More Complaints About Yucca Mountain

AstroAce writes "I saw this article about the Yucca Mountain Nuclear waste dump, and was doubly intrigued. Not only did I do lab tech work on a YM grant as an undergrad, but my science advisor said the best thing I could do for science would be to become a Congressman, and get hold of the purse strings (remember SSC, the Super-conducting Super Collider?) I think geeks would be the best representatives of other citizens, making detailed, objective analysis of the issues, arriving at rational conclusions and actions. However, they don't seem to be gregarious enough to be politicians. Are there examples of both?"

Comments

Root for Rationality

[4of12]

I think geeks would be the best representatives of other citizens

They could be, but not necessarily.

Just as the rest of the world gets caught up in emotional irrational evaluation of how government ought to be run, so can geeks.

Not a few geeks are emotionally involved with science and technology. That attachment can be an asset when it helps to drive scientific progress.

But it can be a liability when it comes time to evaluate whether it is best to spend money on fish or bicycles, which are the kinds of decisions and value judgements confronting elected representatives.

Probably the most significant contribution an elected geek could make is to push in every possible way for the population to become more educated, more rational, willing more to use powers of analysis than to fall back on emotion and feeling. Unfortunately, the latter traits are becoming too well developed because they are useful pry bars in advertising as well as in their long-standing role in swaying political opinion.

Early childhood education programs will really bring the most bang for the buck if you look in the long term.

Geeks with political power

[Anonymous Coward]

I seem to recall a scientist/inventor with political power they talked about in my history class. His name was Thomas Jefferson, anyone heard of him?

He seems to have been responsible for putting into the Constitution the American concepts of intellectual property--copyright, patent, trademark, etc.

If you let an inventor write laws, of course he is going to write laws that favor inventors. Then lawyers, who are much better with laws than inventors, will interpret those laws in the way that makes the most money for whoever hired them.

I think the same would hold true for geek-politicians today.

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Re:Geeks with political power

[greenhide]

Ben Franklin was a good businessman and PR man. So he is the one known as the inventor, when in fact TJ probably invented at least as many items as Ben Franklin did. Since Ben Franklin was the shrewd businessman-type, and Thomas Jefferson was the always-losing-money-on-every-business-he-tried type (and his businesses were often based on the newest and latest technologies), you'd think Ben would be more likely to come up with patent, trademark, and copyright laws than TJ would.

TJ created the patent system that was the basis for the patent system in place today, even though he disliked the idea of patents in general. He felt that patents could cause there to be an unfair monopolies.

So he never patented any of his inventions.