Geeks Are Cool: Scientists And Engineers Will Lead The Way To A Greener Future
by John Laumer, Philadelphia 
on 12.14.08
Dr. Wernher von Braun, Director of the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center on July 1, 1960.
If ever there was a time for Big Scientists and Big Engineers to take leadership roles in government, this is it. We now have reason to be optimistic. The incoming US Federal administration has signaled its intent to put a Nobel Prize-winning physicist at the helm of the Department of Energy, a Chemical Engineer to Administer the Environmental Protection Agency, and, if what I just heard is correct, a Harvard-educated architect in charge of the Department of Housing & Urban Development.
Business Nerds Out, Techno-Geeks In
People with MBAs and PhDs in economics know best how to optimize for profit. Put lots of 'em in government and running investment houses and the odds increase greatly for 'overshoot.' Like what just happened. For the time being, business nerds have lost their credibility. Into the shadows for them.
To Every Thing There Is A Season.
Put mostly lawyers in charge of administering environmental agencies, and legal or regulatory debates will dominate, dragging on for years.
Not that MBAs and bean counters and attorneys should be wholly disregarded. It is a matter of regaining balance, and of re-centering our vision of the future, to put experts with technical depth in charge of the agencies of government: so they can hire the change-agents and make it happen.
Of course, they must have proven administrative skills and political competency. Goes almost without saying.
Three more things, and then I'd like to open it up to our readers for comments.
I can't wait to see these people speaking up in Congressional hearings, when it will then be much harder for lobbyists to "spin" their statements later, and get away with it.
Those pushing Think-Tank generated talking points will find it harder to confound and run around administrators who are personally centered in the topics of which they speak.
For the best possible outcome, Congress has to take on the voice of the ethicist. That's something the "green blogs" can take a bead on as well.
Oh yeah,...one last thing, relating to the image used for this post, which comes via Wikipedia. Though we are still, thankfully, in a situation where the policy discussion is mainly about how to cost-effectively mitigate against climate forcing emissions, it is plausible that we could, much sooner than expected, find ourselves in crisis mode, freaking out over a rapidly acidifying oceans and atmospheric tipping points.
Measure twice, cut once: know that old adage of carpentry? NASA would have to redouble its efforts around climate missions. Now that's rocket science.
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I worked for an engineering company for a number of years. Even though they had a low profit margin...3% their stock was stable and they had a good dividend. Engineers and scientists were treated very well, but I wasn’t an engineer, that’s part of why I left. The best part of my job was working with the engineers and scientists, by in large they were very creative, very logical, they took their job very personally and wanted desperately to make whatever they were working on be the best that it could. What they made might not have been the sexiest thing out there but it performed it’s function extremely well. Then the investment atmosphere changed, investors stopped investing because a 3% margin wasn’t enough to push the stock price up, so changes were made in the company to accommodate the investors expectations. I DO NOT think the company is better off for what happened. What’s my point?
I think putting scientist types in charge is a good thing as long as they’re seasoned and savvy in the right areas. BUT it’s not just the government that needs to change, it’s PEOPLES attitudes!!! And Wall Street expectations for companies!! There is no free lunch! The quick buck now will cost down the road. In these peoples life times!! This is more important than getting good government appointments. The type of government and business changes that need to happen won’t come in 2 or 4 years, and with peoples expectations being what they are the slow growth that’s needed won’t be allowed to happen. We’re paying for peoples quick buck attitudes of the past right now.
Engineers Rule . . . at Honda
http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2006/0904/112.html
Although we should remember how "The Best and The Brightest" under Kennedy got us into so much trouble. Lawyers, at least, are expert at knowing where the divisions and interests are in society, and know how to avoid conflict (or how to generate it needlessly!). I have a lot of engineers in my family and they have total tin ears to cultural and social issues. Manipulating a group of competing constituencies is not the same as manipulating a fillet of metal.
Hear hear. Business nerds out. I always hated those guys. A little too rigid for me. At least techno-geeks are fun! Oh, and they know how to turn a computer on.