Bankrupt Brain Bank?

As the speeches droned endlessly on, the white-haired scientist turned in despair to a fellow dinner guest and sighed: "I have just got a new theory of eternity." Albert Einstein's ennui at a function of the National Academy of Sciences was hardly unusual. Though the prestigious organization likes to consider itself the supreme court of American science, it has all too often resembled other self-perpetuating honor societies, like baseball's Hall of Fame or Hollywood's Oscar judges.

Rigorous Scrutiny. Now the academicians of science have finally come under rigorous--and embarrassing --public scrutiny. In a carefully documented book, The Brain Bank of America: An Inquiry into the Politics of Science (McGraw-Hill; $10.95), which was published last week, Journalist Philip Boffey reports the bias and lethargy behind the marble facade of the academy's Washington, D.C., headquarters. Created by Congress in 1863 to provide impartial scientific counsel to the Government, the 1,000-member academy and its hundreds of committees provide guidance on many critical questions--from food additives to automotive emissions. In this important assignment, Boffey argues, the academy has frequently failed, turning in shallow, inaccurate advice, serving as an ally for industry, the Pentagon and other agencies under scrutiny.

An experienced reporter (the Wall Street Journal, Science magazine), Boffey, 39, had only limited help from the academy. By tradition, it keeps most of its working documents private. But Boffey and three young associates, working under the aegis of Ralph Nader's consumerist Center for Study of Responsive Law, overcame the academy's secrecy by conducting more than 500 interviews, many of them with academicians themselves, including an initially reluctant Academy President Philip Handler. In such controversial areas as the sonic booms and atmospheric damage caused by supersonic transports, the dangers of cyclamates and the effects of defoliants in Viet Nam, the study shows in case after case that the academy "allowed itself to be used as a shield by those intent on preserving business as usual."

When a committee, for once, criticized the Atomic Energy Commission's handling of nuclear wastes, the annoyed AEC cut off further funding until the academy leadership appointed a more congenial group. Lacking significant outside support, the academy depends on such money for its studies. But Government agencies--or industry--have rarely had to wield a financial club since the committees themselves are frequently staffed by uncritical scientists. Examples: key parts of a report on lead poisoning were drafted by a chemical company scientist; a subcommittee on dog-and cat-food standards was chaired by a pet food company executive; an aerospace company vice president headed the academy's aeronautics and space board. Such panels occasionally did include "public interest" representatives, but they had little influence. "Industry was pretty much calling the tune," says University of Minnesota Environmentalist Dean Abrahamson, who quit the academy's power-plant-site committee in disgust.

Academy President Handler calls Boffey's charges "old hat." He insists that the academy has already done extensive housecleaning: examining potential study-committee members for conflicts of interest, recruiting younger and less conservative scientists for studies (median age of academy members in 1970 was 62), setting up a $100,000 fund to support worthy studies without outside financing. Adds Handler: "This is a remarkable institution that has served the country well." If it does better in the future, Boffey perhaps should claim some credit. In his final interview, Boffey remarked to Handler that he might be able to use the imminent appearance of a muckraking book to persuade some balky academicians of the need for change. Replied Handler: "Don't think I haven't."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.