Word: leet
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...crux of Leet's complaint is that the Berkner panel, formed to study the problems of test detection, excluded professional seismologists. They only members of the panel who had any seismological experience were what Leet calls, not derisively but not respectfully, "doodlebuggers,." This is a popular term for seismic prospect seismologists, electronic engineers who use a fraction of the know-how of earthquake seismology. Leet himself is an earthquake station seismologist. His application to work for AFTAC, a unit that presently constitutes the Air Force Vela Uniform test detection project, was turned down on the grounds that Harvard...
...using earthquake station seismologists on a project like this," he explains, "is like revising our measurement system without consulting the Bureau of Standards." Others on the committee included representatives of instrument companies, and one man who, according to Leet, "never took the equivalent of Nat. Sci. 10." Berkner himself is a fairly well-known scientific administrator; he and nuclear physicist Hans Bethe were the only members of the panel not associated with those who were awarded grants by the panel itself (for "further research...
...expense, Leet made two trips to Washington in an effort to complain. One official of the Disarmament and Control Agency listened patiently to him and finally asked, "if your theories prove correct does it mean that we'll need more or less inspection in the Soviet Union?" When Leet answered "less," the official told him don't call us we'll call you. He was never called. He went to the Defense Department and was given a similar hearing...
Obviously the scientific conclusions Leet has reached could reverberate to Geneva. Even if the United States can no longer withdraw its inspection demands (inspection is being sought as a political precedent as well as a military necessity), a consideration of Leet's data might lead to better historical understanding of the Soviet suspicion that Inspection is an American ruse...
...Leet has no political axe to grind. "I was naive enough to believe that science was objective in anyone's hands, but that Vela data was as full of holes as Swiss cheese. Three months ago I wasn't aware that it would be carried over and used at Geneva. How the hell can a thing like this go on? When I found out I was mad enough to do some digging." The Professor, who was born in Alliance, Ohio, sixty-one years ago, has a ready laugh still untainted by cynicism. He knows it seems quixotic for a lone...