if a bridge collapsed
in the Soviet Union,
Stalin would execute the engineers.
This had a remarkably bracing effect upon those currently so
employed,
but (alas) impinged negatively on future recruitment.
~
And, now, in our own day,
in a land far away, called Italia,
purporting to pertain to the civilized world,
we have an echo of this:
A
court found six scientists and an official guilty of manslaughter for failing
to properly warn residents in the central Italy city of L’Aquila about the risk
of an impending earthquake that killed more than 300 people in 2009.
The three-judge court handed down a prison sentence
of six years for each of the defendants, more than the four years requested by
the prosecution in a case that many thought should never have gone to court
because of the virtual impossibility of predicting an earthquake.
A reader
acutely comments:
When not predicting earthquakes is outlawed, only outlaws
will not predict earthquakes.
~
In this insane decade
here in America,
Republicans have been going after climate scientists who report things
that the Tea Party would rather not hear.
Yet none of them has gone so far as this bold Italian
initiative.
If the Romney-Adelson ticket wins,
expect that to change …
* * *
~ Commercial break ~
Relief for
beleaguered Nook lovers!
We now return you to
your regularly scheduled essay.
* * *
[Footnote: To forestall any such possible contretemps,
the World of Dr Justice predicts
that an earthquake (and, for good measure, a volcano)
are about to hit your very own house.
RUN FOR YOUR LIVES !!!!!!!!!!! ]
[Update 13 XI 2012] For further European judicial
instances of what are arguably overreaching into technical matters, click this:
[Update 22 XI 2013]
For a further essay on a matter of public science policy:
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