M I C H A E L G I B B O N S

The CERN 300 GeV Accelerator: A Case Study in the Application of the Weinberg Criteria

THE rules regarding the appropriate criteria for scientific choice formulated by Dr. Alvin Weinberg 1 have expressed and helped to shape a major trend in thought about decision-making in the field of science policy. In Britain, for example, the first report of the Council for Scientific Policy underlines the necessity for such criteria to help in the promulgation of a balanced basic research programme at the national level. The report suggested that proposals be judged according to both intrinsic and extrinsic criteria which are reminiscent of Weinberg:

We are endeavouring to apply to each element in the programmes of the Research Councils, criteria based on general consideration of the value of science. On such criteria there is unlikely to be universal agreement . . . We believe however that there would be general agreement that science may be judged both by intrinsic criteria (whether or not a project is "good science ") and by extrinsic ones (related to the social, humanitarian, educational, political or economic effects). 2

It is clear from the foregoing passage that Dr. Weinberg's criteria are not merely of academic interest. They and criteria akin to them are in fact being used in important decisions in scientific matters. Dr. Weinberg's criteria undoubtedly cannot cope exhaustively and definitively with the problems of the allocation of resources in basic research, but they do provide a first approximation. I propose in this paper to show that, despite their general and abstract nature, criteria of the type put forward by Dr. Weinberg have in fact been used. I shall do this by examining the recom- mendations of the Council for Scientific Policy and the Science Research Council, presented to parliament by the then Secretary of State for Education and Science, Mr. Patrick Gordon Walker, in January 1968, for the proposed 300 GeV particle accelerator for the Centre europ~en pour

1 Weinberg, A., " Criteria for Scientific Choice ", Minerva, I, 2 (Winter, 1963), pp. 159-171 and " Scientific Choice and Biomedical Science ", Minerva, IV, 1 (Autumn, 1965), pp. 3-14. In these papers, Dr. Weinberg introduces intrinsic and extrinsic criteria to analyse scientific projects competing for limited national resources. The intrinsic criteria used are " Is the field ripe for exploration?" and " Is the necessary manpower available?" The extrinsic criteria are concerned with the relation of a given field to the rest of science (scientific merit), possible commercial applications (technological rneri 0 and the likely military, prestige, educational and cultural benefits (social merit) arising from the research.

2 Council for Scientific Policy, Report on Science Policy. Cmnd. 3007 (London: H.M. Stationery Office, 1966), p. 9.

The CERN 300 GeV Accelerator 181

la recherche nud~aire (CERN)? I shall show that the decision to support participation by the United Kingdom in this project was arrived at by a mode of analysis very close to that put forward by Dr. Weinberg. The Council for Scientific Policy was, of course, aware of Dr. Weinberg's work in this field and, according to Dr. T. G. Pickavance of the Science Research Council, similar criteria have been used for quite some time in assessing the merits of various scientific proposals. ~ The decision of the Science Research Council to ask the government to support the project was based on a very thorough assessment of the political and economic as well as the scientific implications of this research. The fact that, in a later analysis, the government decided against the proposal is no reflection on the quality of the analysis.

Internal Criteria: Is the Field Ripe for Exploration ?

One of the first questions which must be confronted in making a decision on the allocation of resources to a research scheme is whether the scheme is likely to be fruitful scientifically. According to Dr. Weinberg, the persons best qualified to answer the question " I s the field of particle physics ripe for exploration? " are the nuclear physicists themselves. The Nuclear Physics Board of the Science Research Council, consisting of nuclear physicists, after considerable study came to the following conclusion:

Nuclear or "particle" physics is one of the main growing points of science and is concerned with our deepest penetration into the structure of the material universe. From the time of classical antiquity it has commonly been assumed that there could one day be an end to the process of delving deeper into the nature of matter--" atom " means that which cannot be cut--but such a .posi- tion can no longer be asserted. In the light of the discoveries of the past 30 years, it is now reasonable to suppose that there is no limit to the process of discovery in this field. 5

The argument as to the fruitfulness of the field is based on the steady stream of accomplishments in the field over the preceding 30 years. This is of course different from an analysis of the present state of research which would show that a fundamental problem has been put in a soluble manner. Perhaps the nuclear physicists believed that this kind of evidence could not be appreciated by persons, even scientists, who were not nuclear physicists and concluded consequently that an argument resting on the frequency of past accomplishments would be more effective.

Realising that the statement as to the inexhaustibility of particle physics research might be interpreted by some as a lack of a clear indication of where to go next, the members of the board proceeded to suggest some of the more proximate results to be expected from high-energy physics.

3 Department of Education and Science, The Proposed 300 GeV Accelerator. Cmnd. 3503 (London: H.M. Stationery Office, 1968). Hereafter this will be referred to as Report.

The composition of the various committees involved in the preparation of the Report is to be found in Report, pp. 4, 5, 53 and 83.

4 Private communication from Dr. T. G. Piekavance, 1969. 5 Report, p. 59.

182 M i c h a e l G i b b o n s

Developments in nuclear physics in the past five years, towards which Europe has made most significant contributions, demonstrate conclusively that we are now entering fundamentally new domains in our understanding of the physical universe. We now know of about 150 different "elementary " particles in addition to the neutrons, protons and electrons which compose our familiar world. These new particles have been arranged in families, ordered groups which strongly suggest the existence of an underlying structure which we shall be able to elucidate. ~

Largely because of the present state of the subject, the nuclear physicists said:

The great generality of these advances and their profound implications give us confidence that the subject will continue to be one of the principal centres of advance in fundamental science for many years to come and that the new picture of the nature of matter which will be established will have a resounding effect on the whole of physical science . . . . One major objective for a new 300 GeV accelerator would be to probe this possible infrastructure and, if in fact it exists in explicit form, bring it out into the open for investigation, s

The authors of the report, arguing f rom the precedent of previous advances in physical science which were directly attributable to particle accelerators, expressed confidence that:

�9 . . In the field of particle physics machines have frequently been built in the past to solve clearly formulated problems . . . Usually these specified tasks have been carried out as planned, but almost invariably the wealth of unexpected and radically new phenomena has been of much greater importance. It will be extraordinary if, at the present stage of the subject, in which we are faced with so many profound problems in a subject of immense promise and vitality, and in which we are clearly entering fundamentally new domains of experience in the physical universe, this does not happen again?

On the strength of this expectation, the report went on to discuss the present status of high-energy physics in the United Kingdom and the need for future investment.

It is clear that if Europe is to remain an important contributor to this [i.e., high-energy] branch of physics in the last quarter of this century, decisions about the 300 GeV proton synchroton must be taken soon. Even if all the administrative moves involving decisions by many countries could be taken quickly, it is unlikely that the new accelerator could be working before 1976 and the physics programme would not be in full swing before the late 1970s. 1~

These remarks show how political considerations can become inter- twined with intrinsic criteria. After all, a field might be as Dr. Weinberg put it " r i p e " for fruitful scientific investigation, but why should British or European physicists in cooperation investigate it? Why should not the task be left to American nuclear physicists to whom the field is equally " r i p e " and who could presumably make the same progress as the European nuclear physicists while the Europeans could then tackle

6 Report, p. 60. s Report, p. 64. lo Report, p. 67.

r Report, p. 60. 9 Report, p. 66.

The CERN 300 GeV Accelerator 183

something equally important in which they had a unique expertise. It is no criticism of Dr. Weinberg's analytical scheme to say that scientists who apply such a scheme make certain unspoken political and professional assumptions. This certainly seems to have been the case in the recom- mendations of the Nuclear Physics Board to the Council for Scientific Policy. Nor does it imply that such values should not be postulated. It only means that the utilisation of the criteria is often rendered more complicated as a result of the inevitable machinery of science policy advice. The requirement that the experts in a field advise whether it is " r i p e " for fruitful scientific development must by definition be transmitted to those who are relative laymen compared with the experts---and the experts, truth- ful as their assessment might be, do not raise the question as to whether or not the resources could be put to better use if applied to another field of equal scientific importance and "ripeness ". This leaves room for recom- mendations which, however honourable, are also to some extent unwittingly political and to some extent professionally self-serving? 1

Is the Necessary Manpower Available?

The second internal scientific criterion which must be met by any proposal for financial support concerns the availability of manpower. The Nuclear Physics Board assumed that the British university system would continue to produce physicists of the required calibre and devoted most of its efforts to calculating the number of physicists, engineers and technicians required. They further assumed that the national employment problem would remain essentially the same and that the total supply of technical manpower would go on increasing at the rate of 4"5 per cent. per annum. Table I shows the number of British high-energy nuclear physicists actually involved in CERN operations during 1968.12

Assuming the stability of the annual growth rate between 1966 and 1981, the board reported that they expected the number of high-energy physicists to grow from the present value of 355 to more than 430 and

al In this connection the comments of two " dissenters " to the Report are particularly interesting because they express the apprehensions of two eminent scientists who are not nuclear physicists. The two chemists, Professor Sir Ewart Jones and Professor Sir Ronald Nyholm, pointed out that " . . . a good case on purely scientific grounds has been made for proceeding with this project. But we are acutely aware that there are other scientific fields which, cultivated and nurtured as nuclear physics has been in recent years, would yield a still richer harvest. Some of these are of no less scientific interest and have much greater potentialities for benefiting mankind . . . We cannot reconcile embarking upon this massive new commitment with our present unsatisfactory and worsening situation. Can high-energy nuclear physics justly claim to be of such overwhelming merit and importance? We should urgently be seeking opportunities of investing comparable, and if possible, larger sums in projects which offer some prospect of material advantage to the community and which at the same time serve to train useful scientists and technologists." See Report; p. 55.

12 There are approximately 355 high-energy nuclear physicists in the United Kingdom. The maiority (288) are involved in research concerned exclusively with the national pro- gramme, However, some high-energy physicists (102) use CERN for their research but are employed mostly in the universities. StiU others (25) have left the United Kingdom altogether for a period of time and are on the CERN payroll. See Report, p. 80.

184 Michael Gibbons

TABLE I

High.Energy Nuclear Physicists of CERN Member Countries and the United Kingdom in 1968 12

CERN UK members

Physicists engaged entirely in their national programmes in 640 their own countries

Physicists employed in their 690 own country but using CERN

Physicists on CERN payroll 108

228

102

25

Total 1,438 355

possibly to as many as 550 in 15 years. O n the question of striking a proper balance with regard to manpower between domestic and inter- national programmes in nuclear physics and between the activity in the different branches of nuclear physics and the rest of the programme, the board calculated its manpower requirements in the following way:

At present about 500 students begin work each year in Britain for the Ph.D. degree in physics. About 80 of these are in nuclear physics and, with the omission of students working in nuclear structure, it may be expected that 40-50 will each year be awarded the degree of Ph.D. in experimental high- energy nuclear physics. If half of these Ph.D.s continue in the subject, and if wastage from the group of high-energy physicists occurs at the rate of 12 per annum, then the population may be expected to increase by 180 over 15 years. Extrapolation over such a long period is perhaps not very significant, but the above, rather pessimistic, set of assumptions shows that the figure of 550 physicists is likely to be reached without increasing the share that high- energy physics gets of research manpower and without requiring that more than half the high-energy physicists should continue in their subject after taking Ph.D.s . . . . 1~

The report of the Science Research Council itself supported these figures with some of its own and expressed the view that the 300 GeV machine would receive top priority in manpower allocation and that: " T h e council's first priority would be to ensure adequate utilisation of the 300 GeV machine while maintaining an effective home base."

The report of the Council for Scientific Policy, whose main function is to advise the government on all matters pertaining to science policy, agreed in general with the recommendations of the Science Research Council and the Nuclear Physics Board but, reflecting on the wider interests of the country, pointed out:

~3 Report, p. 81.

The C E R N 300 GeV Accelerator 185

The 300 GeV project will itself employ 3,880 staff of whom perhaps 2,400 are lower grades locally recruited while 1,500 are professional staff of whom perhaps 350 are from the UK. This latter will not place too heavy a demand on our output of physicists and electrical and mechanical engineers. . , but among these will be a small number of very highly skilled men who might perhaps have employed their exceptional talents elsewhere and in projects of more immediate commercial application, had the machine not been undertaken. 14

Nonetheless, accepting the qualifications of the Council for Scientific Policy, it would appear that the pool of nuclear physicists could provide manpower for such a project as the 300 GeV accelerator without suffering undue strain in other parts of its programme. This last observation suggests a further refinement of Dr. Weinberg's criterion regarding the availability of manpower. The question which is raised is not only whether manpower of sufficient quality is available for a particular project but also how any proposed decision would affect the quantity and quality of man- power available for other, equally " i m p o r t a n t " and equally " r i p e " problems.

External Criteria: Technological Merit

The first of the "extrinsic criteria" refers to the technological merit of any proposed research scheme. This is a rather confusing criterion because it must be based on yet another set of criteria for deciding what the technological aims of the nation should be. However, as Dr. Weinberg conceived it, a project has some "technological mer i t" if it is likely to lead to or is absolutely necessary to accomplish some valuable technological end, When dealing with a "front ier subject" like high-energy nuclear physics one does not, in general, expect to be able to justify it on the basis of its technological merit, though high hopes for "fal l-out "' from such research are often voiced. This view was expressed very distinctly by the High-Energy Physics Advisory Panel of the United States Atomic Energy Commission in one of their reports on the status of the subject. They said:

Up to now there have been relatively few applications of the discoveries of high-energy nuclear physics to other sciences and technologies. It is typical of a field which deals with completely new phenomena that connections with other subjects develop at a later date. Nuclear physics (low-energy) today is deeply involved with astronomy, biology, solid state physics and other disci- plines. Thirty years ago it was a relatively isolated science. We can confidently expect that high-energy physics will undergo a similar evolution. 15

A similar argument from historical precedent was expressed by the Nuclear Physics Board, which pointed out that in the early stages of every new branch of physics " t h e concepts which were introduced seemed strange and esoteric and of no practical i m p o r t a n c e . . . " They went on to quote from the Flowers Report of 1963 which said: " S o m e of the discoveries of high-energy physics may never in themselves be of direct practical

14 Report, p. 18. 15 Science, 23 August, 1968, p. 1125.

186 Michael Gibbons

significance; but the grandchildren if not the children of these discoveries will one day form the new foundation of everything we do." 1~6 In only one place in this report did the members allow themselves the liberty of a tittle speculation on the possible commercial benefits of the proposed accelerator:

The long-range and speculative possibility exists that through such machines as the 300 GeV accelerator we may learn to tap a super-nuclear power. Such a power could perhaps exceed ordinary nuclear energy by as large a factor as nuclear power itself exceeds that from oil and coal? 7

Perhaps the most interesting thing about these remarks is that this eminent group of physicists felt that the reference to a possible long-term application of the research might strengthen their case.

The Council for Scientific Policy, after studying the possible technological benefits to be derived from participating in the project, concluded, some- what pessimistically, that:

�9 . . These [benefits] are mainly indirect and at present marginal, but could be accentuated by an enhanced flow of persons participating in the project into industry (bringing with them their valuable experience of advanced techniques and unusual management skills developed) and in addition by active encourage- ment of British industry to tender for contracts for the machines? 8

The technological merits of the 300 GeV machine thus seemed to be discouragingly slight�9 Most technological benefits appeared to be very uncertain and at the best in the far distant future and unless a prospective technological benefit is clearly discernible in the fairly near future, the criterion of technological merit seems to require that any proposal be negatively assessed. Historical precedents and analogies are not persuasive enough to justify large expenditures.

Scientific Merit

The criterion of scientific merit is, according to Dr. Weinberg, to be invoked to estimate the relevance of a proposed research scheme or parti- cular field to other fields of science. That area of science which contributes most heavily to and illuminates most brightly its neighbouring scientific disciplines has, according to Dr. Weinberg, the greatest "scientific merit." Accordingly, this must be determined by scientists in these related fields. It might be expected from what we have already said that the scientific merit of the 300 GeV machine would be rated rather low because high- energy physics is a "frontier subject"

The general recommendation of the Council for Scientific Policy, while favourable to the proposal, nevertheless expressed a similar concern for the impact of the 300 GeV accelerator on the development of British science in other fields. After considering arguments to the effect that no discovery made 50 or 100 years ago had had any commercial application

1G Repor t , p. 60. 1~ Repor t , p. 64. i s Repor t , p. 23.

The CERN 300 GeV Accelerator 187

and that in any eventuality it would be necessary to have on hand scientists who were conversant with the techniques and concepts of high-energy physics, they still expressed some reserve since the proposal was to be regarded within the context of Britain's national and international commit- ments. The council suggested that there were two difficulties which had to be ~ven due consideration:

Firstly, there are many scientific activities of comparable interest which cost a fraction [of the proposed s million] to support the same number of active researchers. Secondly, there is the obvious existence of a threshold expenditure in high-energy nuclear physics, below which progress in this field can hardly be sustained. 19

On the other hand, the council pointed out:

Science is indivisible: concepts arising in this field, though unlikely to lead to rapid direct applications, may in 10 to 20 years permeate the whole of other fields of science, just as the concepts of quantum mechanics now permeate the whole of physics and chemistry. Thus it is very important to ensure that a proportion of those trained in physics research will be conversant with concepts and tech- niques arising first in high-energy research but not exclusively associated with that one field. The researchers may well need this knowledge in other employ- ment in 20 years' time. Such a transfer of knowledge can, in our judgement, occur effectively only if the UK and the rest of Europe as well continue in this [high-energy physics] field at an appropriate level. 2~

The council then went on to consider other benefits, such as the relative advantage of siting the accelerator in the United Kingdom, but in the end they concluded that " m o s t of them are extremely marginal ". On the strength of the statements quoted above, it appeared that for the foresee- able future at any rate the relevance of high-energy nuclear physics to other sciences taken as a whole would be slight. Quite apart from the difficulty of forecasting beyond the very immediate future, the criterion of "scientific merit ", like the other criteria, raises very difficult problems of weighing alternatives. Much further analysis will be required to clarify the tasks which are confronted in the application of this criterion.

Social Merit

The criterion of social merit is the most difficult of all to handle. According to Dr. Weinberg, social merit is measured by the relevance of the project to human welfare and the values of man. I need not dwell on the problems which arise when there is disagreement over the rating of particular ends, as is always the case, except in a few extreme situations such as a war in which all are agreed that national survival is involved. Such projects in basic science which will with some certainty contribute to national defence, greater food production or enhanced medical services are often given a high and consensual rating as far as social merit is concerned. The role of basic research in creating and maintaining national

19 Repor t , p. 19. 20 Report , p. 9.

188 Michael Gibbons

prestige or stimulating international cooperation is both more difficult to predict and more difficult to settle consensually. These however, are not logical difficulties; they are factual and political. The assessment of the values of alternative ways of spending large sums of money entails logical tasks which the discussion of science policy has yet to face.

Probably the most important single factor in evaluating the social merit of the 300 GeV accelerator was the cost to the country. Because of this, the Council for Scientific Policy undertook to do a cost-benefit analysis on the accelerator. In this kind of analysis the costs are relatively easy to determine. The estimated monetary cost of the United Kingdom con- tributions to the 300 GeV machine and the national cost of the entire United Kingdom high-energy nuclear physics programme are relatively easy to calculate, although estimates of future monetary costs have a high probability of being underestimated. But what of the costs of alternatives foregone in other fields of research? Are these to be disregarded?

On the "benef i t " side of the ledger, the council reported that the major justification must be the scientific interest of the results. On the other hand they regarded as important the fact that "there are the intangible and general political benefits of participating in a European project, the first stage of which at CERN has been so successful-.21

Another attempt at cost-benefit analysis was contributed by Professors Youngson and Wolfe of Edinburgh University who attempted to give an economic evaluation of the benefit to Britain which would arise from having the machine sited in the United Kingdom. While it was a relatively easy task to estimate the costs of the 300 GeV accelerator, the report gave no indication as to how the economists calculated the benefit of having 3,000 of Europe's best scientists located in Britain for a period of 20 years! But quite apart from questions of procedure, the economists estimated that the benefit of location in the United Kingdom was marginal.

The "dissenters" of the minority report, on the other hand, seemed somewhat dismayed at the cost of the project and the resulting effect on the whole of British science:

Our participation in this project means that for the next 10 years the Science Research Council expenditure on a single branch of physics will continue to con- sume more than 40 per cent. of the funds which seem likely to be available. Thus the council's intention gradually to reduce the proportion of its resources going into nuclear physics will be completely frustrated. We are convinced that to continue to spend such substantial sums in this direction is not in the national interest and many scientists in this country, if they are properly appraised of the situation, will view the prospect with dismay. Can we expect them calmly to accept a slowing down of their activities whilst we go ahead with a huge project which will directly benefit only two or three hundred academic physicists? 2~

The main value to Britain appeared to lie in developing a feeling of confidence among the Common Market countries about her intentions

2a Repor t , p. 21. zz Repor t , p. 55.

The CERN 300 GeV Accelerator 189

to move " towards Europe ". Establishing such a favourable climate of opinion could be considered a form of social benefit. Another closely related social merit arising from participation in the accelerator project would be the effect on Britain's prestige of joining this international concern. This is essentially a political decision. But to say this is not to estimate the magnitude of the value to her prestige nor to render it comparable with other values. The present methods of estimating "social mer i t " are so primitive and the difficulties in the way o f estimating the magnitude of future "social mer i t " so great that very little else than vague estimation is possible.

Application of a mode of analysis very similar to that proposed by Dr. Weinberg led to the conclusion that (1) research in high-energy nuclear physics was likely to produce new and significant information on the infrastructure of matter; (2) the necessary manpower would be available; (3) the relevance of this field of research to neighbouring fields of science appeared to be slight; (4) the technological benefits likely to arise would do so only in the distant future and (5) the social benefits would be marginal. On the strength of these conclusions, the chairman of the Council for Scientific Policy, Sir Harrie Massey, recommended to the Secretary of State for Education and Science that it would be reasonable to support the proposal for the 300 GeV machine on certain conditions:

�9 . . if costs . . . rise, as we expect, the Science Research Council intends that they should be met by savings from the budget for nuclear physics . . . . �9 . . in view of the potential harm cost escalations of this size could cause to the rest of science by diversion of limited resources, this project should not be undertaken without assurances that the rest of science can have the resources needed for development . . . We therefore have a responsibility for safeguarding . . . other fields, and we endorse the view of the Science Research Council that the balance with nuclear physics should be redressed to some extent in favour of these other fieldsY 3

The Persistent Problem

Dr. Weinberg's analysis provides an extremely valuable first approxi- mation to a model for decision-making in science policy. It fails however to provide a guide to the further problem of the " w e i g h t " to be applied to each of the criteria and to bring decision-makers to a situation in which they could have a fully rational procedure for deciding whether or not to allocate resources to a given project and what amounts should be allocated to the different projects. How, for example, should intrinsic scientific interest be weighed against low technological merit, or shortage of suitable manpower against large and rapid social benefits?

There are great if not insuperable obstacles to the development of a scale for weighing the various values according to a common measure. The intrinsic and extrinsic criteria cut right across two different, if not conflict- ing, interests: the scientists with their tendency to be preoccupied with

23 Report, pp. 3-4.

190 Michael Gibbons

the intrinsic interest of their field and the politicians who have to consider political and economic factors as well in arriving at an overall judgement on the issue. In the case of the 300 GeV accelerator, the ability to decide on the relative weights of the various criteria is of critical importance, as the situation of the policy-makers is only aggravated by the fact that with the exception of the subject's intrinsic interest, the other benefits seem to be either indeterminate or marginal.

There is one area where some advance may be possible because a measure of agreement already exists between different groups of scientists and politicians: the need to maintain a well-functioning scientific com- munity. Although there is reasonable unanimity (though possibly for different reasons) about the importance to the United Kingdom of the continuing development of science as a whole, the general well-being of science could be undermined from within by too much support for one area and from without by too little support for the whole resulting from pre- occupation with short-term economic or political gains~ From this view- point, the criterion of scientific merit could be improved by study of the process by which different scientific fields interact with one another. More rational judgements would then be possible about the effect of a decision (for or against one or another allocation of resources) on the development of science as a whole.

If greater attention were paid to the scientific impact of developments in one discipline on others, it might be possible to identify a kind of "scientific multiplier" along the lines conceived by Lord Keynes when he sought to measure the impact on the economy as a whole of an additional amount of new capital investment. A similar analysis of the effect on different areas of science of discoveries in a given field might, as a second-order effect, reveal previously unforeseen technological and social possibilities.

In addition to further exploration of "scientific merit ", there is need for a more systematic analysis of alternative uses for resources using the same (or a similar) set of criteria. It is not possible, using Dr. Weinberg's or any other set of criteria, to approach a more rational policy for science if each proposal is considered in isolation. While it is true that there is no other single proposal equivalent in magnitude to the 300 GeV accelerator, it is difficult to see, from the information presented in the report, how any judgement could have been made about the true importance of the machine for British science since it is .not compared with any alternative research project or any sets of alternative projects. The "dissenters ", Professors Nyholm and Jones, as well as the Chief Scientific Adviser, Sir Solly Zucker- man, and influential civil servants in the Ministry of Technology, quite rightly thought it best to base their doubts about the 300 GeV machine on the question of its relevance for British science. It is significant that when the chairman of the Science Research Council, Sir Brian Flowers, in an effort to gain government support for the proposal, presented the

The CERN 300 GeV Accelerator 191

possibility of a reduced domestic programme in high-energy nuclear physics, he was able to do so with the full support of Professors Nyholm and Jones. ~4

It might also be desirable to conduct some direct observational studies of decision-making in comnfittees dealing with particular research proposals. A detached study of what actually went on--reconstruction from observa- tion and from interviews with the participants--might make for greater circumspection and greater precision in the estimation of such variables as "scientific merit" and "social merit '" But short of foresight which would permit the prediction of the solutions of as yet unconceived scientific problems, and the measurement of social events several decades in advance, the making of science-policy decisions can never become an exclusively rational enterprise. It can, however, become more sensible than it is at present and the work of Dr. Weinberg and the Council for Scientific Policy have shown the way.

The Council for Scientific Policy report represents an excellent attempt both to reduce a complex situation to manageable proportions and, what is perhaps more important, to present the results in a form more amenable to public discussion. The case for the 300 GeV accelerator could have been seen in a better light by both government officials and the general public if other projects which were presumably competing for the same resources had been systematically analysed, using similar criteria, and the results presented. This, coupled with a more detailed discussion of the ways in which high-energy physics interacts with the rest of science, would go some additional distance towards clarifying the tasks which policy-makers face when trying to decide whether or not, and on what scale, to support particular research schemes or certain fields of research. No wholly rational solution seems attainable in the foreseeable future but it is certainly not unreasonable to think that the methods of coming to conclusions could be made more dispassionate, more realistic and better thought-out through the further development of the criteria of choice first presented by Dr. Weinberg.

24 Clarke, R., " How the 300 GeV Decision was made ", Science Journal, V, 3 (March, 1969), p. 4.