Understanding science

Cambridge University Government Policy Programme seminar series

Origins And Background

The first seminar held under the auspices of the Cambridge University Policy Programme (CUGPOP) took place on 6 November 1998. It was the first meeting to be held in the newly constructed Mong Building in Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge. That seminar marked the date on which the Programme came into the public domain. What were the reasons for creating the Programme, what were its purposes and to whom was it addressed?

Background

The rate of progress in science and technology in the past sixty years or so has been breathtaking. We have sent probes into outer space. We have launched satellites that orbit the earth and allow us to monitor the effects of climate change on the size of the ice caps, on mountain ranges, the courses of rivers and the size of deserts. We have computers of enormous power that can complete in seconds, or in fractions of a second, calculations that only thirty years ago would have taken weeks or months. We take for granted the fact that, in our own homes we can watch football matches as they are being played, whether in Brazil, Japan or Germany. We have a deep knowledge of the chemical basis of life and we have spawned the biotechnology industry that has the power to improve the living standards of all people. Wherever we look, science has changed, is changing and will continue to change the way we live.

It is impossible for society, and therefore for governments, to ignore these developments. Some of them will benefit society and some may harm society. For example, nuclear energy has the great advantage of providing a virtually inexhaustible supply of energy; but it also has some disadvantages, one of which is the disposal of radioactive waste. That is, there are costs as well as benefits in using knowledge derived from advances in science. It is for governments, and to some extent industry, to decide how to meet the future needs of their countries in the light of the best scientific information available, in the light of the known and foreseeable costs and benefits, and in the light of the wishes of the electorate. But if governments are to act in the best interests of that electorate, and indeed of the wider population of the world, they need a secure base of scientific knowledge on which to make their decisions. And scientists have the responsibility of advising their governments about that knowledge base.

During the 1990s two major events in Britain sharply focused people's minds on science. One happened in the farming industry, the other in the laboratory.

In 1986 a novel disease of cattle was identified. The disease was Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE or more colloquially Mad Cow Disease). In Britain over the next ten years the disease would claim the lives of some 160,000 cattle, and probably had infected several hundred thousand more - killed before they showed any symptoms of the disease; many of these asymptomatic animals must have entered the human food chain. Amongst the many questions that this terrible disease raised was whether it was transmissible to humans. At the early stage of the disease in cattle, scientists did not know the answer to this question. They were uncertain. But scientists were not expected to be uncertain. The knowledge that scientific inquiry had gained was so robust that it had often been translated into amazing technological achievements and there has been no uncertainty about those. Indeed the second major event that focused attention on science was itself a technical triumph. Some four decades ago John Gurdon (1962) removed the nucleus from a frog's egg, and replaced it with the nucleus of another cell. The donated nucleus came from a cell in the wall of the intestine of a tadpole. Some of the host eggs began to differentiate. Many of them died, but a few survived, developed into tadpoles and then into frogs. The frog was genetically identical to the tadpole that donated the nucleus. The tadpole had been cloned. This work demonstrated that the genetic material needed to make an individual was present in the nucleus of differentiated cells (in this case a cell of the intestine), and could do so in the 'right' environment, namely an enucleated egg cell or ovum. This elegant, pioneering work generated great interest in the scientific community, but apart from forming the basis of the plot in the book by Ira Levin, The Boys from Brazil, sparked little public interest. After all, frogs are not mammals and certainly not humans. That interest was sparked twenty or so years later when a group of scientists working in Scotland announced that they had cloned a sheep (Wilmut et al 1997). In principle the genetic material of the lamb could be used to generate another cloned sheep: the genetic material could be recycled. In other words, the technique raised the possibility of genetic immortality in mammals.

Accordingly, cloning became a major issue in public debate - in newspapers, television and radio, and from temples and churches to Parliament. Could humans be cloned? Would it be ethical to do so? What was the purpose of the research anyway? Are scientists playing God? Should they? Interest, amazement, fear, anxiety and moral indignation - all were expressed.

Science was in the limelight, and its form was frightening: demonstrably powerful, worryingly uncertain. Without doubt it was reoccupying centre stage, but it was viewed with distrust. Scientists clearly needed to explain what they were doing and why they were doing it. They needed to communicate more effectively with the Government and with the general public; they needed to demonstrate that the power of science can be harnessed for the public good and to the creation of wealth.

Origins

It was in this context that the idea of initiating the Government Policy Programme came into being. During the course of a casual conversation over lunch I wondered whether the University, with its great strengths in science (including medical science and technology), might be of assistance to the Government in shaping its policies for the 21st century. One way of giving this assistance would be through a programme of seminars that would allow genuine dialogue between scientists and government policy makers. The University, operating under tight budgetary constraints, was not able to support the Programme and it seemed doomed. However, Lord Eatwell (JE), President of Queens' College, to whom I had spoken about the idea, was very enthusiastic and so were Professor Bob Hepple (BH, Master of Clare College) and Professor David King (DK, Master of Downing College). The four of us, who were to form the Core Committee, therefore decided to 'go it alone' and were able to do so because of the wonderfully flexible structure of the University and its colleges, where interdisciplinary interactions within and between the sciences and the humanities flourish. Together we covered a wide field of knowledge: the physical sciences (DK was Professor of Physical Chemistry), the biomedical sciences (I had been Professor of Zoology, and earlier a Professor of Anatomy), political economy (JE was to be elected to a Professorship in that subject) and law (BH was Professor of Law). After David King had been appointed Chief Scientific Adviser to the Government in 2000, he ceased to be a member of the Committee. The physical sciences position was filled by Sir Martin Rees (MR) Astronomer Royal and Royal Society Research Professor of Astronomy.

At the time of its formation all members of the Core Committee were Heads of Houses. This fact was important. College Heads are given a small allowance to meet the expenses that they incur in Office and each of us drew on this allowance to contribute to the cost of running the first seminar and so we were able to initiate the Programme. Necessarily, the amount each of us could give was small, and this financial constraint was one of the reasons for largely restricting the speakers to those who worked in Cambridge. However, we fully recognised the contributions made by other universities, research institutes and industrial organisations, and if the Programme were successful, we hoped they might also become engaged. The first seminar was well attended. With this encouragement, and in order to meet the costs of drawing on the wider academic and industrial communities in the UK and elsewhere, we sought and received financial support from the Royal Society.

It was one thing to have the idea of the Programme; it was an entirely different matter to expect that the seminars would be noticed, let alone attended by ministers and their senior advisors. JE therefore approached the Policy Unit at Number 10 Downing Street outlining the Programme we had in mind, and providing the Unit with a summary of the subject matter to be covered by the first seminar. The subject was on the highly topical issue of the cloning of organisms. Our proposal was favourably received and we were encouraged to proceed. This encouragement was crucial to the implementation of the Programme.

Objectives of the dialogue

The UK Government spends substantial sums of money on science and technology. Not surprisingly it expects tangible returns that enhance the nation's wealth and improve the quality of life of its citizens. With these factors in mind, the Programme had the following objectives:

1. To provide some understanding of the nature of scientific and technological advances.
2. To emphasise that, whilst past advances in knowledge have led to many technological triumphs, at the boundaries of knowledge there is much uncertainty.
3. To inform on developments that have recently taken place, or are likely to take place in the next five to ten years and beyond, so that the government is well placed to make the appropriate contingency plans; to be proactive rather than reactive.
4. To indicate the likely practical implications of the scientific and technological advances.
5. To draw attention to some of the opportunities and challenges that these advances offer.
6. To consider the legal, economic and ethical implications of these advances.
7. Where possible, to suggest solutions to problems, rather than merely to pose more questions. Governments are plagued with questions and often offered solutions by pressure groups that have their own agendas. We hoped that constructive, disinterested advice, and the generation of realistic solutions would help the Government in formulating its policies.

There was one purpose we were determined should not be part of our dialogue. We were not seeking additional funding for science. We had no intention of being yet one more of the pressure groups that asked for more resources. Our purpose was to help provide a knowledge base about scientific advances for government ministers and their senior advisers, many of whom had no scientific background.

Selection of topics and structure of the seminars

The topic selected for a seminar usually emerged during the frequent informal discussions held amongst members of the Core Committee over sandwich luncheons. GH and DK/MR had special responsibilities for monitoring developments across science and technology. The discussions were profoundly informed by the political insights brought by JE, as political economist and a member of the Upper House of Parliament, and by BH who so clearly saw the legal implications of these developments. We all appreciated some of their ethical implications and were sensitive to the reactions of the public to these developments as seen through the eyes of the media. We asked Sir Bob (later Lord) May, the Chief Scientific Adviser to the Government if there were any topics that he, and through him the Government, would wish us to consider. His view was that the decision to select a topic and speakers should be the sole responsibility of the Core Committee. This was the policy we adopted, free of pressure from particular lobby groups, whether in government, industry or other institutions. Furthermore, although members of the Core Committee were members of the University, our collective decisions were independent of the special interests of Departments, Faculties or Schools. In these ways ministers and their advisers were assured of a disinterested input. The funding of the seminars by the Royal Society ensured no conflict of interests and allowed us to be free of any possible bias that funding by industrial or government departments might have introduced.

We decided that the seminars should be one-day affairs so that the audience could travel to and from London on the same day. Each seminar began with a brief introductory talk outlining the scientific background and social importance of the chosen subject. The introduction was followed by two or three talks about the fundamental science and technology that underpinned the subject. These talks were followed by two more exploring ways in which the scientific work was being or was likely in the future to be exploited. The last two talks were devoted to the legal/economic/ethical issues raised by the morning lectures and were followed by an hour devoted to a general discussion of all the talks. On the whole, seminars in the biological sciences alternated with seminars in the physical sciences and covered a wide range of issues. For example, in the biological sciences, the topics included 'Age and senescence', 'Drugs of addiction' and 'Stem cells'. In the physical sciences, 'Information technology', 'Nanotechnology', and 'Climate change'. In addition, some of the seminars cut across the physical and biological sciences, such as those on 'Biological and Artificial cognitive systems' and 'Water, the next fifty years'.

Once a topic had been agreed we sought the advice of colleagues both within and outside Cambridge on who were the acknowledged experts in the field, as well as making our own suggestions. In selecting possible speakers we placed great emphasis on their capacity to communicate complex scientific findings to a non-scientific audience. Once possible contributors had been approached and had agreed to speak, they wrote a brief abstract of their talk. These abstracts were circulated between all speakers and to members of the Core Committee, all of whom later met, or conversed through a telephone link. At these meetings the objectives of the seminar were outlined, and the abstracts discussed. Each speaker was also invited to outline his/her talk, a procedure that minimised unnecessary duplication and ensured continuity across talks. Finally, on the evening before the seminar, the speakers gave a 'dry run' of their contributions - again to ensure continuity across talks and clarity of exposition. Sometimes a PowerPoint presentation/slide/overhead might be overloaded with information, and the speaker often worked late into the night to remove redundant material.

Subsequent developments

In 2000 Sir David Williams was approached by Dr Seng Tee Lee, a philanthropist who had been a Fellow of Wolfson College, who wished to create an annual lectureship in honour of Sir David. He was a former President of Wolfson College and a former Vice-Chancellor of the University. An annual lectureship in Sir David's honour had already been established and with characteristic diffidence he declined the offer of a second one. Sir David was a strong supporter of CUGPOP and most generously directed Dr Lee to GH. Dr Lee agreed to make funds available to the University for the 'Dr S T Lee Annual Lecture on Science and Public Policy'. The University accepted this proposal, which was supported by Sir David and by members of the Core Committee, and lectures were given by Sir John Sulston in 2003, and by Sir David King in 2005.

MR initiated a more recent development soon after he became Master of Trinity College in 2004. He invited scientists from government, industry and academia to attend a one-day workshop on future energy demand and supply, in the particular context of transport, but in the general context of climate change. A second Workshop was held in 2005 focusing on the costs and benefits of nuclear power as a major energy source over the next fifty or so years. These discussions will help to inform the Core Committee about subjects that are suitable for future seminars.

Conclusions

Modern human beings have been about for some 150,000 years. Experimental science is generally considered to have begun with Galileo, roughly 400 years ago. Towards the end of the nineteenth century the pace of advance accelerated, so that modern science is a mere 100-or-so years old. During that short span of time we have begun to understand some of the fundamental physical and biological processes that operate in the universe, dispelling myth and dogma with evidence-based knowledge. No one should be surprised that we have still a great deal to learn, given the youthfulness of modern science. But the boundaries of knowledge are advancing rapidly, probably more rapidly than ever before. The seminar programmes and abstracts of the talks contained in this booklet may give a glimpse into some of those advances. However, the booklet cannot convey the sense of drama that attaches to the scientific discoveries described in the seminars; the extraordinary pace at which advances are being made; the astonishing capacity human beings have for understanding the world in which we live - and to some extent - ourselves; and the tremendous power of evidence-based knowledge. As I have already said, at the boundaries of knowledge there is much uncertainty. But by making predictions from prior empirical knowledge and by testing those predictions we are able reduce the levels of uncertainty. Necessarily, many of the advances bring in their wake difficult moral, ethical, legal and economic issues. We, the Core Committee, have attempted to address these issues openly, never to avoid them. We hope that those who have attended the seminars have benefited from them and feel more fully informed about the basis of scientific knowledge when they come to formulate policies that that will affect the lives of all of us.

Gabriel Horn
June 2006

References

The title of this document is: Understanding science: Cambridge University Government Policy Programme seminar series
URL: http://www.cam.ac.uk/about/scienceseminars/background.html