556 HISTORY OF THE COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY 



in various States, and by international organizations. He also got more 

 specific on how OTA might help Congress supply more scientific in- 

 formation on the technological impact of such developments as the 

 SST, the Alaska pipeline, supertankers, the spread of mobile homes, 

 cable television, and the use of computers. 



INTEREST IN TECHNOLOGY ASSESSMENT MOUNTS 



Citizen interest continued to be expressed in letters like this one 

 to the committee from a lady in Pittsburgh: 



I am not young, and am not technically trained, so will very likely never see or 

 suffer greatly from misuse of the things that can, and I believe, will happen with 

 irresponsible and uncontrolled development of various and spectacular advances in 

 many fields. 



I can imagine nothing worse than an unchanging world, but I think we need to be 

 aware of long-term as well as immediate consequences and plan accordingly. Even 

 the most responsible specialists get carried away by their accomplishments and see 

 onlv their own small part of society, so somehow we ought to insure a system of 

 overall knowledge and reasonable control. 



A Federal Board might perform this function, so I will be very much interested 

 and appreciate it if you can tell me more about the (technology assessment) idea. 



By now, the issue was being widely debated, covered in feature ar- 

 ticles, the subject of conferences and forums of learned and unlearned 

 societies. Prof. Raymond A. Bauer of the Massachusetts Institute of 

 Technology, in an essay on the subject, certainly clarified one aspect 

 when he wrote: 



How does one carry out technology assessment? I suppose that at this stage the 

 problem is akin to that of how one can eat an elephant. And, considering the magni- 

 tude of the task, it is difficult to argue that one place is better than another for the 

 biting to begin. 



SURPRISE 



After meeting almost until Christmas in 1971, the 92d Congress 

 decided to postpone the start of its 2d session until January 20, 1972. 

 Having been put off so many times before, Science Committee members 

 took with a grain of salt the promise of the Rules Committee that a 

 hearing on the OTA bill would be held early in the second session. 

 Therefore, it came as a real surprise when Chairman Miller received 

 a telephone call only a week after the new session had convened, in- 

 forming him that the magic moment had arrived. Miller received the 

 call with mixed emotions. His pride and joy, the Panel on Science and 

 Technology, was meeting January 25-27, tying up the committee 

 members in the high level discussions and conflicting with the Rules 

 Committee meeting. Miller had the meeting postponed and it was 

 finally reset for February 1, 1972. 



