Talk:Alvin M. Weinberg

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Subsections under Work at Oak Ridge
Breaking up this large section may make it more readable. Pknkly (talk) 06:38, 10 April 2009 (UTC)
 * SBaker43 (talk) 03:48, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

Trans-science
In 1972 Weinberg published a landmark article in Minerva entitled “Science and Trans-science”1, which focuses on the interface between science and policy matters, especially governmental policy decisions:


 * Many of the issues which arise in the course of the interaction between science or technology and society … hang on the answers to questions which can be asked of science and yet which cannot be answered by science. I propose the term trans-scientific for these questions since, though they are, epistemologically speaking, questions of fact and can be stated in the language of science, they are unanswerable by science; they transcend science. [Emphasis in original]

Weinberg provided several examples of trans-scientific questions and noted that they transcend science in three rather different senses: cases in which science is inadequate because it would be impossible in practice to ascertain the answers -- e.g. the effects of low-level radiation (he calculated it would take an experiment involving 8,000,000,000 mice to ascertain directly the effect of low level X-radiation) or the probability of extremely improbable events such as a catastrophic nuclear reactor accident or devastating earthquake; fields, such as much of the social sciences, in which “the subject matter is too variable to allow rationalization according to the strict canons established within the natural sciences; and cases in which the issues involve moral and aesthetic judgments – axiology of science.” -- But I suggest there is an ongoing experiment, for 800,000,000 years or more, involving low but virtually constant radiation, of all potassium-using organisms, said to be 4000 to 5000 Bq of beta or gamma, internally, for a human being of about 70 kg. Without actually disagreeing with Weinberg as to the difficulty of ascertaining data of the complete span of low level X radiation, I believe this strongly suggests a threshold at which potassium-using organisms (All organisms?) are defended by their gene-repair mechanisms. 71.163.107.53 (talk) 02:53, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

The field of risk assessment is where trans-scientific issues have been most explicitly, formally, and deeply addressed. In 1983 the US National Academy of Sciences published RISK ASSESSMENT IN THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT: MANAGING THE PROCESS. This report, called "the Red Book" provided a framework still used by the U.S. government and many others.2,3

The authors of the 1983 volume identified several dozen “components” of Risk Assessment and attempted to identify which are purely scientific, purely policy, or a hybrid. They categorize about half as hybrid. Indeed some authors have labeled the entire list of components as “trans-scientific”.4

Although the Red Book focuses on the assessment of risks arising in exposure to toxic substances, issues and techniques relating to trans-science occur in multiple fields.5 Some argue that many of the conflicts relating to climate change arise from lack of appreciation of trans-scientific issues, that is, of the nature of issues that lie at the boundary of science and policy and thus should not be decided by scientists or policy-makers alone.6

Weinberg Foundation
This link is to the wrong Weinberg Foundation. Will check it out and correct.

Phantomnubian (talk) 04:02, 15 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Redirect was changed on Feb. 6; corrected now. -- Limulus (talk) 08:34, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Removed book
I removed the entry for Fluid Fuel Reactors from the list of books, because AFAICS Dr. Weinberg had no part in creating it. If this is wrong, or if someone wants to put it back in another context, the citation from the LOC is:

Fluid fuel reactors. Edited by James A. Lane, H.G. MacPherson [and] Frank Maslan. Published/Created: 	Reading, Mass., Addison-Wesley Pub. Co. [1958] Description: 	xxii, 979 p. illus., diagrs., tables. 24 cm. — Preceding unsigned comment added by CPWinter (talk • contribs) 20:03, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

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