Document pBkpx5ZVxdbDpqvDMMebmkDwj

LEAD POLLUTION dour P<*.ir c*tC+ Lead is only a trace element in the earth, averaging about 12 parts per million in its surface rocks. During the course of evolution most plants growing in soil came to exclude rare heavy metals in favor of the more abundant lighter metals. Similar exclusion-enhancement mechanisms evolved in herbivores and carnivores.. Complex organisms like men, existing near the ends of food chains, are therefore relatively pure in nutritious abundant light metals compared to the earth's rocks, and are relatively free of toxic rare heavy metals because of the cumulative operation of exclusion-enhancement me char' . ; one successive stages in food chains. The natural levels of . iffer . .c -iosphere are not yet known, but observed free:'*, . vee c. ~an be used as analogues to estimat- jm /C:'' . .oundent than lead in soil, it p. terrestrial plant' _ -u- ' ;es . oti. -a*-. . - uncontaminated t uncontaminatec a Is. me - ngest.o. ... amounts larger than those - --a. to he. T.T 70 *TiC r.. Only a minor fraction o ead ;ood enters the inrov' ai blood, most of it being excreted. The IIv_ ithc . wwA www wO'TC > , C m rejects it with bile before It can er.. ;he me;.-, systemic biooc $ - - so :r.a: about 95 % of the lead taken by mouth is finally excreted in feces. ue "or lead breathed into ; ur.^s. About 40 % of suer, lead enters to- .rom.c ole--, and atmospheri c .lea* before a much more set -r.rcmincr.t. .Vo; -od absorbed into body fluic in urine after a . c.y short time. - /er, a small fractipn of the . ad is retained for .one periods In the body, mainly in the bones, where it a* s a sluggish reservoir in contcct with the blood, slowly NL I -2- occumulating or draining according to changes in the rates of lecd ingestion, in natural circumstances body concentrations of !ecc probcbiy at first Increase rapidly with age in the child and then increase more slowly in the ccuit. As an enzyme inhibitor, lead impairs cell metabolism in the body and thereby disrupts the natural functions of organs made up of those cells. In some instances of excess lecd ingestion, as in cases of gross dysfunction of the brain, or muscles, or kidneys, the cumulative impairment of the metabolisms of multituces of cells in the body is recognized as classical lead poisoning. In other instances of excessive lecd ingestion, when organ dysfunctions are less severe and symptoms less overt, the widespread impairment of cell metabolism is termed chronic lead Insult. Man cannot eat food containing even one-tenth the average concentration of lead in soil, that is, about 1 parr per million, for very long without becoming ill with classical lead poisoning. Man's food In industrialized societies is conrcminated with lead, and it contains cbout 0.2 parts per million of lead. It is likely that the uncontaminated food of man's ancestors contained much less lecd, perncps o-!y 0.01 parts per million. In prehistoric times ncturai water and air contributed amounts of lead to the body which were insignificant compered to thet in food, in natural circumstances a mar. probably consumed each cay cbout 20 microgrcms of lead in food, and on this basis he excreted about 19 microgrcms in his feces, absorbed about 1 microgram into his blood, stored a small fraction of that in his body end excreted a little less than a microgrcm in his urine. At late maturity he probably contained a total burden of about 2 milligrams of natural lead in his body. \V Man's troubles with industrial lecd began cbout 2500 S.C., near the end of the Chalcolirhic era in southwest Asia. By that time men were mining and smelting metal ores and they were well acquainted with the remerkebie utility of bronze and the value of gold. In their attempts to smelt useful bronzes from different, ebundanf NL I 00129G Ht'sh>rJcnj AJoi* -3- ores, the/ had finally discovered that small amounts of silver could be parted (cupelled) from lead metal which had been first smeited from lead ores. Previously, native silver had been much rarer than gold, end perhaps more esteemed. Trcces of silver occur commonly in galena, an abundant lecd sulfide ore, and silver production from lecd ores boomed after 2500 B.C. The mines were worked by slaves whose lives were brief and painful. About four hundred tons of lecd in oxide form were produced for every ton of silver obtained by cupellation. Lead oxide was ecsily converted to metal again by reduction with charcoal. With the advent of coincge in 650 B.C., silver became a keystone in the founding end operation of successive civilizations and lead production rose sharply. The glory of Greece and the grandeur of Rome were founded upon the iced mines of Attica end Spain. During the two millenia beginning with the cupel let: on of silver from lead ores and ending with the commencement of coinage, men found c mu in fade of uses for the huge piles of lead that began to accumulate. 3y Classic Greek rimes wafer was being collected from lecd-covered roofs, end transported through lead metal gutters to lead-lined cisterns. Stone building blocks were being held together with iron clamps imbedded in lead metGl that had been poured into holes drilled In the stone. Ships were being sheathed with lecd metal to repel wood-worms. Salves, ointments, cosmetics, and paints were being made of lecd compounds. Grcpe sugars boiled down in lead pots, were being added to wines to keep them from souring (1). Lead-tin alloys were being widely used to line the insides of bronze utensils to keep copper out of foods and liquids. V The industrial use of lead in the world reached c monumentc! plcteau during the 1st and 2nd centuries of the Christie.-, era. In Itcly, the annual industrial use at the time amounted to nearly 0.C04 ton of tecd/person/year, which clmost equaled the 0.006 ton of lead/persen/year industrially used in the United States two NX- I 001297 -4- .thousand yeors later. The Romans exhausted oil the leod'rrvnes within their empire down to several hundred meters below the wafer fcble by about A.D. 200, and world lead production declined precipitously with the fall of Rome, ana then remained at a low ebb during the following six centuries. Production cgain began to climb slowly in Europe after the 9fh century A.D., when most lead mining activities shifted from holdings in the declining Byzcntine Empire to virgin deposits operated by free entrepreneurs in centre! Europe. During tr.e 'Cfe Renaissance, world lead production finally reachec the former mighty levels ccr.leved by the Romans, after entire Indian nations became ensieved ir. the lead mines of Peru and Mexico. Beginning with the Industrial Revolution, world lecc production climbed exponentially from 100,000 fons/yr in 1750 to 3,500,000 fons/yr in 1966 (2). Today there Is evidence of intense, widespread pollution of the earth's surface by industrial lead. Studies of the accumulation of lead in ocecnic sediments show that 11,000 tons of cissolved !ead/yr were added during prehistoric times to all the oceans of the northern hemisphere by rivers draining ail land crecs there (3). This flow of dissolved lead through the earth's natural secimentcry geochemical cycle is now quite small compared to the massive 3,500,000 fons/yr flow of industrial lead through man's urban environment, and there is evidence that geo chemical balances in some portions of the eerfh have been modified as c consequence. Measurements of lead in rivers, atmosphere end oceans in the northern hemisphere suggest that the present annual input to the oceans may be about 430,000 tons of dissolved lead/yr, the forty-fold increase coming from Industrie! pollution end agricultural stimulation of soluble denudation (4). The young, upper layers of the oceans appear to contain about five times more lead than is natural, compared to underlying ancient waters, which are not yet much affected (5). The concentrations of industrial lead in the atmosphere ot IfL l 001295 remote locations in the Pacific and the Arctic are hundreds of times above nctural levels established by silicate dusts and other natural airborne constituents (6). In urban areas the excess of industrial lead in the ctmosphere is about 10,000 times above natural levels (7). Mosses collected in Sccnd:ncv?a over the last century and analyzed recently, show a ten-foia increase in 'sad content during this period near cities with the increases becoming smaller at locations remote from roads and urban areas (8). in cities of North America concentrations of ;eaa in upper Icyers of soil have risen ten-fold. Annual layers of snow in Green'.cna near the North Pole show progressive increases of industrial lecd with time above natural levels during past centuries, present concentrations being excessive by a factor of about 500. At the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, lecd concentrations in Greenland snow were already 25 times above natural levels, and they continued to rise steadily during the next two centuries ro 150 times above natural. N'ecrly all of this excess lead probably originated from iead smelteries. At about 1940 lead t concentrations in snow rose abruptly, probably because of massive new additions of f : lead aerosols from automobile exhausts, end increased by a factor of three in only two decades (9). Obvious evidences of lead pollution heve caused conflicts to arise between private industrial interests and public health interests. Chemical industries manufacturing lead alkyls and petroleum industries adding them to automotive fuels ere the most powerful defenders of the use of lead end at the same time contribute the Icrgest identifiable share of lead pollution. In 1966 these industries used 310,000 tons of the world's annual production of 3,500,000 tons of lecd to manufacture a product that was completely burned in ambient cir. Lead exhausts from this product then entered the bodies of people directly via the lungs from cir or indirectly via the intestines by fallout on food. NL I 001290 l t I Petroleum industries ccrr.e to depend more end more upon iecd cikyis during the lost 45 years because they decided in the beginning to meet cemcncs for better fuels by purchasing a costly chemicci eddirive out cf current funds on short term bases, rather than risk large investments on refining developments that hed to be amortized over long periods in uncertain future markets. The huge sums subsequently expended on lead alkyls over pest decodes characterize the additional investment the petroleum industry would hove needed to make on refining equipment, hed they chosen not to use lead additives. The risk of emortizing the cost of c complete switch from using lead edditives to actually refining better fuels is very much greater now than it was in the past. In addition, the petroleum industries heve become accustomed to meeting differences between merket demands and their rather inflexible refinery outputs end to correcting refining errors by ccjusting the emounrs of lead additives used, and they fear the risk of being required to depend upon mobility and accuracy in refinery production, beccuse no precedent exists for this more complex plant operation, and they have no large-scale previous experience to draw upon. The lead alkyl producing and consuming industries have successfully used two methods to exert pressure Ir. favor of the continued use of lecd cikyis: invoking the threat of economic penclty if lead cikyis are not used; and ccquiring data concerning the public health hazards of lecd pollution which favor their cause. In testimony before public health agencies end legislative bodies, end by information disseminated in public literature, Industry ncs refused to explain that lead additives are alternatives to complex refining methods cna that the use of lead vv additives imposes additional costs on the automobile owner through plug fouling and engine corrosion. Instead, industry maintains without equivocation that iecd alkyls are so essential that automotive traffic will grind to a hclt without them. The N'L T 001300 petroleum industry alone posesses all the information needed to properly evaluate the economic feasibility of eliminating lecd alkyls, but no legislative committee can pry it from them at present. Only naked thrects by the public to take over the automotive fuel industry, would shake thct industry's resolve in this matter. . The lead alkyl industries have enjoyed spectccuicr success in manipulating public opinion on the health hczcrcs of lecd pollution. In 1924, Aub, a distinguished specialist in lecd poisoning, end his coilecgues published a definitive work on the subject, wherein they claimed that lead did not exist naturally in humans, but was present only in those persons contaminated by industrial exposure (10). It was difficult to cetecr lecd in cny but badly contaminated persons at the time because methods then in use were rather insensitive. This was a correct approximation, but it ceme at an unfortunate time because it proved to be a perfect foil for Kehoe, c young doctor at the University of Cincinnati Medical School, who had been hired by the Ethyl Corporation to unearth data which could be used to defend their manufacturing practices. Using newer end more sensitive methods Kehoe was able to demonstrate thct lecd was present not only In typical human food and feces, but in their blood end urine as well. Other investigators confirmed his findings. By thus disproving established experts, Kehoe gained, in time honored fashion, stature ana respectful notice. In the following decades Kehoe, fincnced by the Ethyl Corporation, developed three major principles that have since become enshrined in medical texts: (1) the equality of natural, uncontarr.inafed lead states with typical, contaminated W lead states (natural lead is ubiquitous in nature and men, existing in emounts comparable to those introduced by industrial pollution, end so vcricble in concentration from one place to another that it is impossible to distinguish between natural and industrial lead contributions); (II) the threshold for damage concept (persons are NL I ooi3oi -8- absolutely healthy arid completely free of any form of lecd disease for all levels of lead exposure and ingestion up to a certain, high, knife-sharp value of lead concentration in the body, beyond which, persons ere suddenly stricken with \ classical lead poisoning - the emphatic terms in this statement originate with Kehoe); and (ill) tho equilibrium concept of the flow of lead through the body and its equality with hcrmlessness (except for unusual occupational exposures, typicci, contaminated persons excrete in urine as much lead cs they ebsorb in systemic blood, and since the body is thus able to "detoxify" any industrial pollution lecd that enters its fluids in typical circumstances, such lead does no harm) (11). There was c dearth of basic academic research on the biochemistry of lead in the period 1925-1965, and Kenoe's work filled that void. The views of the lead alkyl industries, cloaked in an aura of cccdemic and scientific respectibility, therefore remained unchallenged for forty years end came to be regarded cs the best medical information available on the hazards of lead pollution, instecc of the defensive propaganda it actually was. Influential public health organizations, such cs the U. S. Public Health Service and someC&partments of Public Health in a few populous U. S. states cnc cities, were indoctrinated in their eerliest years with the view that lead poisoning was an occupational hazard, and during the first part of the 20th century they applied themselves with success to the alleviation of clcssical lecd poisoning among industrial workers. This view, at odds with best public interest, hed its origin in Europe during the 18th and 19th centuries. Correlations between occupation and disease were developed by medical practitioners during this period Into powerful diagnostic olds. The obvious value of this practice placed the idea of occupational health hazards in a morally righteous setting, and this, in turn, acted in two unfortunate ways: it short-circuited cr.y growth of an awareness of environmental N'L I 001302 poisons; and it established the divine right of hazardous rr.cnufccture. Several centuries ego, people had been on the brink of reccrnizing lead as the first great environmental poison, but the opportunity vanished cs more and more persons came to believe that lead poisoning wes clwcys associated with the improper handling of lead and that a lack of Iced poisoning wos always associated hazardous manufacture: responsibilities conceming'the health hezerds of lead can be partitioned and separately assigned in each step from mine, to fcctory, to home. The absurdity of this belief appears when one considers (to take only one out of a multitude of examples) the fifty thcuscr.d children in the ghettos of big U. S. cities classically leac-poisoned at this moment from old paint, whose brains, kidneys, and livers are irreparably damaged (12) : where, back along the torruous route to the lead ore deposits of Mexico, does blame for this crime rest? The classic overt application to the lecd pollution problem of the idea of occupational hazard and partitioning of responsibility is the cction taken by the U. S. Public Health Service upon considering the public health hczcrcs of lead alkyls in 1925, when it specified how the environmental poison lecd tetraethyl should be manufactured without acute hazard to workers in the manufacturing plants, but made no recommendations limiting the amounts to be manufactured, end when In 1959 it increased the maximum allowable recommended concentrations of lecd alkyls in gasoline, again without piecing limits on the amounts to be mcr.ufcctured (13, 14) . The 1959 action is remarkable since it followed upon a decade of thorough public indoctrination on the subject of environmental poisons brought about by the testing of atomic weapons. Public health organizations have engaged in another practice detrimental to public interests by working jointly with lead industries in evaluating public health 001303 - 10 - hazards of lead pollution. In such dealings, public health officials profess to believe that independent of motives, true fccts concerning the hczarcs of lead pollution can be ascertained by scientific methods, end these fccts will then determine the issue, letting the chips fall where they mcy. Ar. ourstancing examoie of such hypocrisy is the study reported In 1965 by "The Working Group of Lecc ' Contamination" of the health hazards of lecc cikyis, end made Jointly by the U. S. Public Health Service, "he California Store Department of Public Health, and various manufacturers and users of lead cikyis (15). This report, which absolves lead alkyls of any pollution effects and public health hazerds, has been fondly quoted and referred to by the petroleum and lead alkyl chemical industries in their attempts to manipulate public opinion since 1965. Researcn or. the biochemistry of lecd sank into coldrurr.s In the 1920's. Most of the basic work carried out during the next several decades has been summarized and reviewed by Cantarow and Trumper (16). Interest in the field seems to have revived now that Kehoe's popular views have been disputed by geochemists studying the isotopic evolution of lead In the earth. Some isotopes of lead are formed from the radioactive decay of long-lived uranium and thorium, end certain geological occurrences of lead are useful for dating rocks and tracing their chemical history. In order to study common, ubiquitous minerals of geologic Importance, investigators must isolate and measure the Isotopic compositions of microgram emounts of lead, because the minerals contain no more than that. These minute amour.rs of lead are extremely succeptible to contamination, and elaborate precautions have been developed during the Jast several decades to exclude industrial lead contamination down to very low levels. It was this background of an acute awareness of the pervasiveness of industrial lead contamination combined with cn experience in handling small quantities of lead that helped geochemists stumble on to the discovery N L I 001304 -li that the oceans were being polluted with Industrie! lead, investigators were interested in the ocecns because they serve cs gient mixing bowls for different leads derived from all lends. Pollution effects hec not been previously recognized because ocean lecd concentrations are smell cnc difficult to meesure. As a geochemist involved in this work, ! organized whet was known about the occurrence end distribution of lead in ncturci cnc contaminated environments into a coherent study and published it In 1965 (17). To compare unknown nctural lead environments with typical, polluted ones, I formalized some enhancement-exclusion relations crr.ong the alkaline earth group of metals in soil, plants, and cnimcls, cnc then used the observed narurcl abundances of lead in soil and the above relations cs analogues to extrcpolcte lead values in natural food and human bodies. This body burden value wes checked by interpolation from the human body cbundances of metals in group 4-b end row 6 of the periodic table. It was shown by material balance considerations that most of the lead in our food, water, cir, ana bodies probably originated from leca mines. The average urban American ingests cbout 250 microgrcms of lead each day in food and water and some 20 to 50 microgrcms of lecd in the cir he breathes. He absorbs 30 to 40 microgrcms of lecd per dey Info his mein bloodstream, about half coming from the air. He hes an cverage body burden of 200 milligrams of lead, and an average blood lead concentration of 0.25 ppm. I suggested that the health hazard of this typical, contaminated state could be evaluated from its position on a scale recching from natural, uncontaminated states to classically lead-poisoned states. This might be done on the besis of blood lead concentrations, since they rise with increcsed ieca exposure and ingestion. On the basis of estimated nctural lead body burdens, it was assumed thet natural blood lead concentrations should be less then 0.01 ppm. Classical lecd poisoning Is N L 1001305 ft - 12 - `generally associated with blood lead concentrations of 0.8 ppm. Since the average American has 0.25 ppm of lead in his blood, ! proposed that the cvercge American was suffering severe chronic lead insult, probably with adverse effect. Natural lecd states were defined In the report end it was shown how Kehoe had attached a nctural mecning to his term "normal", end then used this term to describe his analyzed subjects and their food, conveying the impression that they were natural end unpolluted when in feet they were typical end polluted with lead. It was shown how Kehoe had been ccmouflcging incustric! lecd pollution behind a fast shuffle of posed uncertainties: the extreme range of lead concentrations in soil (neglecting to mention that the high urben vciues originated from leaded paints and gasolines); the multitudinous nctural lecd contributions to the atmosphere such as soil dust end meteorite smoke (neglecting to rr.ention that the former contributes less than one thousandth end the letter less then one billionth of the lead in urban air); end ctmospheric lecd contributions from such things cs coal, smoke (neglecting to mention the observed one-to-one correlations between automobile traffic, carbon monoxide, and atmospheric lecd, end the fact thet c coal-smoke tracer, vanadium, is too low by C TCCTCr of more than a hundred to indicate significant contributions of lead by coal-smoke). Kehoe's famous proof of lead ecui librium in the body,obtained by measuring lead in the food and excreta of several men,was shown to be erroneous ' because he had neglected to measure lecd inputs to the body from the lungs, and had assumed that all such lead was excreted without storage in the body (IS) . A simple case of assuming'.he conclusion - a rather serious mistake on Kehoe's part, since some of his subjects apparently smoked end hed very large lecc inputs from the lungs. His assumed conclusions left him in a position unable to explain how his subjects were pertinent to the public at large if they did not have typical body burdens N'L I 001306 - 13 - of 200 to 400 milligrams of lead cr.d how they esquired them if they did. It was pointed out that there was no biochemical knowledge affirming the hcrmlessness of industrial lead circulating through the bodies of polluted people. Ey merely observing kidney excretion, Xehoe did net prove non-interference with cell metabolism, even if storage did not occur, which, of course It does. It was shown that Kenoe's concept for a threshold of damage was derived from circular reasoning, and that success in reducing the incidence of classical lead poisoning among industrial workers did not constitute proof thet the only form of lead poisoning was that defined by practitioners of occupational medicine (17, 18). The U. S. Public Health Service and the California State Department of Public Health were criticized ir. my report for refusing to recognize, in their cooperative study with the lead industries, thet lecd alkyls had elevated the body burdens of lead ana the concentrations of lead in the blood of urben Ar.ericans,and that existing levels of lead contamination in people were ccuses for alarm - not complacency. Public Health officials operate with "facts", just cs lewyers end engineers do, and not being scientists, fcil (or refuse) to understand that there are no "facts" as they envision them in the realm of science, end that science does not operate to reveal objective truths which will solve human problems dispassionately. 'This point is admirably illustrated by a sequence of events related to the report issued by "The Working Group on Lead Contamination" mentioned cbove. Members of the California State Department of Public Health carried out investigations of lead concentrations in the blood of people and in the atmosphere of cities end joined the lead industries in not recognizing that a correlation existed (their 1965 report). In 1966 ! prevailed upon the Governor of California to direct the Department 001307 14 of Public Health to re-evaluate their position, end they issued such a resort in 1967 (19), in which they reversed their earlier position on the seme date and explicitly recognized that lead alkyls are the source of lead in urban atmospheres, and that lead concentrations in the blood of people living in cities are elevated as a consequence. The principal authors of the California report then published their views in a scientific journal In 1967 (20), which resulted in a cispure and polemic with Kehoe (21), their former cily and chief co-cuthor of the 1965 report. The petroleum and lead alkyl industries, in referring to the 1965 joint report, take care to neglect to mention these interesting addenda. Public health agencies show c cismc! lack of leadership, vision, end resolve in defending the public's health, as might be expected, since they are staffed with compromisers, the most successful being those who have displeased the fewest in power. The U. S. Public Health Service did not rush to consider the hazards of lead alkyls, cs one might infer from propaganda commoniy cvcilabie. Lead tetraethyl was manufactured and marketed without a twitch from that cgency until poisoning scandals associated with its manufacture brought legislative pressure to bear on the service, and it was forced to act (lead alkyls are extremely poisonous in pure form, and the effects on the brains of acutely poisoned subjects induces bizarre behavior that is disconcerting to observe). Public health agencies are potently unable to conduct evci.uctive investigations that turn out to be truly defensive of public health, in 1939 the U. S. Public Health Service was involved in an extensive investigation of public health hazards originating from lecd ersenate insecticides on apples (22). It concluded that there was no harm to the public at a level of 7 ppm N"L I 001305 lead in apples (this maximum permissible level is still a regulation today). Kenoe, during this same time, was obtaining data on lead ingestion snowing that 1 .5 pom in food should give rise to classical lecd poisoning in a matter of months. The conclusions of the Public Health Service were dictated by matters of economy then, and it is likely that they always will be. My report was printed in a journal that belonged to the forces of occupational medicine end lecd industries. This stirred up a hornets' nest of opposition. The furor acted to rally forces opposed to lead poilution^however, and a vigorous, well publicized, controversy ensued both in the U. S. and in Europe (23-25). The reverberations from that controversy and the renewed interest in lead biochemistry which it stimulated was so influential it brought to a close cn era, lasting forty years, of the complete domination by industry of the accepted medical views on lead pollution. Much anguish and bitterness accompanied this transformation. Kehoe's associates in occupational medicine heve been outraged by the indignities imposed on a prominent colleague who contributed so much to their field. They recognize that the privileged position of occupational medicine in ministering to public health, which they long enjoyed, is now being seriously challenged, and they fear and resent this. No one wants or hopes for such personal tragedy, but It should be pointed out that tragedy has not been one-sided. The editor of the journal in .which my paper appeared was severely criticized for allowing it to be published. Friendships among medical practitioners end resecrchers in public health agencies and in industry became strained. I have been insulted in numerous publications and on an international scale. The American Petroleum Institute cancelled their support of my research. 1 am an almost pure end-member of the species Scienrist, and yet am N'L I ooi3oo - 16 - regarded as a crusader. Now that is the ur.kir.desf cut of cll, because, cs a consequence, my contributions to constructive cnc crecfive aspects of the biogeochemisfry of metals cnc problems of lead pollution ere ignored, end my name is confined to degrading contexts in sensctior.al baffles. Will recent advances in knowledge about !ecc pollution help in its eventual elimination? Hardly. In c recent conference on man's chemical invasion of the oceans, if was mede clecr that if wes not knowledge that governed action on pollution problems, but emotion. Knowledge of lead pollution does lend perspective to man's broader problems, however. The development over the last four and a half thousand years of both iecc technology cnc its associated environmental pollution, from its benign origin to its ccrcsirophic dislocation of ourselves from our animal herifege, is not singuicr. Insfecc, it is much like a small, comprehensible, working model of our whole world of difficulties - a world that seems too big and complex to understand - for scientists, at least. We have developed technology in our world to an unbecrcble frenzy, and we huddle, overcrowded and terrorized, in national jails, hoping :hct someone will find a panacea that will banish this unpieesantness. Well, we ccn see from the example of lead pollution that no help can be expected from industry, our "servant" which provides the paraphernalia we cherish. Nor from the public cgencies that are supposed to guard our health and keep our food, water, end air wholesome and free of poisons. What about those saviors of mankind, the scientists? People want to be deceived by the new whitewash thet has been poured over scientists beccuse thV\ey are afraid end seeking help, but' the centuries old evaluation is still true: scientists are cold-hearted, murderous, egomaniacs. We would all sell our mothers to finance our experiments, and why not, since most of us have had our wives and children in spiritual hock for years, and-that's dedication, fiL, I 001310 .. t \1 - 17 - a noble virtue. Scientists have tiny intellects. Consequently, our philosophy is of the kindergarten variety. We resolve everything our senses perceive into the simplest of abstract forms. The philosophy of science is c name for the activities of some philosophers whose subject is science. It is not meant thct that term should dignify the childish faiths of scientists. V/e ere congenitally amoral. Human relations are too complicated cnc vast to be squeezed into our small minds; therefore scientists subjected to the hazards of people are unable to understand them, and fear them. This mede It easy for us to band together and devise a wey to roast alive several hundred thousand Japanese civilicns twenty yeers ego. Any normal human, contemplating his part In that hideous crime, would go mad. out we manage to survive, sometimes being mistaken for crusaders, even. Scientists are problem solvers. Not worthwhile .Homo sapiens sepiens problem solvers, like creative men in the humanities, but dinky little problem solvers, barely on a hominian level. We are completely hooked, like any common junkie, on * the mental orgasms we get from solving our cbstract problems. But our activity is revered by others as basic research, end no one, except maybe cur wives, wants us to go to Lexington and get the monkey off . Does this mean that scientists are not specially fitted to solve our lead pollution and other problems? Yes. It is not just that scientists might suggest wrong solutions, for there are no solutions to human problems, end cny recourse that is taken will eventually prove wrong, but scientists ere congenitally inccpcble of understanding what to do about human problems. They are not wise. They can only abstract things into inhuman form and discourse on arid problems of relationships among these abstractions. Consider this essay. Its subject, and its author. It's a typical scientific product, end it illuminates the unbridgeable gulf that separates scientists from what they may even yearn to do socially. N'L J 001311 - IS - The barrenness of the scientific intellect does not result from :he mere fact that the scientist is a problem-solver, rather, it derives from the nature of his problems and the manner of their solutions. Historicns, for excmple, are also problem-solvers, but they are differently placed on the intellectual cole. Lot both rhe scientist and the historian be presented with, say, a table of data on silver production, wherein cnnuci silver productions of a nation are cited to twelve significant figures. Their reactions will be chcrccterlsticcily different. They are both cware from a standpoint of simple scientific meaning, that the quoted producfions.are probably not cccurcte to more than the first two significant figures our of the twelve. The scienrist, after closing his lew which had dropped open in cstonishment, will round off the icst ten of the twelve figures. The historian is not confined to such a miniscule cctivity beccuse his larger awareness of human relationships will drive him to seek non-scier.tific mecnings in those last ten nor-zero figures. Unlike the scientist, the historian somehow understands beforehcnc that government burecucrcts do not issue tables of figures for scientific purposes. The scientist believes he understands the meaning of the statement, "The cccurccy of my conclusions, which involve annuel productions of silver, depends upon the accuracy of the recorded silver production data" . But from the historian's vantage this may sound like, "The accuracy of my determinations of the boiling point of water depends upon the cccuracy of the water" (26). Consciously or subconsciously, most scientists are aware of their intellectual deformity, and they try to deaden this awful perception with the narcotic of scientific research. ^ The problem of lead pollution - ail of our troubles for thcr matter - did not originate with our generation. Our troubles evolved, and they wili be dissipated by further evolution into even greater troubles. -Although this may seem N'L I 00131 - 19 - / / t like we are.eternally acmned for being hurr.cn. It really means that while we live as a wholesome part of the universe, our understanding of what we are lags behind what we'do, so most of us live In ignorcnt terror. Three million years ego the biosphere cchievea a recognizcble means of engaging in overt technology with the evolution of problem-solving hunters. It resided in the power of abstraction by those early Pleistocene man-like apes, and depended simply upon their cbility to pause and reflect after sensory stimulation and before responsive cction. Possessing the required body structure, they could manipulate their environment ct will of their cbsrract intellect. The origin of any technology ccnnot be described in terms of a specific event at c given time, however. It lies buried within the evolving biosphere as c driving force, a spectacular example being the wey in which living organisms crept out of the secs, took over the lands, end modified basic geologic mechanisms operating at the surface of the earth. Plants did not just move large masses of hydrocarbons out of the seas onto barren wcstelcnds to transform them into gardens inhabited by animals. They changed the manner In which the forces of weather end streams shifted huge messes of land. They cbruptly slowed down the rapid erosion of mountains and for the first time permitted broed elevations of land masses to occur. Because they created soils and greatly reduced the rapid dumping of coarse debris into basins adiccent to mountcin chains, they promoted for the first time the long range transport of gigantic masses of fine clays to the open basins of the oceans. This not only greatly altered the character of the oceans and their sediments, but it aTso modified the role which isostasy had previously exercised in volcanism and mountain building, and so modified the evolution of continents and ocean basins. We cannot look with selective horror upon man's destruction of forests and arable lands, h's extinction of animals, his rape of mineral deposits. I 001313 - 20 - end his pollution of the air, seas,, end lend, for it is an inherent chcrccreristic of the evolving biosphere to try to feed upon end modify the surfcce of the earth. continued process. He is the precursor of the evolution of the biosphere on an entirely new level. !n striving toward now, different forms of technology, the biosphere is now evolving on a non-morphologiccl level cmid rcmificctions end on a morphological level, but we have not yet learned to appreciate the new evolution of anguish on the emotional level. Capping the fossil record in geologic strata are new cdcitlons: increasing concentrations of industrial lead. They do not simply merk new aspects of physical evolution. They signify the probing of life clong fer more wonderful and terrible avenues of emotion than have ever existed before. The prophets of the world's great religions scid it in different, but true, words, in twentieth century terms, technology is the devil within us, the temotetion to evi we must try to master. At least the lead pollution problem may be solved. How? By Oregon wheat farmers and California corn growers. The whect farmers want the government to build huge alcohol stills, buy the carbohydrate portion of their wheat at cost, and convert it to alcohol, a substitute ent;-knock for lead alkyls at no extra cost to the motorist. This would pay for the whect and the stills and the government would come out even. The farmers would keep the protein portion of the wheat and make a profit from it as feed concentrate. The cutomcbiles would run fine. Since lead alkyls are not mede in Oregon end they are poison, while wheat is grown in Oregon and burned cicohol Is hcrmless, there is every reason for the I 001314 -21 state legislature in Oregon to ban lead end boost alcohol. Oregon con neatly use all it can make. Now, California is right next to Oregon, end is the leading farm state in the nation with a powerful block of termers. Even more alcohol can be obtained from corn than from wheat. Exposed to Oregon's example, California may succumb, end if California goes - look out Ethyl Corporationl God bless the Oregon wheat farmers. If they ccn.ao it, what they do may turn out to be wrong eventually, but it will have been right ct the time. N'L I 001313 References end Notes S. C. Gilfiilan, Jour, of Occusarior.cl Medicine 7, 53 (1965). C. Patterson. Data on the history of !ecd production are taken from cn unpublished manuscript in preparation by the author. (1969) T. J. Chow and C. Patterson, Geochim. et Cosmochim. Acta 26, 263 (1962). M. Tatsumoto and C. Patterson, "Concentration of Common Lead in Sea Water", in Earth Science end Msteoritlcs, Geiss and Goldberg, Eds. (North-Holland, Amsterdam, 1963). T. J. Chow end C. Patterson, Earth end Plan. Sci. Let. 1_, 397 (1966). T. J. Chow, J. L. Earl and C. F. Bennett, "Lecd Aerosols in Marine Atmosphere", Environmental Science end Technology (in press, 1969). J. Cholak., L. J. Schafer end T. D. Sterling, Jour, of the Air Poll. Contr. Assoc. U_, 281 (1961). o A. Ruhiingand G. Tyler, Sotaniska Notiser 121, p. 21 (1968). M. Murozumi, T. J. Chow end C. Patterson, "Chemical Concentrations of Pollutant Lead Aerosols, Terrestrial Dusts, and Sea Salts in Greenland and Antarctic SnoW'-Strata", Geochim. et Cosmochim. Acta (in press, 1969). NL I 00131G -23- 10. J. C. Aub, L. T.. Fairhall, A. S. Minot and P. Reznikoff, Medicine 4, 1 (1925). 11. R. A. Kehoe, Jour, of the Royal Ir.sf. of Publ. Health 24, p. 81-97, 101-120, 129-143, 177-203 (1961). 12. D. Elwyn, Scientist and Citizen 10, 53 (1963). 13. U. S. Public Health Service, "Proceedings of a Conference to Determine Whether or not there is a Public Health Question in the Manufacture, Distribution, or Use of Tetraethyl Lead Gcsoiine", Public Health Service Bulletin 153 (1925). 14. U. S. Public Health Service, "Public Health Aspects of increasing Tetraethyl Lead Content in Motor Fuel", Public Heclth Service Publication 712 (1959). 15. Working Group on Lead Contamination, "Survey of Lead in the Atmosphere of Three Urban Communities", Public Heclth Service Publication 999-AP-12 (1965). 16. A. Cantcrow and M. Trumper,- Lead Poisoning (Williams &. Wilkins, Baltimore, 1944). 17. - C. Patterson, Archives of Environmental Health 11, 344 (1965). 18. C. Patterson, Archives of Environmental Heclth i_2, 136 (1966). 19. State of California Department of Public Health, "Lead in the Environment and its Effects on Humans", Stcte of California Department of Public Health (1967). KL I 001317