528 HISTORY OF THE COMMITTE1 ON SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY 



would have ^nickered at that one, we would have been wrong again. Because that 

 led to the inaser and the laser. 



Bauman brought up the spending of $70,000 "to study the smell of 

 perspiration given off by Australian aborigines." Symington nailed 

 this one on two scores: First, that the study was done by the Depart- 

 ment of Defense and not the National Science Foundation; and second, 

 that the study was designed to ascertain why aborigines did not sweat 

 as heavily in hot weather. The results were designed to protect Ameri- 

 can soldiers against dehydration in the jungles of Vietnam. A com- 

 mittee-led effort helped defeat another Bauman amendment to the 

 NSF authorization bill in 1976, which would have required NSF to 

 furnish full supporting documentation on all grants or contracts to any 

 Congressman within 15 days of any request. On the surface, the amend- 

 ment sounded like a worthy "sunshine" amendment, but as Mosher 

 pointed out in the debate it was designed to give a "hunting license" 

 to Members wishing to make end runs around the Science Committee 

 and undermine its oversight responsibility. Speaker Albert made one of 

 his rare floor speeches against the Bauman amendment, pointing out 

 that it would necessitate the hiring of many new employees to carry 

 out the tasks required. Wirth indicated that the amendment would 

 politicize the NSF funding process as unsuccessful applicants would 

 petition their Congressman to review all recommendations, thereby 

 destroying the confidentiality of the peer review process. Although 

 Conlan was the only committee Republican to speak for the amend- 

 ment, minority members on the committee backed the amendment 

 7 to 3; Ambro was the only Democrat voting for the amendment, which 

 was defeated 257 to 136 on a rollcall. 



Conlan then offered an amendment to kill the $1.4 million author- 

 ized for precollege curriculum development and use the funds instead 

 for summer school institutes for teachers of science and mathematics. 

 Conlan charged that the teachers' guide for the material would "re- 

 quire children in the sixth and seventh grades to cooperate with class 

 data banks where they gather material on the attitudes of their parents, 

 politics, everything from their Zodiac signs to their medical history." 

 Wirth responded that the program in question was thoroughly pre- 

 tested with parents and teachers on review boards. He added: 



There is a great distinction which must be made between surveillance and 

 observation. * * * The features which characterize science in the first place are ob- 

 serving, questioning, describing, speculating, interpreting, valuing, choosing, 

 verifying, comparing and experimenting. If we eliminate these features entirely from 

 ■ curricula, we are not teaching science. 



Fuqua, Mosher, Symington, and Scheuer also spoke against the Conlan 

 amendment, in support of which Conlan was the only speaker. Demo- 

 crats Ambro, Mrs Lloyd, and Milford joined seven Republicans on the 



