The Inevitability of Discovery. . .

A 3.30 A.M. LIQUID hydrogen explosion three alaram fire in the experimental chamber of the Cambridge Electron Accelerator yesterday injured eight Harvard and MIT scientists and research technicians, three of them critically. The multi-million dollar explosion ripped apart the entire roof of the circular experiment section of the CEA complex, severely damaged a $1,000,000 hydrogen bubble chamber, and destroyed an elevator shaft in the adjoining administrative section of the structure."

Francis M. Pipkin, associate dean of the Faculty, remembers that July 5, 1965 blast that caused the death of one worker. He recalled last week how he left the building that night at about midnight. Three hours later he was coming back to do more research. He saw the explosion from his car miles away. He says that people were doing experiments in the facility that they shouldn't have been doing. But that wouldn't happen now, Pipkin says, because Harvard takes more precautions.

Pipkin is now the head of the Committee on Research Policy. That committee last month approved the building of a facility in which scientists want to conduct potentially hazardous genetic research that involves forming new organisms by artificially combining strands of DNA. There are other parallels between the accelerator that Pipkin worked with and the planned facility his committee now favors. Despite the potential hazards of the research--particularly the danger that the bacteria, once transplanted with foreign DNA, could induce disease and death in humans--the scientists want to perform the experiments in the Biological Laboratories, at 16 Divinity Ave., in a residential area. And, as was the case with the electron accelerator, the public has not participated in early decisions about recombinant DNA work that may later affect it.

Up until a few weeks ago only the University's scientists and administrators were involved in the decision to construct the special containment facility that the federal government stipulates for this kind of research. But now because some scientists at Harvard and other institutions are wary of the potential dangers of this biohazard, particularly the dangers it could inflict on Cambridge, the final decision about the construction of the facility was reserved for the Cambridge City Council. After several weeks of debate, the council voted last week to place a three-month moratorium on recombinant DNA research while a special review board attempts to assess the dangers involved.

As almost everyone who attended the hearings voted, the decision by a local government to intervene and stop the planned research is unprecedented. In the past, city governments, if they meddled with science, did so only to restrict the sites of research, but never the basic science itself. The council could have said that DNA was none of its business. But instead, in a commendable gesture, it decided not to duck a question that may affect the lives of the citizens it represents.

DNA is not a simple matter to explain. Many scientists are sure that the research will revolutionize the world's understanding of some basic biology, that it may lead to greater knowledge about agriculture and disease. Scientists, however, are also sure about another element of the research--they as a group can't predict what the organisms will be like. The may be unstoppable little monsters--Frankensteins, some have labelled them. Or they could turn out to be harmless bacteria incapable of escaping the containment facility.

Also on another, perhaps more important plane, scientists and policy-makers are divided about how this research will affect the broader society. Specifically moral and ethical questions of genetic engineering have to be discussed in connection to recombinant DNA work.

For these reasons, the City Council, at times dominated by partisan politics and old town-gown animosities, is not particularly suited for the complex discussion on DNA research. Still, without more than a three-week crash course in DNA, its decision to place a ban on the research until further inquiries are made, is prudent.

Some of the witnesses who spoke for and against the research at the council last week were far less commendable. These scientists had the opportunity to focus on the true hazards and benefits of the research. They could have stated their goals objectively and clearly. But few on either side took that path.

The Harvard scientists opposing the ban damaged their case critically long before entering the City Council chamber. They did so by insisting that the lab containing this potentially dangerous research be built in the antediluvian Bio Labs, in the middle of one of the nation's most crowded cities. A simple, political, but not necessarily correct decision, would have been to void that choice, and propose a new facility built from scratch.

Instead, these scientists have decided to rig the contest in their favor by changing the ground rules of discussion. They cite the stringency of their own precautions. They tell you that the p-3 facility is safe for all levels of the work they plan to pursue. But, as Richard C. Lewontin '50, professor of Biology, warned last week, we shouldn't be surprised if some overly ambitious scientists does experiments that should be classified p-4 in the p-3 facility. (p-4 work is very dangerous and needs a far more protective facility, like that used in biological warfare testing.) The proponents cite how the proceedings would follow strict federal guidelines. But those guidelines were drawn up by none other than scientists like themselves--some of whom are interested in pursuing the research. In any other field, the contestants would scream "fix," but the seeming independence and "stature" of the men involved seems to block any conflict of interest charges.

There are only two occasions when the proponents choose to go beyond the discussion of their facility's safety: when they tell us that anyone who knows anything about pathogenic bacteria is in favor of the research proceeding immediately, and when they say that stopping the research is tantamount to being pro-cancer.

THE FIRST VIEW sounds like a logical point in favor of the proponents. If those who knows the most about the research believe it is fine, then why bother to listen to the uninformed objections? Still, there are a few knowledgeable dissenters, including Erwin Chagaff of Columbia and Caltech's Sinsheimer. And, an analogy to another situation--decisions involving the military--shows just how flawed this logic is. After all who knows more about how to wage war than the generals, and yet recent experience tells us that the generals, so itching to launch their projects, need to be regulated by others who can exercise better judgement in the public's favor.

But perhaps even more unfair is the way that the recombinant DNA researchers have managed to bring cancer into the proceedings. To listen to some of the debate at the last week's meeting is to believe that curing cancer, not researching recombinant DNA, is what is at stake. As Mayor Alfred E. Vellucci aptly noted, the parade of cancer researchers forced the councillors into an anticancer research position if they issued a longer than three-month moratorium. Such talk of cancer clearly confuses the issue. Everett I. Mendelsohn, professor of the History of Science, pointed out last week that if the urgency of cancer research is used to battle for an immediate go-ahead for recombinant DNA, then the issues are being misrepresented. The DNA research being done now is still basic, years away from practical application to cancer. Most scientists when pressed will admit to that. "If there is no great social need," Mendelsohn says, "why don't you take the time to lower the risk?"

The opponents of the research, perhaps because they felt so defensive about the cancer issue, decided to emotionalize the debate even further. George Wald, Higgins Professor of Biology, most notably, focussed almost entirely on an appeal to stop cancer at its environmental sources. Another opponent talked about pressure from above--University Hall specifically--to conduct this research. But, if anything, the Faculty dean's office has been passive in this debate, choosing to listen to the scientists.

There were some worthy suggestions made, however, One came from William Petri, a research fellow in Biology, who warned the council not to cripple the research, but to take it to an area that is not so crowded. Other worthy suggestions include confining the research to one site, at least for the time being. People interested in conducting the research could receive leaves of absence to work at the site, as the Harvard physicists interested in working with high energy accelerators do now.

Mendelsohn has another consideration, a secondary one he admits, but symbolic and important for that reason. He suggests that an arrangement be made with the Nobel Prize committee not to give an award for recombinant DNA research this year. Scientists realize that recombinant work is Nobel material, and the risk that they may be spurred on to engage in hazardous research in quest of the prize is not worth taking.

By far the biggest problem at the hearings was no single group's fault. The situation dictated that the discussion revolve only around biohazards and how they can be combatted. Leftout were the moral and ethical questions of recombinant work. The research has great implications for those who wish to pursue genetic social engineering. Such a debate needs to be held at a national, not local, level. As Mendelsohn warns, it is time to take stock of this type of research and decide whether we really want to make these discoveries. Despite what many scientists claim, "there isn't inevitability to discovery," he says. "You can choose the path to take." Perhaps if such stock had been taken with greater seriousness in 1939-40, scientists would have agreed to discontinue atomic research, or at least measure the potential gains and losses. Such is the case with recombinant DNA work. The Cambridge review board investigating DNA should think about this stock taking and recommend that the federal government begin a debate on the issue.

If there is anything that has been gained by the City Council's foray into basic research, it's the positive right to place a Cambridge resident or residents on future research policy review boards within the University. If a resident had been involved in 1965, perhaps the potential dangers of the accelerator that exploded may have been more easily recognized. And, if a resident had been on the biohazards committee at its inception, perhaps the proposal to place the facility within the Bio Labs would have been recognized as being outlandish. As it is now, Cambridge's entrance may be too late; Harvard scientists have established the rules, and any review board may be forced to play ball with them.