GALILEO, TOSCANINI, AND NUCLEAR COSTS

There is one and only one point in which the antinukes have our respect: the amount of junk they are able to absorb. How many times can you read that nobody has solved the waste "problem," that nuclear power leads to a police state, that plutonium is the most toxic substance known to man, that no level of radioactivity is safe? Forever, apparently, for there is no end to the foul flood. The latest wisdom is that nuclear power has priced itself out of the market; this week's reinforcement by repetition is called Nuclear Power: The Market Test by one C. Flavin quoting Komanoff, Bupp, et al to be doubtlessly followed by further garbage by Bupp quoting Flavin, Komanoff et al. It is published by Worldwatch Institute, one of the sea of "nonprofit" phonies featuring non-experts (such as le roi soleil Denis Hayes) in non-subjects ("environmental policy analysis") writing nonsense. Worldwatch gets your tax money not just by the usual channels, but also via the United Nations. That's what makes them so knowledgeable about the free market.

The market test, indeed! Two other failures that did not pass the market test come to mind. One is Solidarity, which was obviously too high-priced in the Polish market of Trade Unions, the other Galileo Galilei, whose theories were not able to stand up to the competition.

Which brings us to a more enjoyable subject: reading Galilee. Early in his career, Toscanini was advised by an older musician during rehearsal "This place should be played piano. I have it straight from [conductor] Nikisch." -- "No, it should be played fortissimo," replied Toscanini, holding up the score. "I have it straight from Beethoven."

You don't have to go to some Harvard underling to interpret Mark Twain for you; you can go straight to Mark Twain. And in many cases you do not have to know mathematics to read the classics of physics and astronomy. Newton wrote the mathematical Principia for scientists in Latin, but he wrote the Opticks for everybody in English. Similarly, Galileo wrote the Sidereus Nuncius (Starry Messenger, 1610) in Latin, but the Dialogues Concerning Two New Sciences in Italian (English translation $5.00 from Dover Publications, Cat. No. 60099-8, 180 Varick St., New York, N-Y 10014). Although he disguised his opinions in what today would be called a "balanced presention" as a debate among three friends (his own views obviously voiced by Salviati), and though he let the Church-obedient Simplicio win the debate, the book (1632) got him into immediate trouble. On being led through the torture chambers, the 70-year old Galileo failed to pass the market test, recanted, and was sentenced by the Holy Office of the Inquisition to life-long incarceration for his heresy.