Challenge. He cites cases that12 OMNI

smack of slow-witted folk he deemsacceptable for ridicule. Little wonder hisoffers to prove claimed abilities are turneddown: Who wants to be the public fool?The problem lies in the arrogance of

self-righteous campaigns. What peoplebelieve may be foolish or even dangerous,but the right to those beliefs must be pro-tected. Carl Sagan recommends strongpublic education to inform and affectthose beliefs. We need to understand theconnection between belief and fact.As Sagan has pointed out, science is

not so much a body of knowledge as away of thinking, The working scientific-imagination appreciates the quality ofmetaphor in the Uncertainly Principle orthe Second Law of Thermodynamics aswell as the progression from impossible topossible. I find it intriguing that four pagesaway from Ihe Randi interview, Arthur C.Clarke suggests that "when a , . . scientistsays that something is possible, he isalmost certainly right. When he says it isimpossible, he is very probably wrong."

Richard CurreyFarmington, N. Mex.

James Randi's story about his "karate"demonstration mostly serves to demon-strate his lack of understanding of thenature of karate and the purpose of boardbreaking. We are concerned about theerroneous and dangerous impression hehas created and more concerned thathe seems to be arguing more from biasthan from an examination of the facts.One of us (M. David Stone) is a science

writer and a third dan black belt in TaeKwon Do, which he has been studying forover 13. years. The other (Richard A.Brandt) is a theoretical physicist and asecond dan black belt. Both of us shareRandi's skepticism about ESPWhile it is certainly true that almost

anything can be faked, the fact remainsthat any black belt in any legitimate stylecan break unprepared, unsawed, undriedwood. In our style, for example, part of thetest for first dan consists of breaking aminimum of three inches. Despite theimpression that Randi gives, this is not all..that easy. People who have been studying

karate for two or three years can havetrouble with this part of the test and, infact, students have been known to missbreak and injure themselves. Breakingbone in the hand or foot, while rare, is nunknown. The point is. just because Racan show how something can be fakeddoes not follow that it must be faked.What bothers us is that Randi'scomments about karate, based on

minimal research and sloppy thinking,demonstrate such a complete lack ofreliability that we can't help wonderinghis debunking of, say Uri Geller is justbaseless. We suspect not, but we urgeRandi to be more careful, or he may docause more harm than good.

M. David SiProfessor Richard A. BrNew York,

Congratulations on your interview withAmazing Randi. He deserves three chefor his important work of debunkingcharlatans like Uri Geller. They havespawned awhole new generation ofstarry-eyed kids and true believers whomushy sentimentality and pseudo-scientific jargon sprout like weeds in Ihwell-tended gardens of science. If theweeds aren't checked, they will chokereal and beautiful flowers of true scienthat mankind has labored so long tocultivate. James Randi is one of the gogardeners, and he should continuewielding every spoon he has bent byhonest trickery rather than by paranorpower as he goes about his weeding.

ImrnanuelNew York,In April you ran an interview with JameRandi the magician. He described cerprocedures used in judging a series oexperiments at Stanford Research Inst[SRI]. On the basis of his description,concludes that the results were "grossdishonest." Having been one of the juwho carried out the "suspect" procedufind that his description and my experience are in no way similar. I was there.one knows where Randi gets his versifrom. He has made this false claim bef

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and has been informed of its inaccuracy,yet he persists in what can only be called"gross dishonesty." Before you publishsuch near-iibelous attacks againstlegitimate researchers, made by a circusmagician who feels his craft threatened byreality, you might at least investigate theclaims.

Peter SchwartzSRI InlernationalMenlo Park, Calif.

James Randi replies: The "slow-wiltedfolk" mentioned are those touted byparapsychologists as miracle workers.And a magician who makes a tool olhishelper makes a fool of himselfas well. Notunderstanding how a trick is done makesno one a foolexcept in his own mind.

I have never attempted to deletepeople's choices. I agree 100 percent withSagan and I attempt to supply alter-natives to the claptrap that passes asscience in She field of the paranormal. If athing is fact, it cannot be "many things tomany people" if those people are sane.We are being told that 2+2*4, and Icannot accept this. Also, I have never saidthat the things I criticize are impossible; Ihave said only that they are unlikely in thesame way that metealies ana X rays wereunlikely. They are now established facts.Show me evidence and I will accept psialong with meteorites and X rays.

Several karate buffs took exception tomy reference to board breaking andinterpreted my comments to mean that Iimplied cheating. No! at all. I simply saidthat board breaking as I have seen it andI've seen a lot of it is easily done withoutrigorous training or preparation. Some 260requests for the $10,000 offer rules cameto my door, and all have been answered.As expected, a certain number ofpink-crayon-on-a-brown-paper-bag itemswere included. And, I must add, asatisfying number supporting my point ofview. In months to come, I will be testingthose who pass the preliminaries, and areport will be made to Omn] of the results

.

As for Mr. Schwartz, I have no ideawhich of the multitude of experiments atSRI Mr Schwartz was involved in, sincethejudges usually are not identifiedprobably for very good reasons. I haveample evidence that reports from SRI wereoften misrepresentations. Such data willbe reported in my book Flim-flam, due forpublication in September. As for the threat,it cannot apply to my craft, for we con-jurers openly with a few exceptions admit that we are simulating miracles, andwe leave the claims of real magic to theparanormalists and children.My claim is not false.Nuclear or Natural Threat?In Omni [Earth,. April 1980] you discussthe flash of light detected by the Velasatellite. As the article states, the expertssuspect that the flash was causedby some sort of nuclear device. There14 OMNI

is another explanation possiblenot discussed in the article. The flashcould have been caused by a naturalphenomenon similar to the Tunguskaexplosion of 1908 In the UFO Updatecolumn of the October 1979 issue yousummarized what was known about the1908 explosion. The article then told of asimilar explosion that had taken placeover Revelstoke, Canada, in 1965. Thisblast, in the kiloton range, was directlyattributed to a meteorite, possibly a chunkfrom Encke's Comet.

I suggest that the flash seen by Vela wasanother such meteorite. First Vela saw adouble flash, suggesting that the hypothet-ical meteorite was breaking up so that thedifferent pieces did not explodesimultaneously. Vela did not detect theradiation and magnetic disturbances thatwould have resulted from a nuclear blast.There have been no repeated indicationsof any radioactive contamination in thearea and waters that would have beenaffected by a nuclear blast. How does theflash compare with the explosion inCanada? I believe that this possibilityshould be investigated and, if shown to beprobable, firm steps should be taken tocurb a menace to mankind.

Ronald A. BerendsBuffalo, N.Y

Technological Intrusion"Cesarean Boom" points out the folly ofmisplaced technology. More and morewomen are realizing that their bodies arecapable of handling the "trauma" ofchildbirth. K. C. Cole is supporting thepopular misconception that childbirth is acomplicated medical problem.The fact is, however, most births canand should be completely natural. Fear is

the number one factor in the pain mostwomen endure in labor. A relaxed, warm,welcoming atmosphere is a benefit to bothmother and child. A Cesarean section is adrastic step that results in medicalcomplications for the mother and infant.Contrary to Cole's implication that

Cesarean sections result in more "perfectbabies," it has been recognized by manyopen-minded physicians since the 1930sthat the best method of delivery is asnatural a way as possible. Childbirth is asnatural as copulation. A technologicalintrusion would not be necessary if womenwere encouraged to know what is happen-ing during labor and delivery. It is a grossmismanagement of resources when acompletely healthy person is subjected tounnecessary surgery. The birth of a childis a wonderful thine; "Cesarean Boom"makes it sound like a gallstone removal.

Fi. FindlayThunder Bay, Ont., Canada

More on Cattle MutilationsI feel I must respond to Alan K. Bingham'sletter [Forum, April 1980] on the cattlemutilation mystery. Bingham suggests thatthe federal government is monitoring the

long-term effects of nuclear tests in theWest by surreptitiously killing and dissecting privately owned cattle.

While our government loves to dosimple things in complex and expensiveways, it seems unlikely that it would riskflying a fleet of helicopters at night overrough and often mountainous terrain. IfBingham is correct about the govern-ment's intentions, it would be much easieto dress an intelligence agent in civilianclothes and have him purchase the animalas any other cattle buyer does. Anotherplan would be to have FDA meat inspec-tors in slaughterhouses collect the needeparts, which could later be diverted to thappropriate government agency.

I have been deeply involved in theinvestigation of these strange animaldeaths since 1974, when a series of themoccurred in my home state of Minnesota,where the military has never conductednuclear or chemical-warfare experimentsLater this year Manor Books will publishthe results of my investigations. This bookprovisionally entitled The Terror, detailsmany incidents that have been sup-pressed by law-enforcement agencies;it also offers an explanation of the mutila-tion mystery that will rock the scientificestablishment to its foundations.

Michael D. AlbeMinneapolis, Min

As Time Goes ByThe case is no! closed! In the April 1980Games column, your "Clock Problem"states that in 12 hours, the hands of aclock are coincident 1 1 times. You arewrong. Start counting at: (1) 12:00; (2)1 :05; (3) 2:10; (4) 3:15; (5) 4:20; (6) 5:25;(7) 6:30; (8) 7:35; (9) 8:40; (10) 9:45; (11)10:50; (12) 1 1 :55, The next 12 hours wouldbe started again at 12:00. Take time toconsider it.

Lynn ErickseLockport,

Scot Morris replies; In the introduction tothis puzzle, I said it was a great one forstarting arguments and I was right. Hocan the hands of a clock coincide at 11:55and again five minutes later at 12:00?

For the record, here are the times thatclock hands are coincident, worked out bDavid Cortner, of Johnson City, Tennesseeand George Kelley Jr., of Glade Spring,Virginia, and accurate to the nearesthundredth of a second:(1) 1:05:27. 27; (2) 2:10:54.55; (3)3:16:21.82; (4) 4:21:49.09; (5) 5:27:16.36;(6) 6:32:43.64; (7) 7:38:10.91;(8) 8:43:38.18; (9) 9:49:05.46;(10) 10:54:32.73; (11) 12:00:00.00.The clock hands are not coincident at1:05, as Ms. Ericksen and several otherreaders suggest. At 1:00 the little handpoints to the "1," but five minutes laterwhen the big hand points to the "1,"thelittle hand has already moved on onetwelfth of the way toward the "2," etc. Casclosed. Again.DO

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1NG PLANETEARTHBy James E. LovelockImagine the control deck of a space shipas ifaoproaches a newfound planetarysystem. The commander turns lo his

chief exobiologisl and asks, "Do any ofthese planets bear life?"The C.E. replies confidently, "Planet

Three has abundant chemical life, alongwith an atmosphere we can breathe."How could the C.E, tell? By using thetelebioscope, which is able to deteci lifeacross tens or even hundreds of millions ofkilometers of space. The device, devel-oped under NASA's sponsorship 15 yearsago, uses the information in reflectedsunlight to determine the contents of aplanet's atmosphere.

There's nothing unusual about findingsome surprises when a new inventionis used. The telebioscope, or life detec-tor, was no exception. When turnedaround and trained on Earth, it spun offthe astonishing suggestion that life on ourplanet is integrated on a global scale.Earth, as a planet. 1$, alive.An entity as large as a planet and with

the power to control its own habitatneeded a name to match it. William

Golding, the novels"., suggested Gaia, thec-sr:h goddess of the Greeks. It alsoneeded a collaborator to put some fleshonto the bare bones of theory. I was in-deed fortunate to have Lynn Margulis helpme to develop Gaia.The evidence for Gaia's existence

ranges all the way from astronomy tozoology. Stars in globular cluslers shinemore brightly as they age. If our sun hasdone Ihe same, its output of radiantenergy has increased by 25 percentsince life began on Earth.

This raises some questions: Why hasn'tEarth's temperature risen accordingly?Why aren't we now boiling? The answer is:Our climate depends not only on the heatof the sun but also on the gases of the airand on the reflection and emission ofradiation from land and sea,The average iemperature of the earth

has scarcely varied from what it is today.The ice ages have affected only therelatively unimportant upper 15 percentand lower 15 percent of the planet'ssurface, while the regions around theequator, which include 70 percent of the

The telebioscope has mrnccJ lj.jj U':e Nanjing =.:jyqe:j'jL16 OMNI

that the earth as a planet is actually alive.

earth's surface and most of its life formshave been immune from ice cover

It is possible that the sun, air, andsurface of the earth have always changby accident to maintain a constantclimate. To have done this for 3.5 billionyears, however, stretches credibility. Amore likely alternative is that life respondeto changes by modifying the surfaceand atmospheric composition so as tomaintain the optimal climate. This is oneof the arguments for Gaia.

Mars. Earth, and Venus are thought thave had very similar compositions at torigin. We might expect, therefore, thatlifeless planet interposed between Marsand Venus would be an average of the tIt would have an atmosphere rich incarbon dioxide, but with only traces ofoxygen. This imaginary planet would haevolved into something vastly differentfrom our present-day Earth, for it wouldnhave experienced life's powerful andcontinuous manipulation of the entireplanetary surface. If life can make suchenormous changes, it seems perversedeny it the capacity, through Darwinianevolution, to make them so as to favor iown survival.

Life uses the atmosphere of its planetas a convenient, mobile medium for theexchange of its chemical products.Methane and oxygen are present in larquantities in Earth's atmosphere, and fthis alone it would be possible, using ttelebioscope, to deduce that life existeon this planet. Yet the great fluxes thatthese and other gases undergo in relatto the earth's crust suggest that the entbiosphere must be involved in the gastransfers, for inorganic processes simpcould not handle the volume of thereactions. Air is not passive, but is a paof life and its interactions with the planeWhat is the function of a gas such as

methane or oxygen in the atmosphere?Ordinarily such a question would rightlcondemned as teleological. It is the roscience, after all, to study the mech-anisms of nature, not to look for somepurpose or design. But it for the sake oargument we assume that Gaia does ethen the question is no more illogical thCONTINUED FROM PAGE 124

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HE!

By Dr. Bernard Dixon

^^ cquired characteristics may be^^fc acquired after all. Certain# abilities developed duringa person's lifetime may be passed onto offspring, as claimed by the Frenchbiologist Jean Lamarck but vigorouslyrepudiated by both early and present-dayfollowers of Charles Darwin.

That bold assertion, which clashesviolently with a central tenet of modernbiology, is made by the young immu-nologist Dr. Ted Steele in his provocativebook, published recently, called SomaticSelection and Adaptive Evolution (Williamsand Wallace, Ltd.}. An Australian, Dr.Steele has worked at the University ofAdelaide, the John Curtin School, inCanberra, Australia, and the OntarioCancer Institute, in Toronto, Canada.He is now in London to continueexperimental work that he hopes willprovide overwhelming support for hiscontroversial views.Many adherents of Lamarckism werewon over by its simplistic appeal, ratherthan by its scientific underpinnings. JeanHenri Fabre was one great writer whorefused to accept that life's beautifuladaptations, in solitary wasps, forexample, are based on nothing more thanthis Darwinian selection of purely randommutations. But ever since we learned thatthe genetic material in germ cells (ova andspermatozoa] is in a sense isolated fromthe rest of the body, it has been impossibleintellectually to accept Lamarckianevolution. There simply is no route bywhich acquired behavior can beincorporated in the DNA code of germcells and bequeathed to ensuinggeneralions.Why, then, has Steele's book been

endorsed by such noted philosophers ofscience as Arthur Koestler and Sir KarlPopper and by Nobel Prize-winningmolecular biologists Dr. Howard Temin andSir Peter Medwar? Until now the scientificestablishment has been unwavering in itsopposition tQ.Lamarckism. And Ted Steeledoes not go outbf his way to seducepotential critics. On the contrary, his bookshows all the blunt brashness of youth.

Steele has not been damned without a20 OMNI

hearing, largely because he bases histheory on the fantastic abilities of theimmune system. Scientists have long beenbattled by the body's skill at generatingantibodies to fight off an almost endlessbarrage of foreign intruders. So whenSteele offers a plausible explanation-even when that explanation invokesLamarckian evolution he must be takenseriously.The riddle at the center of immunology

is this: How can we and other animalsproduce an astronomical range ofdifferent antibodies that specifically reactagainst not only disease-causing bacteriaand viruses but also novel products of thechemical industry? To take an extremecase, we know that a baby, a rabbit, anelephant, or a mouse not yet born will becapable of making antibodies thatspecifically neutralize a totally newchemical that has not yet even beensynthesized.There seem to be just two possiblemechanisms at work here. Foreign sub-

stances either instruct cells to fabricateparticular antibodies (for example,

Lamarck: He may have been right alter a

they might imprint their patterns on thoscells, telling them the complementaryshape of antibodies to produce), or theyselect antibody-making cells from apreexisting catalog of possibilities.

Neither idea seemed remotelybelievable until about 20 years ago wheanother Australian, Sir Macfarlane Burneapparently solved the enigma. He sug-gested that the mutation and selection wobserve in populations of monkeys, fruitflies, and bacteria might also work amonthe cells of an individual creature. Thisgenerates a wide range of antibody-making capabilities. So when somethinforeign appears, the appropriate cells astimulated and their production linesbegin to turn out antibodies of the"nearest fit."

For a while everyone was satisfied witthis explanation. But then biologists begto realize that Burnet's theory didn't realanswer the central question of howimmunological diversity appears in thefirst place. Where does that catalog ofinformation come from?

This is where Ted Steele provides ahazardous, brave, but liberatingexplanation. Like everything else in thebody, he points out, the immune systemhas a genetic basis. Something is in-herited. Could it be that the adaptationsof one lifetime the mutations that gen-erate antibodies to protect that indi-vidualmight be incorporated into thepassed along to the next generation?Steele believes that this is precisely whahappens. Cells are selected, as Burnetsuggests, but then the relevant informatin them is transferred into the animal'sDNA. How this occurs, Steele cannot besure, but one possibility is that a virusperforms the task of inserting the codeddata. Viruses certainly do transfer genetinstructions among bacteria. Maybe thealso do it in animals.

That is fundamentally a Lamarckianproposition. And it has straightforwardpredictions that can be tested, which isexactly what Steele is doing. After a lonand bitter battle to debunk Lamarckiantheory, Darwinists may now have to settlfor a compromise.OQ

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AT/wi

By Brian O'Leary

n June 30. 1908, a ten-megatonbomb exploded at a height of ienkilometers above the pine for-

ests of Tunguska, Siberia. Trees toppledand branches sizzled over an area 60kilometers across. About 1 ,500 reindeerwere killed, and a man standing on hisporch was knocked flat. Shock wavesregistered on seismographs the worldover, and the sound was detected inEurope, thousands of kilometers away. Abrilliant fireball flared in broad daylight.The explosion released as. much energyas a small hydrogen bomb.What caused il? Probably a small cometor an extinct comet-turned-asteraid, Theloose agglomeration o! dust and ice,probably 60 meters across and weighing100,000 tons, exploded in midair with apotential for destruction far exceeding1,000 falling Skylabs.The fear that this sort of thing will

occur again has become a mainstay offormula science fiction. (Have you seenthe movie Meteor or the olt-repeatedTV movie about a comet that explodesover Phoenix 9 ) II is a fact, however, thatsuch collisions have happened before andthat others will occur, not necessarily overuninhabited wastelands. The cataclysmicimpacts of larger comets, asteroids, andmeteorites may even be a major factor inchanging Earth's climate and geology andthe evolution of living things.The meteor crater near Winslbw,

Arizona, is an example of asteroid collisionin geologically recent times. The craterwas caused by the impact, about 22,000years ago, of an iron-rich asteroid 50 to100 meters across and weighing severalhundred thousand tons. This asteroid, likemany others, might have originated in theasteroid bell between '.he orbits of Marsand Jupiter and was pulled into a new,unstable, earthward orbit by planetaryperturbation.

Our.even less.frequent, very energeticcollisions with Earth-approachingasteroids could have had a profoundinfluence on the evolu:.on ol life. BerkeleyNobel laureate Louis Alvarez and hiscoworkers have found that some'deep-sealimestones contain unexpectedly high

amounts of platinum and iridium,suggesting influxes of extraterrestrialmaterial. Some depots oonlaining 30 to'160 times the normal level of iridium dateto an event 65 million years agoprecisely the time of the Cretaceous/Tertiary extinction.They suggest that the impact of a ten-kilometer asteroid would account for both

the extinctions and the iridium. Pulverizedrock uncovered by the impact would "stayin the stratosphere for three to five yearsand be distributed worldwide," Alvarezreported. "The resulting darkness wouldsuppress photosynthesis, and thee-xpected biological consequences matchquite closely the extinction observed in thepa!ecn:obg cal -ecords."How abundant are these Earth-approaching asteroids, and how likely arewe to get hit? We can work out a goodestimate by combining the number andsize of craters on the moon with data onthe 50 Earth approaches whose orbits areknown. There are probably at least100,000 such asteroids with diametersgreater than 100 meters and weights of a

Win ar. asteroid oes:'

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GHOST 8TORxnniruDBy Morton SchatzmanRuth stared at the televisionscreen. The black-and-white

checkerboard pattern on thescreen reversed itself once a second,Electrodes on Ruth's scalp showed,through an oscilloscope, that electricalwaves from the vision center of Ruth'sbrain were stimulated each time thecheckerboard reversed itself. Ruth wasexperiencing a reaction called the visualevoked response.

Peter B. C. Fenwick, a Londonpsychiatrist and neurophysiologist, and Iwere interested in Ruth's visual evokedresponse for an unusual reason: Sheclaimed to see apparitions that looked asreal to her as living persons did. Theseapparitions did not have the insubstantialquality of ghosts or dreams. Ruth said theyobstructed herview of things just as realpeople would. Their feet were literallyon the ground: They walked, stood, andsat on furniture; they never flew or floatedon air, If people talked with Ruth, theapparitions would follow the conversation,sometimes making relevant remarks onlyshe could hear. When they left a room,they walked out the door, not through awall. They never simply vanished.

For Ruth, an American mother In hermid-twenties, the only difference betweenher apparitions and living persons wasthat no one else saw them. Dr. Fenwickand I were trying to see whether anobjective test would corroborate Ruth'sexperience.We asked her to create an apparitionbetween the checkerboard pattern andher eyes. Ruth had acquired the ability toproduce apparitions at will as a result oftherapy to eliminate her original terror ofthem. We had taught her to accept andcontrol the images, not repress them. Nowr. Fenwick and I wanted to use thatcontrol to test the effects of the apparitionson Ruth's brain.

While staring at the pattern. Ruthimagined an apparition of her seven-year-old daughter, Heather, sitting on her lap."Her head is in front of my eyes," Ruthsaid, "and I see the part in her hair and herpigtails. She's blocking out the screen."The electrical activity of Ruth's brain

24 OMNI

during 16 pattern reversals was averaged.Her visual evoked response pattern hadvanished completely!

"You've won!" Peter exclaimed."What's happened?" Ruth asked."Your brain has behaved in the same

way it would have if your daughter hadactually been sitting on your lap," Petersaid. "You've produced the appearance ofa real person."

"But I could have told you that." Ruthreplied.

"Yes, but your saying so isn't the sameas our proving it."We repeated the experiment severaltimes. When Ruth said her daughter'shead blocked the checkerboard patternincompletely, the visual evoked responsewas reduced but not eliminated. Ruth'sreports of how completely the screen infront ot her was obstructed consistentlycorresponded with how much theoscilloscope showed her visual evokedresponse was inhibited.

"It's nice that the electrodes can tell youwhat I'm seeing," she said."How do you make an apparition?" Peterasked Ruth.

"I stop paying attention to everythingaround me. I decide whose apparition Iwant to make. I remember what the perlooks like, as most people do with theireyes closed, except my eyes are open.And I produce the person."Where did Ruth's brain intercept the

visual stimuli that she stopped seeingwhen the apparitions got in the way? Waher retina, the light-sensitive surface atback of her eye. registering the stimuli?electroretinogram. which measures theelectrical response of the retina to light,showed that Ruth's retina respondednormally to a beam of light shining at heeye. When she had an apparition coverher eye. the electroretinogram showed nchange. In complete darkness, she hadan apparition turn the light on, and theelectroretinogram again showed that nochange had occurred in her brain patter

That the apparition had not affected tresponse of her retina was unsurprisingas retinal responses are not controlled bthe brain's cerebral cortex, whereconsciousness and will originate. We noknew that the blocking of her visualevoked response to light had occurredafter the light had been normallyregistered by her retina.

Next Ruth sat with earphones, listenito clicks being delivered at a rate of abotwo a second.She said she could hear the sounds o

footsteps and sometimes of clothesrustling when an apparition walked anddoors opening and closing when anapparition left a room. She also allegedheard apparitions speak. If a living persand an apparition spoke simultaneouslyshe found it difficult to follow what eitherwas saying, because she heard thesounds ot both at once.The clicks Ruth heard in our test are a

standard stimulus for eliciting the auditoevoked response from that part of the.brain involved in hearing. Peter and Iwanted to learn whether an apparitioncould inhibit auditory response, too.

"Could you have your daughter turndown the volume control on the machineproducing ihe clicks to the point where ycan't hear them?" Peter asked. He show

D ON PAGE 1 1(3

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THE ARTSBy Robert Siiverbergne of the least likely successstories in science-fictionpublishing is a small company

that puts its books out in editions of a fewhundred copies, doesn't botherdistributing thern to bookstores, andprefers to issue at prices ranging up to$35 novels long available in paperback.Since.1975. Gregg Press has releasedseveral hundred books by Alfred Bester.Fritz Leiber, Poul Anderson, Robert A.Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, Roger Zelazny,and almost any other first-rank SF writeryou can name. As quality science fictionbecomes more apoealhgly collectible,this modest publishing house is enjoyingsteady profits and overwhelming criticalacclaim from writers and editors.Headquartered in Boston, tiny Gregg

Press belongs to the multitentacledempire of International Telephone andTelegraph Corporation - a fact Greggdoes not work hard to publicize. Some 20to 30 books a year appear under theGregg imprint. Though Gregg pays nextto nothing for publication rights $250is a lypical advance for a famous novelwrilers who draw 50 limes as much frompaperback companies are eager to haveGregg reprint their books.

"For an aulhor to see his work trans-muted from temporary little paper editionsinto splendid, strong, and durableeditions," says novelist Philip K. Dick, "isthe dream of a lifetime. Seeing the superbGregg Press editions of my novels andstory collections gives me the impressionthat whal I have done amounts to morethan a temporary bubble thai one day willpop into oblivion. These matched editionsare the pride of my bookshelf, and wouldbe even had I not been the author."Andre Norton, whose seven-volume

Witch World series has been Gregg's topseller al $50 per set, says, "Certainly l amvery proud and pleased that my titles havebeen gathered into well-designed anduniform sets, and l very much appreciatethe chance to have my work appear underthe Gregg imprint."Gregg's editions provide an ego trip for

authors that goes far beyond putting oldpaperbacks between hard covers. As any26 OMNI

despondent librarian will aomii. moslbooks printed in the twentieth century arenot going to survive very far into thetwenty-first. The chemicals that are usedin modern papermaking processesguarantee that treasured first-editionHeinleins, Asimovs, and Bradburys aregoing to self-destruct in another genera-tion or two and that those paperbackSturgeon, van Vogt, and Leiber classics,however carefully tended, will perishof natural causes long before the firsthuman explorers land on Mars. But Gregg almost alone in contemporary SF pub-lishinguses high-quality, acid-freepaper thai will save its titles from the doomthat awaits other books. Even suchobscure SF works as William N, Harben'sThe Land of the Changing Sun andCharles Romyn Dake's A StrangeDiscovery are assured immortality byGregg Press reprints.Gregg tickles auihors, ib'arians. and

book buyers with elegant buckrambindings of uniform design, stamped inred and gold. A group of Gregg titlesmost a 'e issued without du^ jackets-

gleams on .he booksn elf like someimposing nineteenth-century collectedworks. And eacn :itle 'S accompanied bylengthy and searching introduction by awell-known scholar or author. Among thowho have done such essays for Gregg arMichael Bishop, Algis Budrys. JoeHaldeman, Barry Malzberg, MichaelMoorcock, and Norman Spinrad.The Gregg program was born in 1972,when Thomas Beeler invited New York

editor and book collector David G.Hartwell to act as consultant for a line ofhardcover reprints of SF slandbys.Hartwell, a formidable wheeler-dealerwhose inexhaus: bie energies have madehim perhaps the single most powerful aninfluential figure in contemporary sciencefiction, threw himself into the project withcharacteristic gusto, but behind-lhe-scenes complications delayed the firstseries of 20 Gregg Press titles for nearlythree years. Since then, titles haveappeared in annual bursts. From thebeginning Hartwell's coeditor has beenrare-book dealer Lloyd Currey (in the earyears they were assisted by Richard GidPowers, of the City University of New YorkThe original emphasis of the Gregg

series was scholarly, austere, almostrarefied. The first 20 books included 9virtually forgotten nineteenth-centuryworks, some equally unfamiliar early-twentieth-century ones, and hardlyanything by modern masters of the genreMuch of the newer material already hadone hardcover incarnation and was merebeing brought around again for the benefof librarians looking to replace worn-outeditions of out-of-print books (WalterMiller's A Caniicio tor Lsibowiiz, forinstance, or Ola' Stadia-dor's To the EndTime), But also on the first list was BesterThe Stats My Destination, which qualifiesfor anybody's top-ten ranking and whichhad never been published in the UnitedStates in hardcover before. Gradually itdawned on collectors that here was agenuine first American hardcoveredition available only in some 250copies. The books were snapped up."We haven't ceased republishing early

classics," Hartwell says, "but we've) ON PAGE 116

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Fill/

THE MR"By Jonathan RosenbaumSpeculating on what movies of ihe

future will be like, it's hard lo getvery far without some notion of

the changing needs of audienc.es. A cru-cial part of this change can be detected inwhere we see movies. Acco'd no lopresent signs, -i see~s pretty clear thatmost of the films we'll see will be either inhomes or at shopping malls."Once inside a ma I. shoppers have few

decisions to make," the magazine Dollars& Sense recently noted. "Corners are keptto a minimum so the customers will flowalong from store to store-, propelled, as thedevelopers say, by 'retail energy.' " It's adescription that "is seve'.sl -ecent movieblockbusters and others we can expectto see in the future.By contrast, the movie houses that

traditionally cropped up near the centersof towns public gathering places, notunlike the municipal squares they wereoften adjacent toare quickly becomingncs-algic emb cms of ano-.her era.Shopping malls, meanwhile, are

sprouting virtually everywhere mainly, itseems, on the outskirts of towns-, away

;,cm those oic corners. Their overall rate offailure during the past 25 years is said tobe less than 1 percent. Almost half of theretail business in ihe United Statescurrently takes place in them.These 18,000 strip and enclosed com-

plexes also known as plazas andcenters rep issenJ only "

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A built-in, dual-track cassette tapedeck with 1500 baud rate, for APF'sdigitally recorded, "saturated"tape programs. A built-in soundsynthesizer. And two, built-in,game style controllers, withjoysticks and numeric keypads.When you want to go beyondAPF's library of educational, home-and- personal management orentertainment programs. . . whenyou want to create your own pro-grams. . .you can. The ImaginationMachine is programmable inBASIC and 6800 machine lan-

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is also expandable. Just add ou"Building Block", an optional, foport expansion device, and youcan hook up a printer, telephonmodem, and additional memorcartridge or mini-floppy disk driFor the name of your nearestImagination Machine dealer caTOLL FREE: 1-800-223-1264. [NewYork residents call: (212) 758-755or write: APF Electronics, Inc. 444Madison Avenue, N.Y., N.Y. 100S599. Manufacturer's suggested retail prlF*#-electronics i

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THE RUSSIAN CONNECTIONUFD UPDATEBy James ObergFor the past few months, groceryshoppers across the United

States have been titillated bybanner headlines in the National Enquirer."Crippled UFO Orbits Earth." oneproclaims. "First UFO to Inflict Damage ona City," 'Aliens on the Moon when WeLanded," "UFO Base on Saturn Moon,"others announce.The mainstream UFO movement has

had the good sense to ignore thesesensational claims (while often trusting thesources on other matters), but the publicnay well be wondering just what is goingn. Few people realize that these

i :eadlines can be traced from thei-nquirer's editorial offices in Floridatosuburban Los Angeles, and then acrosshalt a world to Moscow!UFOs are a sensitive topic in the SovietUnion. Such sensational headlines wouldnever be printed there. The governmentofficially denies alien visitations andblames such tales with somejustice on "Western yellow journalism."The Soviet public, however eagerlydevours UFO rumors that rank among the

wildest in the world, and in practice theregime appears to tolerate this as a safetyvalve for ideological dissent.The reigning czar of the Russian

ufologists is Feliks Zigel. an astronomylecturer at the Moscow Aviation Institute.Zigel has written popular books andarticles on UFOs, on a Soviet "bigfoot" inthe Caucasus Mountains, and on similartopics. He is also the reputed author of atwo-volume UFO "lecture" now circulatingin the underground [samizoa!) 'iterature.The cast includes some other

interesting even bizarre characters.Science-fiction author AleksandrKazantsev is one. An "ancient-astronaut"enthusiast who predates Von Daniken, heclaims that "God" is a case of mistakenidentity that originated with aliencosmonauts a notion encouraged inofficial antirel gious propaganda.

Aleksey Zolotov, a provincial universityprofessor, enthusiastically touts the ideathat the Tunguska explosion in 1908 was aspaceship crash. He has vowed not toshave his Tolsxyar, ceard until the worldadmits he's right. Zolotov is also into body

A purpc'iecl alien era!! Si30 OMNI

rJ during a peak of UFO activity

auras, faith healing, and altering thespeed of wristwatches held in his handsTwo physicists are also active in the

USSR's UFO cult: Vladimir Azhazha andSergey Bozhich, whose specialty seemsto be embellishing foreign UFO reportsand fobbing them off as Russian origina

Reports from these Russian enthu-siastsWestern newsmen are delighteto find Russians willing to talk on the recabout anythingare consideredhighly cr ologistswhen they appear in UFO magazinesand newsletters. They are written upin the National Enquirer by the RussiansAmerican contact man. Russian-speakHenry Gris (pronounced Gree),of Los Angeles. G r is is an editor for thetabloid and coauthor of several booksdealing with UFOs and parapsychology

Gris seems to quote the Russians witsubstantial accuracy, but he takes liberwith reality. Instead of identifying hissources as a small coterie of obscureenthusiasts, he turns them into "topRussian scientists" and "leading Russiaphysicists." Check the indexes to theworld's scientific literature, however Themen's names are notably absent, thougtens of thousands of genuine Sovietscientists are listed.

Their UFO stories are as questionableas their credentials. Take, for example,flying-saucer attack on the city ofPetrozavodsk on Sepie~ bet 29, 1977,"First UFO to Inflict Damage on a City,"National Enquirer bannered it on April 11978. Within hours after the story brokethe West, it had been solved; Thejellyfish-shaped "UFO" was really thesunlit exhaust trails from the predawnlaunch of a spy satellite at a.secret spaccenter nearby.The Russian populace could never b

given that explanation, of course, andUFO buffs in the USSR rushed to embrathe case. 'As far as I am concerned, it wa spaceship from outer space, carryingout reconnaissance," said Kazantsev.

Zolotov declared, "In my opinion, theobject was a typical flying saucer. Theavailable reports left no doubt whatsoevabout that in my mind."

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Zigel agreed. "Without a doubt." hesaid, "it had all the features." And Azhazhawas more specific: "In my opinion, whatwas seen over Petrozavodsk was either aUFO, a carrier of high intelligence withcrew and passengers, or it was a field ofenergy created by such a UFO."The tale of the phanlom alien satellite

("Crippled UFO Orbits Earth," July 17,1979) seems to have been simpleplagiarism. Bozhich claimed to havespotted fragmenls of an alien spacecraftcircling high above our planet, a derelictthat blew up exactly 23 years ago lastDecembers. Unfortunately, Bozhich wasobviously quoting from an Americanscientist's article, which in January 1969suggested that a natural moonlet hadbroken up and left debris in orbit. Whenanother American scientist pointed out thepaper Bozhich hadn't mentioned it-theNational Enquirer proclaimed that itcorroborated the Russian story.The Apollo UFO fable ("Aliens on theMoon when We Landed," September 11,

1979) went through several meta-morphoses across the world. Azhazhawas the main source for the NationalEnquirer Story of a NASA cover-up;somehow he neglected to mention that histale of astronauts secretly photographingflying saucers on the moon was derivedfrom a French book by Maurice Chatelain,published here as Our Ancestors Camefrom Outer Space in 1978.That book, in turn, was based on faked

"space photos" released in 1974 by theCosmic Brotherhood Associates, a fringeUFO cult in Japan. The pictures wereforged in order to illustrate an originallyCanadian hoax, which was so transparentthat most UFO groups in North Americarejected it in 1969,Each of. the participants in this fraud

added his own personal toacnes lo thestory. The result was a family ofderivatives-, which the National Enquirerpresented as independent, reliable,mutually corrobcativu accounts.

Bozhich" s fantasies reached a newextreme in the- rros; recent story, "UFOBase on Saturn Moon," publishedNovember 13, 1979. According to this tale,Soviet observatories had monitored alienradio signals. Their origin had beenpinpointed, he added, by radar that hadtracked the direction of ascending UFOs;toward Salu m . One of the majorconfirmations was the trajectory of thePetrozavodsk UFO the one that turns outto have been a spy satellite.

Cynics saw that Bozhich's claims wereeither limed to cash in on the spectacularsuccess of America's Pioneer Saturnprobe or were a reacT-on lo the suggestionthat Russian radio interference hadscrambled NASA's data on Titan, Saturn'slargest moon and the alleged site of theUFO base. TheThore gullible UFO buffsdid not.Standing opposite the USSR's UFO

rumor factory is a lone Soviet official, Dr.32 OMNI

Vladimir V Miui.lir. ot the Academy ofSciences' Ionospheric Physics LaboratoryHis job ostensibly is to catalog incomingreports' and coordinate-Soviet research.He spends much of his time trying to reas-sure the Russian public a hopeless task.The case of the Petrozavodsk UFO has

boon especially drfiou '. for Dr. Miguii-r Hedenies that it could have been a "trueUFO," but state security regulations torbidhim to announce that it was a Sovietmilitary spaceship. Poor Migulin is left withnothing but scientific mumbo jumboabout geomagnetic disturbances andchemiluminescent smog. The staidscientist is caught in a UFO-KGB crossfirethat cannot end happily for him.

To understand the Russian UFO scene,we must apprecare how small the castof characters really is. Russian names arespelled so oddly and are so oftenmisspelled by the American press thatfew people even try to read them. Hence,repeated quotations give the false

mSoviet observatorieshad monitored

aiien radio signals, andradar used to

track ascending UFOshad pinpointedtheir origin: Titan,

a moon of Saturn.3

impression that 'an entire generation of' top Russian scientists is lak rig tu'nitestifying to the reality of UFOs.Remember that the tabloids are onlyrecycling the same handful of obscureRussian UFO enthusiasts next timethe headlines scream about anotherEarth-shaking revelation from Moscow.Chances are, we'll have seen those namessomewhere before.

Back on this side of the Iron Curtain:Drawings of UFOs reported over the last30 years show almost an infinife variety.Either each UFO pilot has his own cus-tomizing kit, or the UFOs, in the words ofufologist Robert Sheaffer, "are made ofSilly Putty."Or maybe the hundreds o( UFO

sketches on hand don't really show whatthe witnesses saw, That's the suspicionof Dr. Richard F Haines, a researchscientist at the NASA Ames ResearchCenter, near San Francisco. Haines,author of Observing UFOs (Nelson-Hall,Chicago, 1978), is a specialist in visualperception and ascientific consultant forthe Center for UFO Studies and the Aerial

Phenomena Research OrganizaHaines believes the UFO pher

must be studiea scienlit caliy, and hereported one of his most fascinatingexperiments, a study of UFO perception,at a special seminar presented by theAmerican Institute of Aeronautics andAstronautics. The experiment was asimple one: Haines asked UFO witnessesto sketch what they had seen andcompared the results with UFO drawingsby peorjle who had never seen one.Oddly enough, impartial judges couldn't

tell the sketches apart. Drawings trom thetwo groups had the same generalfeatures, and those from people who hadnever seen a UFO contained just as much"information" and detail as eyewitnessrenderings.

"The similarity of the drawings." Hainesbelieves, "suggests that these partici-pants hold a stereotypec image of what aUFO is supposed to look like. Almosteveryone has seen a photograph ordrawing of a UFO at some time, and thememory strongly influences subsequentdrawings."

But shouldn't someone who has actuallyseen a UFO be able to give more detailsabout their appearance than people whohave seen only a picture? You'd think so.

This brings up an interesting possibility:A UFO skeptic could reasonably suggestthat there is no way any preconceivedimage of a UFO could overwhelm theadded details from a sighting unless theUFO is largely made up of preconceivedimages rathe than external data. In otherwords, something cues the witness's mindto conjure up convincing details frommemory. The result would be a trulyImaginary UFO sighting whose appear-ance, honestly reported, had nothing at ailto do with the form of the original stimulus.

Haines hopes that this ambiguity can beresolved by preoanng recognition chartsshowing varied UFO shapes and sizes,Witnesses coulu r.hen select from thecharts to compose the image they recallmuch as a crime witness builds a pictureof the criminal with a police identificationkit. But if their perceptions of the UFO havealready been short-circuited, such ascientific approach may still be worthless.

"It should go without saying," Hainesconcludes, "that more research is neededon the basic perceptual processes," Suchresearch should go a long way towarddemonstrating whether or not many UFOsare "all in the mind" after all.The pity is, if the research eventually

proves that something is there, it will in allprobability impede rather than acceleratethe process of the acceptance of UFOs byLaditional science. Tms is oecause thenew theories will most likely bechampioned by those ufologists alreadybadly discredited by too manyendorsements of what subsequentlyturned outto be hoaxes. They would beright only by accident, not by their ownmerit. OO

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coruTiruuunn.ATION MADNESI

How would you feel if you heard that a federal agency,a district attorney, a state government, and a U.S.senator had banded together to finance a seriousstudy into the reality of Santa Claus9 And what if the

study concluded that Santa Claus doesn't exist, and then thesenator condemned the investigation?

Well, something very similar has just happened. The LawEnforcement Assistance Administration and the state of NewMexico recently spent 550,000 in an attempt to clear up thecontroversy over cattle mutilations. As reported in Omn/'s Janu-ary 1980 UFO Update, this phenomenon involves reports that,since 1975, extraterrestrial beings $Sm UFOs, witches, CIAagents, or other strange types have been surgically removing therectums, eyes, ears, tongues, and genitals from more than 7,000cattle across the country. To get to the bottom of these seriousmatters, the Feds and New Mexico, urged on by no less anauthority than that state "s Senator Harrison Schmiit. came up withthe fifty grand and, under the auspices of the district attorney'soffice in Santa Fe, hired ex-FBI agent Kenneth Rommel to scurryover the countryside examining deceased cows.

Like any good cop, Rommel has discovered' the identity of theperpetrators: For the most part, they are coyotes, buzzards,mice, flies, ants, and other scavengers. The mutilations. Rommelsays, were "caused by and totally consistent with, what, onewould expect to find with normal predation. scavenger activity,and decomposition." He further said, "I have not found onecredible source that differs from this opinion, nor has one pieceof hard evidence been presented that would cause me to alterthis opinion." Rommel went on to explain that mutilation madnesshas been promoted by a "good deal of very creative writing" inthe media,

Immediately following the report, the Albuquerque Journalcompared Rommel to Richard Nixon, describing both as formerfederal employees who "subscribe and give currency to thefiction that the news media can, or do, manufacture news. . . ."Still, the cattle-mutilation notion has been very much the productof careless acceptance of sensationalists reports from unreli-able and biased .sources. Advocates of UFO invasion and othertheories have piled idiocy on hyperbole to present a bizarrepicture ot-cattle in lonely areas with soft parts "surgically" re-

moved and no traces ol any agency nearby that couid have donethe deeds. Lack of animal tracks, carcasses drained of blood,and weird lights in the sky have been hallmarks of these reporls.

But Rommel blew these ang es away by looking carefully into24 classic cases. First, he said, the precision of the alterationswas greatly exaggerated. The edges of the wounds showeddistinct teeth marks, and desiccation had smoothed the areasover. One rancher, intent on retaining his notions about a super-normal cause, told Rommel that "if coyotes did that, they did itwith knives." Rommel countered, "I say that if surgeons did it,they did it with their teeth."He found tracks aplenty, of common predators and scaveng-ers. Droppings from coyotes and buzzards, which are known toconsume the soft parts of dead animals as well as to tear into thebody cavities to get at the internal organs, were in evidence. Thebloodlessness of the corpses was attributable to the normalprocess of pooling of bocy : uios resulting from gravity, he said.Blood congeals in the lower parts, or it is consumed by scaveng-ers as a normal process.One mutifation, he noted, was touted as UFO-related due toaccompanying strange nocturnal glows. Newspapers failed tomention that the aurora borealis that nighl had been exception-ally bright. Another report contained the startling claim that amutilated steer's legs were broken as a result of a drop fromsome airborne craft. Romme! suggested that either the legs hadbeen healed in some mysterious fashion by the time he got to thesteer, or they had not been broken in the first place.

But Senator Schmitt remains unconvinced. While Rommel hasrecommended that no further public funds be spent on thematter, Schmitt said, "I do not think it [the investigation J can betaken as a definitive study." He rejected Rommel's finding thaithere was false information in official reports from law officers.Schmitt prefers to wait for the results from a forthcoming FBIprobe being conducted separately from Rommel's investigation.So the door has been left open for even more reports of "mutila-

tions." But true believers should consider one final question. AsKen Rommel asked reporters when he showed them a grislyphoto of one less-than-precise operation in which predators hadtorn out the genital region of a steer, "How'dyou like that surgeondoing a vasectomy on you?"JAMES RAND!

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coruTiniuuruiHOTDOGGER ORHAMBURGER?When you go out for a

quick lunch, do you preferho! dogs or hamburgers? ABrooklyn psychiatrist re-cently completed a studythat suggests the choice youmake may reveal some as-

"The people who eat hotdogs usually grab it and go,"he said. "Hamburger eaterstake more time. They're bet-ter-dressed executive types,used to making deci-sions well done, rare,ketchup or mustard ..."The sixty-six-year-old

psychiatrist said there'san

Hol-dog eater A risychini'is! describes this type as aggressioutgoing, ambitious, with obvious psychosexuai overtones.pects of your personality.

Dr. LeoWoilman, a psy-chiatrist, conducted thestudy as a result of earlierresearch he did in 1976 for abook on obesity and dieting."I got caught up in the sub-ject of food preferences anddid this study just for fun," Dr.Wollman said.The study of 3,000 per-

sons concludes thai hot-dogeaters tend to be "outgoing,aggressive, ambitious ex-troverts," while hamburgerfanciers are "quieter, intro-verted, more-conservativetypes." Wollman describeshamburger eaters as a bit onthe "whimpy" side.36 OMNI

obvious"psychosexual"aspect to eating a hot dog:"The phailic symbolism, theway a person holds it, deli-cately or forcefully, the rela-tionship to masturbation,and so on. But I didn't getinto that much."One fast-food chain lostinterest in the study, andWollman has decided not topublish the results, but hestill believes it has "commer-cial value to advertisers." Allan Maurer"Be careful about readinghealth books. You might dieof a misprint." Mark Twain

MAKING DRUGSIN SPACENow there's yet another

potential spin-off from theU.S. space program, andit's a big one: a cure fordiabetes.The McDonnell Douglas

Astronautics Company hasjust signed an agreementwith NASA to use the spaceshuttle to explore the pos-sibility of manufacturing newdrugs in space. Specifically,McDonnell Douglas wants totest continuous-flow elec-trophoresis, a process thatcan work effectively oniy in agravity-free environment.NASA will supply freespace aboard the shuttle asearly as 1983. Douglas andan unnamed pharmaceuticalfirm will make a device tobe tested in orbit, which hasthe potential to producelarge, pure quantities of en-zymes, cells, and phar-maceuticals. (While thepharmaceutical companyinvolved is officially uniden-tified, the business weeklyBarron's has identified itas Johnson and Johnson,the baby powder people.)Dave Richman, of

McDonnell Douglas, sayshis company has alreadybuilt several prototypes ofthe device, which will be arectangular chamber 15 cen-timeters wide, 1 .2 meterslong, and only 0.79 millime-ter thick.

'A buffering fluid of mostlywater will flow slowly upwardthrough the chamber,"Richman explains, "while anelectric field is laid across itswidth. A single stream ofsample fluid is then intro-duced, and the electric field

will pul different charges ondifferent particles in thestream, separating it into dif-ferent components by thelime it reaches the top of thechamber."

Earth's gravity preventsthe electrophoresis processfrom functioning effectivelyon the ground; in space,Richman notes, the processshould be highly effectiveand profitable.The potential products

Douglas is looking at includeproteins like the anti hemo-philiac factor, for "bleeders,"and cells like the beta cellsthat produce insulin. "If thisprocess can isolate betacells in quantity," Richmansuggests, "they could thenbe implanted in diabetics."The beta cells would thenproduce insulin for them.The result: not just a treat-ment but an actual cure fordiabetes. Joel Davis

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BIO-SLIMMINGThe role of the hormone

insulin in regulating blood-sugar levels isone known in-timately by every diabetic.(Mow a group of researchersat the University of Wash-ington Health Sciences Cen-ter, in Seattle, may havefound a new role for insulin,one that affects everyone: Itmay be the long-sought-after weight-regulation trig-ger in the human brain.

Drs. Stephen Woods andDaniel Porte, Jr., along withgraduate students DavidMcKay and Elizabeth Loiter,have completed afour-yearstudy using baboons thatshows that increased levelsof insulin in the brain causethe animals to eat less. That,they say, means there's aweight-regulating system inthe brain that uses insulin asthe trigger."We now know something

about what regulates bodyweight," Dr. Porte says.When a person's weightrises above normal, insulinlevels in the blood increase.This eventually increases theinsulin level in the cerebro-spinal fluid surrounding thebrain. Insulin receptors in thebrain detect that rise and tellthe weight-regulating mech-anism, and the person feelsless desire to eat. Weightdrops back to normal.Can all this help fatpeople? Possibly. "Thismight be manipulated in atherapeutic sense," Portenotes, adding that obesity isoften a symptom of otherproblems.McKay suggests that anartificial (orm of insulin mightsomeday be introducedinto the brain fluid of someoverweight people, trigger-ing the weight-regulatingsystem into making them eatless. J.D

UNDERWATERTRAFFIC JAMSFirst, cars choked the

highways. Next spacecraftcluttered theexosphere.Mow remote-controlled ma-chines are creeping alongthe ocean floor in growingnumbers.

Navy model, lifted a sub-merged hydrogen bomb869 meters from the sea bot-tom off the coast of Spain in1966,The National Oceano-

graphic and AtmosphericAdministration says thereare about 300 ROVs, a morethan tenfold increase in five

In the last five yearsunmanned, remotelyoperated vehicles (ROVs)have proliferated. Offshoreoil and gas drilling andpotential large-scale seabedmining have led companiesin many nations to makesophisticated machines thatcan maneuver in areas toorisky lor divers or mannedunderwater craft.A Japanese ROV creepsalong the sea floor like amechanical crab, diggingtrenches and laying cable.A British ROV inspectsdeep-water welds in offshoreoil-rig supports, One ofthe earliest ROVs, a U.S.

years. Experts say thosenumbers could dramaticallyincrease with expandedoffshore exploration. Whilethe seas are large, most ofthe craft would be concen-trated in areas of high com-mercial value. Result: traffic.

Stuart DiamondDevelopment of a Project1. Enthusiasm2. Disillusionment3. Panic4. Search for the guilty party5. Punishment of the

innocent party6. Fame and honor for the

nonparticipantsAnonymous

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coruTiruuurmFiREWHEEL

For afew minutes thissummer a green moon willlight up the night sky. Slightlylarger than our real moon,this artificial green one willactually be a big cloud ofbarium.Part of an internationalexperiment called Firewheel,the green moon will material-ize when a European satel-lite scatters canisters ofbarium gas 56,000 kilome-ters above the equator. Asthe canisters explode,the sun's rays will beginionizing the gas, turning ita pale green.

It will be the first time sci-entists can directly observemagnetic field lines in thisarea of the earth's mag-netosphere. The barium, likethe aurora borealis closer toEarth, will literally paint themagnetic lines, making themvisible.

li i ar.idir.ion, a small satel-lite, designed by scientistsat the University of Californiaat Berkeley, wiH fly throughthe cloud and measure boththe energy changes in thebarium and the flow of plas-mas (hot ionized gases),

Valuable information aboutho! plasmas may be gath-ered, but the green moon isessentially an exploratory,fact-finding effort and only onepari of a larger experimentcoordinated by Germany'sMax Planck Institute forExtraterrestrial Physics.The exact date for this

astrophysical sky show isdependent on weather con-ditions, but when it happens,if should be visible acrossthe entire United Statesshortly after sunset. JaneBosveld"Time is the longest distanceb.etwBen two places. "

Tennessee Williams

WOMEN AT ZERO GA merger of the women's

movement and the spaceprogram is raising someinteresting dilemmas anduncertainties. Because ofthe space shuttle, which willcarry both men and womenaboard, NASA is reexam-ining some of its routineoperations.

For example, researchindicates that the shifting ofblood and fluid balance dur-ing menstruation, withoufthe tug of Earth's gravity,could cause some con-cern, according to JerriBrown, of the JohnsonSpace Center, in Houston.

N;o one yet knows, Mrs.Brown says, whether thebody can deliver themensirual flow to the cervixby contractions alone, orwhether a tampon canadequately absorb the flow.

However, Mrs. Brown, whohas analyzed a wide rangeof female human factors,concludes, "No major

been

Scer^r.; ; ;

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SOLAR PARIt's a beautiful, sunny day

for golf and you're no! doingbadly, considering yourhandicap. You're on thegreen in three, and if yousink the putt, you'll breakyour record. Better yet, it you

sink the putt, someone elsehas to buy the drinks whenyou get to the clubhouse.You give the ball a tap. It

rolls straight for the cup,then stops, teetering on thevery edge. Your buddiesbegin to snicker. You smileand hold up your hand toindicate the shot is not over.You position yourself so thatyour body shades the ballfrom the sun. Fifteen sec-onds go by. Thirty. After aminute there is a little move-ment at the hole and the balldrops into the cup,What happened? Perchedon the edge of the hole,there is nothing holding thegolf ball back but a fewblades of grass. In the directsunlight the metabolism of

the grass is active; theblades are stiff. When thesunlight is blocked, themetabolism slows and thegrass "relaxes." Unsup-ported, the ball rolls into thecup. And someone else buysthe drinks. Nick EnglerREUSABLE FILMThanks to the soaring

price of silver, a key ingre-dient in many photographicprocesses, the price of filmand photochemicalshastaken quantum leaps in re-cent months.

However, help for shut-terbugs may be arriving fromthe USSR. According to anarticle in Sower Weekly,scientists at Kishinev Uni-versity, in Moldavia, havedeveloped a reusable pho-tographic film.The new film is made from

thin layers of thermoplastic.This plastic becomes light-sensitive when an electriccurrent is passed through it.You snap the picture with thecurrent on, then wait for anegative to develop. If youdon't like the picture, simplyheat the thermoplastic toremove the image and shootit again. N.E.MAGNETIC SMOGHigh-speed trains may

be subjecting their passen-gers, and others, to subtlebehavior effects and evencausing them to fall asleepAmong those affected areour leaders in Washington, ifa Stanford University re-searcher is correct.

Radio scientist AnthonyFraser-Smith has discoveredthat such train systems as

San Francisco's Bay AreaRapid Transit (BART) and theWashington, DC, Metro ex-pose people up to 160kilometers away to "mag-netic smog."The third rail of such sys-tems, says Fraser-Smith,

acts as a huge antenna thatbroadcasts ultra-low-frequency radiation from10 Hz to 0.001 Hz. "I don'tknow that your brain can dis-tinguish between what BARTis putting in your head andthe signals it is producing it-self," says Fraser-Smith.

"Studies have shownhuman reaction time islonger when people are ex-posed to 0.2 Hz fields, ofwhich BART is a strongsource. The Russians havedone a lot of work on this andspeak of these ultra-low fre-quencies as 'biologically ac-tive.' They may make peoplefeel drowsy and produceslight changes in the blood. I

think they confuse the braina little bit. It thinks it shouldbe asleep,

"I've done about all I canto measure the fields hereand point out that they'represent. I haven't had muchsuccess in interesting any-one to monitor the effects.But I think it should be apriority concern. The Wash-ington Metro system issimilar to BART, and we haveall those important peoplethere exposed to this."A.M."Since I do not foresee thatatomic energy is to be agreat boon for a long time, Ihave to say that for thepresent it is a menace.Perhaps it is well that itshouidbe. Itmayintimidate the human raceinto bringing order into itsinternational affairs, which,without the pressure offear, itwould not do."

-Albert Einstein, 1945

BART: The highly charged third rail can act as a gigantic antenna.slowing down people's reaction time and even putting them to slee.

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coruTinjuunnPOLLUTION BANK

In a small Marylandlaboratory a few dozensamples of frozen liver tissuepresage a new era in the

study of pollution. They arethe start of what is hoped willbe a national bank of livingtissue, to be compared overtime to pinpoint environ-mental changes.

Until now, toxic-chemicalconcentrations in livingtissue have been recordedon paper. But, as betterdetection methods uncovernew chemicals, there is noway to find out whether orhow much their levels havechanged: The originalsamples no longer exist.The national bank would

enable scientists to go backto older, frozen samples anddirectly compare tissues indifferent geographicregions, both for existingoo omni

and newly discovered heavymetals and toxic chemicals."This would produce a betterscientific basis for publicpolicy questions and alsohelp find out whetherenvironmental laws aredoing any good," says GailPorter, of the NationalBureau of Standards (NBS).NBS scientists early thisyear began a five-year pilotprogram, funded largelyby the U.S. EnvironmentalProtection Agency. TheNBS's Maryland lab willhouse about 30,000samples from four groups:liver, because it storespollutants; wheat or rye,which are staples of theAmerican diet; oysters ormussels, which concentratemarine pollutants; andlichens or moss, whichconcentrate airbornepollutants.Tissue samples are frozen

to -190 D C. Scientists hopeto develop techniques tostore the samples up to 100years.S.DTHE MIDAS TOUCH

Nuclear physicists haveturned the dream of al-chemists into reality. Theyhave changed base metalinto gold. But there's acatch: You need $15 millionworth of equipment.

Actually, Dr. David J.Morrissey and his col-leagues weren't trying tobeat the high prices of theinternational gold marketwhen they bombardedbismuth with large, highlycharged atomic nucleitraveling close to the speedof light. They were simplycarrying out basic research

in nuclear science, trying tofind out how the nuclei ofatoms are held together.The team of chemistshad certain advantages over

their medieval predeces-sors. They had a giant atomsmasher, BEVALAC (BillionElectron Volt Synchrotron/Linear Accelerator), at theUniversity of California'sLawrence Berkeley Labora-tory and they used bismuthinstead of lead, which ofcourse had been preferredin olden times.

"Bismuth is, atomicallyspeaking, nearer to gold,"said Dr. Morrissey. "Likegold, it has only one isotopethat is stable against radio-activity And bismuth hasonly three more protons in itsnucleus than gold." Morris-sey said he was "pretty sure"his team would succeed.

In three experiments,using from 4,8 billion up to25.2 billion electron volts.

the scientists beamedargon-40 and neon-20isotopes, stripped of elec-trons in order to acceleratethem, at bismuth metal foiltargets.

Morrissey reported that,although no new and un-known isotopes of gold wereobserved, improve-ments in experimental tech-niques might produce some.The actual transmutation ofbismuth to gold was de-scribed by Morrissey as"trivial."Equipment costing more

than $15 million would be re-quired to produce less thanone billionth of one cent'sworth of gold. "This obvi-ously is not a cost-effectiveway to make gold." he con-cluded. Phyllis Wollman"Problems worthy at attack/Prove their worth by hittingback.

Piet Hein

The BEVALAC: Machinery costing more than St 5 million is requiredto produce less than one billionth of one cent's worth otgold.

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LAST LEAFEndangered species of

animals have acquiredhordes of protectors inrecent years. There aredozens of organizationswilling to fight for baldeagles or snail darters. Bufwhat about endangeredplants?

Literally hundreds of plantspecies stand in imminentdanger of losing their lastleaf. Unfortunately, there'slittle publicity for this sideof the endangered-spe-cies problem.

For example, a recentOregon Slate Universitystudy indicales lhat almost400 plant species in thatstate alone are in danger ofextinction. And in Arizona,Colorado, New Mexico,Texas, and Utah, 21 speciesof cactus are being uproot-ed to the point of extinctionby collectors and dealers.

Other U.S. flora in dangerof feeling the last rays ofsunlight on their chlorophyllinclude Texas wild rice, theVirginia round-leaf birch, theHawaiian wild broad bean,the furbish lousewort, andthe Contra Costa wallflower.

Ironically, yet another plantabout to die off is the SantaBarbara liveforever.

-J.D."Human beings are membersof the only species lhat pos-sesses the capability tointerfere with its own growth,

Fritz PerlsTALKING WHEELCHAIR

Victims of cerebral palsyor stroke and other disabledpersons who cannot speakclearly, if at all, now have ahelpful new gadget; a talkingwheelchair.Developed at Stanford

University's Children's Hos-

Includedin the long list at endangered plants are 21 species otcactus, which are being uprooted lo extinction by collectors.

pital and funded by theNASA Ames ResearchCenter, both in California,the device features a com-puter word processor and aspeech synthesizer

and volumes, and can evenbe programmed to stockpilecomplete sentences andphrases for later use. An ex-pert operator can iurn out,impromptu, as many as 30

Equipped with a word processor, a computer, ana' a voice out ot anSF movie, the talking wheelchair gives speech to the handicapped.mounted on a wheelchair.Users lug a switch or

shift a joystick or peck at atypewriter keyboard de-pending on how well theycan move to string to-gether words and sentenceson a video screen. Then theyactivate a mechanical voiceto deliver the digital mes-sage in a monotone like thecomputer HAL's in the movie2001.The device could confer

artificial speech on the 1.5million Americans such asdeaf-mutes who cannotspeak understandably.The computer stores 925

widely used words, follows600 grammatical rules, talksat varying speeds, pitches,

words a minute.Six patients tested the de-

vice for a week. An elderlystroke victim, who otherwisewrote what she wanted tosay on note pads, talkedover the telephone via theprosthesis with her family.A young woman with aneurological disease, con-tracted three months afterbearing a son, was able tospeak to that son, now five,for the first time. Her firstwords: "Kevin, put yourpajamas on right now! Robert Brody"'Not quite proved' inmathematics is like 'not quitepregnant' in biology.Howard Pattee

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coruTiruuurmPLIGHT OF THE PANDAAn eminent American sci-

entist is rushing io China toequip that country's giantpandas with radios. His ob-

visil Sichuan (Szechwan)Province, one ot three prov-inces where pandas live.

According tbSchaller,surprisingly little is knownabout the giant panda, a

ject is to keep the speciesalive.The giant panda, one of

the world's most popularanimals and the nationalsymbol of China, is the focusof a newly formed commit-tee of Chinese and Westernscientists. In recent yearspandas, which probably donot number more than 1 ,000,have been starving to deathbecause of a mass die-off ofbamboo, a major compo-nent of their diet.The American delegation

to the committee will beheaded by George B. Schal-ler, director of the New YorkZoological-Society's Centerfor Field Biology and Con-servation. He will be the firstWesterner since the 1930s to4? OMNI

black-and-white relative ofthe bear "The first thing todo is find out where they areand how many there are, "hesaid. After that, he added,free-ranging pandas may betitled with small radios thatenable researchers to trackand study the animals with-out seeing them. Withoutradios, it would be difficult toobserve individual pandasrepeaiedly because they livein mountains with denselyforested lower slopes.The die-off of bamboo that

is affecting giant pandasapparently occurs