Office of Science and Technology Policy
Agency overview
Formed	May 11, 1976
Preceding agency	Office of Science and Technology
Headquarters	725 17th Street, Washington, D.C.
Employees	45
Agency executive	Dr. John Holdren, Director
Parent agency	Executive Office of the President
Website
Office of Science and Technology Policy

The Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) is an office in the Executive Office of the President (EOP), established by United States Congress on May 11, 1976, with a broad mandate to advise the President on the effects of science and technology on domestic and international affairs.

The director of this office is colloquially known as the President's Science Advisor. Dr. John Holdren, Director, nominated in December 2008, serves as Science Advisor to President Barack Obama^[1]. Dr. John Holdren also co-chairs the President's Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) and supports the President's National Science and Technology Council (NSTC)^[2][3].

History[link]

The OSTP grew out of the Office of Science and Technology which was formed in 1961 by President John F. Kennedy. The office was created to provide advice and recommendation in response to the growing importance of space exploration and the accelerating Space Race that was taking place with the USSR.

The United States Congress established the OSTP in 1976 with a broad mandate to advise the President and others within the Executive Office of the President on the effects of science and technology on domestic and international affairs. The 1976 Act also authorizes OSTP to lead inter-agency efforts to develop and to implement sound science and technology policies and budgets and to work with the private sector, state and local governments, the science and higher education communities, and other nations toward this end.

Meetings with China in 2011[link]

In October 2011 a report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) concluded that meetings hosted in May by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy with the Chinese government broke federal law that had been enacted in April 2011. Although not denying that the section in question of the Department of Defense appropriations bill had been broken the White House Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) instead asserted that this law did not "constitutionally apply to the OSTP's diplomatic activities."^[4] Justice Department has declared that the White House has the constitutional power to override a Congress statute forbidding members of the White House Office such as the OSTP from engaging in diplomatic activities with foreign officials.^[5]

Mission[link]

The OSTP's mission is set out in the National Science and Technology Policy, Organization, and Priorities Act of 1976 (Pub. L. 94-282). The act calls for the OSTP to serve as a source of scientific and technological analysis and judgment for the President with respect to major policies, plans, and programs of the federal government.

It further authorizes the OSTP to:

• Advise the President and others within the Executive Office of the President on the impacts of science and technology on domestic and international affairs;
• Lead an inter-agency effort to develop and implement sound science and technology policies and budgets;
• Work with the private sector to ensure Federal investments in science and technology contribute to economic prosperity, environmental quality, and national security;
• Build strong partnerships among Federal, State, and local governments, other countries, and the scientific community;
• Evaluate the scale, quality, and effectiveness of the Federal effort in science and technology.^[6]

The OSTP handles a broad range of scientific and technological issues within the Executive Office of the President. It participates in a multitude of White House Policy Coordinating Committees (PCC) that are tasked with developing policies for the federal government and are populated by senior officials from cabinet and independent agencies. The OSTP has approximately 45 staff members, most of whom are experienced scientists functioning as assistant directors or policy analysts.

Key staff[link]

• Assistant to the President for Science and Technology and Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy: John Holdren
  • Associate Director for Science: Carl Wieman (nominee)^[7]
  • Associate Director for Technology and Chief Technology Officer of the United States: Todd Park (nominee)
  • Associate Director for National Security & International Affairs: Philip E. Coyle III^[8] (On Thursday, March 29, 2012, President Barack Obama nominated Dr. Patricia K. Falcone to succeed him)^[9]
  • Associate Director for Energy & Environment: Shere Abbott^[10]

Past Science Advisors[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website

v t e Executive Office of the President of the United States Council of Economic Advisers Council on Environmental Quality National Security Council Homeland Security Council Office of Administration Office of Management and Budget Office of National Drug Control Policy Office of Science and Technology Policy Office of the United States Trade Representative President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board President's Intelligence Advisory Board White House Office Office of the Vice President

The study of technology policy or engineering and policy is taught at multiple universities.

Classic political science teaches technology as a black box. Similarly economics treats technology as a residual to explain otherwise inexplicable growth. The creation of the U.S. Office of Science and Technology Policy addressed the fact that policy can not treat all technologies as identical based on their social or economic variables. Technology policy is distinct from science studies but both claim Thomas Samuel Kuhn as a founder, while technology policy recognizes the importance of Vannevar Bush. Technology policy approaches science as the pursuit of verifiable or falsifiable hypotheses, while science studies has a post-modern view whereby science is belief-based and all truths are relative. Technology policy is rarely post-modern. Its goal is the improvement of policy and organizations based on an understanding of the underlying scientific and technological constraints and potential. For example, some clean coal technologies via carbon sequestration and the allocation of electromagnetic spectrum by auction are ideas that emerged from technology policy schools.

External links[link]

• Technology Policy Group in LinkedIn

Engineering and policy schools[link]

• Engineering and Public Policy at Carnegie-Mellon University
• Engineering and Systems Division at MIT
• Department of Engineering-Economic Systems and Operations Research at Stanford
• Centre for Innovation Policy and Technology Research at IST-Lisbon in Portugal
• Technology, Policy and Management at TU Delft in the Netherlands
• MPhil in Technology Policy at University of Cambridge, Judge Business School, United Kingdom

Information technology and policy schools[link]

• School of Information at University of California at Berkeley
• Informatics at Indiana University at Bloomington
• School of Information at University of Michigan
• Penn State College of Information Sciences and Technology
• School of Public Policy at Georgia Tech's Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts

Science and technology policy schools[link]

• SPRU-Science and Technology Policy Research

The Office of Science and Technology (OST), later (briefly) named the Office of Science and Innovation, was a non-ministerial government department of the British government between 1992 and 2007.

The office was responsible for co-ordination of the Government's science and technology related activities and policies, and the distribution of some £2.4 billion amongst the seven UK Research Councils (also see Research Councils UK). It was headed by the Chief Scientific Adviser; initially this was Sir William Stewart, then Sir Robert (later Lord) May, and finally Sir David King.

The OST was originally formed in 1992 as a merger of the Office of the Chief Scientific Adviser with the Science Branch of the Department of Education and Science (as it then was). Although originally run under the Cabinet Office, it was moved between Departments in 1995 to operate under the Department of Trade and Industry. In early 2006, the office was renamed to the "Office of Science and Innovation", and was subsequently absorbed into the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills in the Summer of 2007 when the Department for Education and Skills was split in two.

The Government Chief Scientific Advisor now heads the Government Office for Science.

External links[link]

• Office of Science and Innovation
• Research Councils UK

This article related to government in the United Kingdom or its constituent countries is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Neal Francis Lane (born August 22, 1938), is a U.S. physicist. He served as provost of Rice University and served as Science Advisor to the President of the United States. He has written extensively on theoretical physics and technology policy for the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy.

Career[link]

Lane was born in Oklahoma City and earned his undergraduate degree and PhD from the University of Oklahoma. He had a distinguished rise through academic circles, earning many fellowships and awards. He became an assistant professor of physics at Rice University in 1966 and the became a full professor in 1972. In 1979, while on leave, he worked at the National Science Foundation as Director of the Division of Physics. He officially left Rice in 1984 to serve as Chancellor of the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs. He returned to Rice in 1986 to become provost of the university, a position he held for six years.

Lane left Rice again to become director of National Science Foundation in October 1993, a post he held until August 1998. During this time he was also an ex officio member of the National Science Board. He was then appointed Assistant to the President for Science and Technology and Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy under President Bill Clinton from August 1998 to January 2001.

When President Clinton's term ended, Lane returned once again to Rice, where he now lectures in physics and public policy.

Neal also serves as a Senior Fellow at the Baker Institute alongside Dr. Kirstin Matthews with a focus on science and technology policy.

In 2009 Lane was awarded National Academy of Sciences' most prestigious award, the Public Welfare Medal.^[1]

He currently serves on the board of advisors of Scientists and Engineers for America, an organization focused on promoting sound science in American government. He is also a trustee of the education non-profit Reasoning Mind.

Neal Lane is married and has two children.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Biography from Rice University
• Guide to the Neal Lane papers, 1964-2002 from the Woodson Research Center at Rice University

Stanton T. Friedman
Stanton Friedman in 2010
Born	(1934-07-29) July 29, 1934 (age 77) Elizabeth, New Jersey
Occupation	Ufologist, former Physicist

Stanton Terry Friedman (born July 29, 1934) is a professional Ufologist, currently residing in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada. He is the original civilian investigator of the Roswell incident. He studied physics at the University of Chicago and worked as a nuclear physicist on research and development projects for several large companies. He is a dual citizen of Canada and the U.S.

Biography[link]

Career in nuclear physics[link]

Friedman graduated from Linden High School and the University of Chicago, earning a Bachelor of Science in 1955 and a Master of Science degree in nuclear physics in 1956.^[1]

Friedman was employed for 14 years as a nuclear physicist for such companies as General Electric, General Motors, Westinghouse, TRW Systems, Aerojet General Nucleonics, and McDonnell Douglas, where he worked on advanced, classified programs on nuclear aircraft, fission and fusion rockets, and compact nuclear power plants for space applications.^[2] Since the 1980s, he has done related consultant work in the radon-detection industry. Friedman's professional affiliations have included the American Nuclear Society, the American Physical Society, the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and AFTRA.^{[3] [4]}

UFO investigations and advocacy[link]

In 1970 Friedman left full-time employment as a physicist to pursue the scientific investigation of UFOs. Since then, he has given lectures at more than 600 colleges and to more than 100 professional groups in 50 states, nine provinces, and 16 foreign countries.^[2] Additionally, he has worked as a consultant on the topic. He has published more than 80 UFO-related papers and has appeared on many radio and television programs.^[2] He has also provided written testimony to Congressional hearings and appeared twice at the United Nations.^{[2] [5]}

Friedman has consistently favoured use of the term "flying saucer" in his work, saying "Flying saucers are, by definition, unidentified flying objects, but very few unidentified flying objects are flying saucers. I am interested in the latter, not the former."^[2] Friedman used to refer to himself as "The Flying Saucer Physicist", because of his degrees in nuclear physics and work on nuclear projects.^[6]

Friedman's positions regarding UFO phenomena[link]

Friedman was the first civilian to document the site of the Roswell UFO incident,^[7] and supports the hypothesis that it was a genuine crash of an extraterrestrial spacecraft.^[8] In 1968 Friedman told a committee of the U.S. House of Representatives that the evidence suggests that Earth is being visited by intelligently controlled extraterrestrial vehicles.^[9] Friedman also stated he believed that UFO sightings were consistent with magnetohydrodynamic propulsion.

In 1996, after researching and fact-checking the Majestic 12 documents, Friedman said that there was no substantive grounds for dismissing their authenticity.^[10]

In 2004, on George Noory's "Coast to Coast" radio show, Friedman debated Seth Shostak, the SETI Institute's Senior Astronomer. Like Friedman, Shostak also believes in the existence of intelligent life other than humans; however, unlike Friedman, he doesn't believe such life is currently on Earth or is related to UFO sightings.^[11]

Friedman has hypothesized that UFOs may originate from relatively nearby sun-like stars. In a book published in 2008, he said:

...[there] are about 1,000 stars within our local galactic neighborhood, meaning the region within 54 light years of Earth ... According to an excellent study done by Terence Dickinson ... 46 of those stars are very similar to our sun .... the star pair Zeta 1 and Zeta 2 Reticuli, in the southern sky constellation Reticulum (the Net) only 39 light years away from us, are sun-like stars about 35 times closer to each other than the sun is to our nearest stellar neighbor. They are also about 1 billion years older than the sun. A civilization that had a billion-year head start on us will certainly know things that we can't even dream of. Our own limited science has shown that nuclear fusion rockets can provide thrust far in excess of that provided by chemical rocket, and so interestellar travel may be as easy for other civilizations now as nonstop flight across the ocean is for us today".^[2] (p.217)

A piece of evidence that he often cites with respect to this hypothesis is the 1964 star-map drawn by alleged alien abductee Betty Hill during a hypnosis session, which she said was shown to her during her abduction. Astronomer Marjorie Fish constructed a 3-dimensional map of nearby sun-like stars and claimed a good match from the perspective of Zeta Reticuli, about 39 light years distant. The fit of the Hill/Fish star maps was hotly debated in the December 1974 edition of Astronomy Magazine,^[12][13] with Friedman and others defending the statistical validity of the match.

Major conclusions and arguments[link]

Friedman states that he has reached major conclusions on the basis of his research dating back to the late 1950s. These can be summarised as follows:^[2]

• There is overwhelming evidence that planet Earth is being visited by intelligently controlled extraterrestrial spacecraft; that is, "some" UFOs are ET spacecraft, though most are not.
• A few people in the U.S. and other governments have known the above since at least 1947 and employ a "need-to-know" policy regarding this knowledge; that is, the knowledge is highly classified largely as sensitive military information.

In addition, Friedman maintains that although arguments against these conclusions sound plausible, "when one examines them, they collapse, because of an absence of evidence to support them, and the presence of evidence that contradicts them". ^[2] (p. 30) Friedman argues that reproducibility is largely irrelevant to the study of UFOs, essentially because by definition, scientists do not control variables if UFO phenomena involve intelligent extraterrestrial control; that is, in this case, the study of UFOs does not involve experiment and experimental methods. This position can be criticized on the basis that experiments can be conducted on materials or technology that are hypothesized to have an extraterrestrial origin. Although Friedman maintains that such materials have on at least one occasion been obtained, as stated above, he maintains these are highly classified and not available for conventional or mainstream scientific study.^{[citation needed]}

Friedman has characterized the kinds of evidence, scientific and otherwise, that he considers to be relevant, which include credible testimony, analyses of documents, video and physical trace evidence, and particularly multiple sources of mutually corroborating evidence of one or more kind. Regarding testimony, he states that "we must remember that the reason most sightings can be determined to be relatively conventional phenomena, often seen under unusual circumstances, is that most people are relatively good observers. The problem comes with the interpretation of what was observed ... it would be irrational to say that people are good observers when their input allows us to identify the object being observed, and yet poor observers if we can't identify the UFO as something conventional" ^[2](pp. 32–33). In response to criticism on the basis of psychological or other grounds, he refers to the quality evaluation reported in the Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14 and other evidence, such as that contained in the COMETA report.^{[citation needed]}

SETI[link]

Friedman has stated strong views against SETI research. Friedman contests the implicit premise of SETI that there has been no extraterrestrial visitation of the planet, because SETI is seeking only signals, not extraterrestrial intelligence or beings. He maintains that the prominence and widespread public claims of those involved with SETI has tended to prevent serious research, including research by journalists, of UFOs.^[2](p. 129)

Friedman has criticized Carl Sagan, a proponent of SETI, for ignoring empirical evidence, such as "600-plus UNKNOWNS" of Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14. Friedman argued that this empirical data directly contradicts Sagan's claim in Other Worlds that the "reliable cases are uninteresting and the interesting cases are unreliable". Specifically, Friedman refers to a table in Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14 that he says "shows that the better the quality of the sighting, the more likely it was to be an 'unknown', and the less likely it was to be listed as 'insufficient information'" ^[2](p. 42).

Public and scientific opinion[link]

Friedman says of the response to his talks, "I know that most people are unfamiliar with the several large-scale scientific studies ... because I ask, after I show a slide and ask about each one, "how many here have read this?" Typically it is only 1 or 2 percent." He says that a talk he gave to Canadian journalists in Saint John, New Brunswick caused the attitudes of the journalists to change because "Attendees had had no idea there was so much solid information, as opposed to the tabloid nonsense they thought was the primary source of UFO data." ^[2] (p. 202)

Friedman has argued that the majority of people believe UFOs exist and at least some groups of scientists do as well. Friedman (2008) refers to the following data in support of his position:^[10]

• Gallup Polls between 1966 and 1987 asked respondents the question: "Are UFOs something real, or just people's imagination?". Of those who took a position one way or the other, 61%, 64%, 68% and 60% took the position they are real in 1966, 1977, 1978 and 1987 respectively.
• With respect to scientists, a poll was taken by Industrial Research and Development in 1971 and 1979. Of the respondents who took a position, 64% and 69% stated they believed UFOs either probably or definitely exist. Of this subgroup, 32% and 44% considered their origin to be Outer Space in 1971 and 1979 respectively. Of the rest of this subgroup, approximately half believed them to be Natural Phenomena and half were "Undecided".
• Dr. Peter Sturrock also polled the membership of the American Astronomical Society and found that "the greater the amount of time one spent on reading UFO-related material, the more likely one is to accept their reality" ^[2](p. 210).

Criticisms and controversies[link]

Friedman is outspoken in his articulation of positions and in his criticism of UFO debunkers, often stating he is not an "apologist ufologist". His positions are regarded as controversial in mainstream science and media, but Friedman claims to have received little opposition at his many lectures, most of which have been at colleges and universities, many to engineering societies and other groups of physicists.^[2] He has had a number of debates in the mainstream media, including one with UFO skeptic Michael Shermer on CNN.

Friedman has been criticized both by skeptics and other Roswell researchers for taking the position that there are no substantive grounds for dismissing the authenticity of some Majestic 12 documents. Friedman himself was the first to provide evidence that some of the documents are clearly hoaxes. For example, he showed that a supposed memo from Admiral Hillenkoetter to President Truman, dated February 17, 1948, was actually the emulation of a letter from Marshall to Roosevelt that featured in the book The American MAGIC. Friedman has researched the MJ-12 documents since first becoming aware of them from Wiliam Moore and Jaime Shandera in 1984.^[2][14] He addressed criticisms of the original documents in both sources. As an example, Philip J. Klass claimed lexicographic inconsistencies based on the use of Pica typeface in the Cutler-Twining memo and offered $100, in a challenge to Friedman, for each legitimate example of the use of the same style and size Pica type as used in the memo. Friedman provided 14 examples and was paid $1000 by Klass.^[2]

Media[link]

Books[link]

• Flying Saucers & Science, June 2008, 320P.
• Captured! The Betty and Barney Hill UFO Experience. Co-author Kathleen Marden. Career Press / New Page Books, 2007. ISBN 978-1-56414-971-8, ISBN 978-1-56924-741-9
• Top Secret/MAJIC, Marlowe + Co. 2005. ISBN 1-56924-342-5. 296 pages, ISBN 978-1-56924-342-8
• Crash at Corona: The Definitive Story of The Roswell Incident. Co-author Don Berliner, 1997. ISBN 978-1-931044-89-9
• Science was Wrong: Startling truths about cures, theories, and inventions "They" declared impossible. Co-author Kathleen Marden. Pompton Plains, NJ: New Page Books. 2010.

Videos, VHS, DVD[link]

• Safespace - Fastwalkers - Winter 2006
• UFOs: Stanton Friedman's revelation - an interview with Stanton Friedman
• 2 DVDs - FLYING SAUCERS ARE REAL DVD (NOT VHS) Vol. 1, 1993 Video 84 min. (Filmed at Kennedy Space Center) and FLYING SAUCERS ARE REAL Vol. 2, 1996 75 min for a Total Length of 168 minutes.
• 2006 151 Minute 2 disc DVD set "UFO SECRET MJ-12: Do You Believe in Majic?". "Includes Canadian TV Broadcast "Do You Believe in Majic?" (Mostly Stan Friedman vs. Karl Pflock + Stan Friedman's Lecture at Aztec 2003 about Roswell and MJ-12++ outtakes from DYBM.
• RECOLLECTIONS OF ROSWELL DVD 105 min. Featuring testimony from 27 Roswell witnesses.
• Debate "Are Flying Saucers Real?" VHS 2 Hrs. 2 Hour formal Debate STF vs. USAF Pilot Major James Magaha. Middle Tenn. State Univ. January 2004. Includes Q & A.
• UFOs Are Real (1979) VHS - 92 min.

CDs[link]

• UFOs: The Real Story (1996) ^[15]
• New CD of the Ramey Memo Scans and Enhancements ^[15]

References[link]

External links[link]

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• Stanton T. Friedman - Homepage
• Stanton T. Friedman - Statement^{[dead link]}
• Interview with Stanton Friedman

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