Subject: Letters to the Editor -- A Tunnel of Babel
Date: Published: 8/26/92 (78 lines)
Source: Wall Street Journal. Copyright Dow Jones & Co. Inc.

    Letters to the Editor --
    The Super Collider:
    A Tunnel of Babel

    While it is not often that I side with the majority in the House
 of Representatives, I must take issue with John Silber's praise of
 the Superconducting Super Collider, or SSC ("An Apollo Project for
 the '90s," editorial page, July 24).  The SSC is a wasteful special
 interest without fiscal or technological merit.
    Mr. Silber ignores the significant opportunity costs of
 dedicating $11 billion to a single high-energy particle physics
 project.  For the SSC to be "worth" this expenditure of taxpayer
 dollars, its value should match or exceed that of alternative
 investments, whether public or private.  The SSC doesn't even come
 close to satisfying this criterion.
    If America needs improved technologies, it should develop them
 directly.  Yet because our "best minds" will be working on the SSC's
 difficulties, they cannot be working on real world applications of
 these technologies.  The point is that useful products will not be
 developed as a result of the SSC, they will be developed in spite of
 it.
    In general, Mr. Silber's claims of technological "spinoff"
 benefits are grossly exaggerated.  Yet even if they were true, there
 is no compelling reason for the U. S. taxpayer to foot the bill.
 Japanese companies have long profited from the tendency of Americans
 to produce fundamental research only to lose the race to bring these
 technologies to market.  Assuming scientific advances were to arise
 out of the SSC program, they would be immediately available to the
 entire world.  Thus, it is to America's advantage to let other
 nations build super colliders, if they must be built at all.
 Americans can both participate (through joint research efforts) and
 utilize any resulting technological breakthroughs, all without
 bearing the burden of billions in additional debt.
    Mr. Silber's arguments could apply just as well to building the
 Tower of Babel.  Imagine the incredible technologies needed to span
 the gulf between heaven and earth! Putting America's best minds to
 work on such a task, under Mr. Silber's scenario, cannot fail to
 stimulate the economy and inspire the people.  This fallacious
 reasoning is at the heart of the SSC debate, which is rapidly
 becoming a Tunnel of Babel, more likely to harm than to help the
 economy.
    Kent Jeffreys
    Competitive Enterprise Institute
    Washington
    ---
    It is silly to assert that the SSC "offers us the opportunity to
 complete our understanding of matter."  No machine or discovery will
 ever do that.  With any luck, the SSC would answer some questions of
 current interest, and lead us to new questions.  Interesting this new
 knowledge may be, but it is generally agreed that it is unlikely to
 be of any practical or commercial value.
    Mr. Silber says that "the SSC is the equivalent of a major
 public-works project."  Actually it is more like a major defense
 procurement project, in which vast quantities of expensive materiel
 are exploded or thrown away.  It is true that jobs will be created
 and money ($12 billion or so!) put into circulation.  But if the
 intention is to create public works, wouldn't it be better to use
 the jobs and money to build things that are useful?
    Closer to the mark is the claim that technical progress will
 result as a side effect of the main project.  Such progress is indeed
 vital, but why generate it as a side effect?  Twelve billion dollars
 is enough money, roughly speaking, to support the education of
 100,000 doctoral students in science and engineering.  Their
 research, dealing not only with superconductors, but also with
 computers, transportation or cures for AIDS, would provide useful
 knowledge directly, not as a side effect.
    S. E. Schwarz
    Professor of Electrical Engineering
    University of California, Berkeley
    Berkeley, Calif.

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