“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

To some extent (underlined) — a qualified statement, now — the scientists have become somewhat contemptuous of all who do not understand their language: the non-elite. They resent having to get money from the government, from men who are not scientists, and they build up a false sense of comparative omnipotence in response — and that makes them less careful than they should be. They feel misunderstood by the public now.

None of them want any disaster, and yet some of them think it would serve the people right — for then the people might realize that politicians do not understand science, and that the scientists should after all be put in control: “We must have enough money, or who knows what can go wrong?”

2. Jane and I try to understand both the advocates of nuclear power and those who are against it. At the moment we’re sure of but one thing: A nuclear reactor meltdown, like that threatened at Three Mile Island, is just not acceptable in our society under any circumstances. The devastation for many years of a large portion of a state like Pennsylvania, say, should not be risked because of economics, fuel shortages, convenience, apathy, or any other reason. Jane and I passionately believe that instead of concentrating primarily upon nuclear power the United States should be making massive efforts to utilize many other sources of energy — at least until the risks and technologies involved with generating nuclear power are understood much more thoroughly. And there are numerous other sources of energy that can be developed. Among them are: cogeneration, the use of waste heat from manufacturing processes to generate electricity; solar radiation; ocean waves; new, more sophisticated methods of burning coal so that it’s much less polluting; subterranean heat; the production, from municipal solid wastes, of ethanol (alcohol) as an excellent substitute for gasoline; the burning of biomass — waste materials from the home and farm; various methods of deriving energy from the vast oil shale deposits in our western states; the establishment of “energy farms” of trees and hydrocarbon-generating plants; energy reservoirs of pumped water. We think such alternate sources should be pursued even if they cost more in economic terms than nuclear power, either initially or continually, for surely none of them could produce the horrendous results — and enormous costs — that would follow even one massive failure at a nuclear power plant.

Ideas about conservation enter in as a result of my comments about alternate sources of energy, of course, and these are related to a number of deep desires that Jane and I have. We want our nation to embark upon programs to cut, and eventually eliminate for all practical purposes, its continually growing dependence upon foreign oil, for we see great risks in an overreliance upon that course of action; we think those hazards should be obvious to everyone since the oil embargo declared against us in 1973 by the countries of the Middle East. This excessive dependence can be done away with eventually, but at considerable sacrifice. Jane and I are more than ready to make those sacrifices; indeed, we live very conservatively even now. We can’t conceive of anything more worthwhile than to achieve an independence of spirit that’s based upon an independence of means, whether on a personal or national scale. But once it’s largely self-sufficient, the United States could really begin to fulfill its role of leadership in the world.

“The idea is that the scientists’ system of beliefs is bound to result in some destructive action; that is, the implied attitudes of today’s scientists lead them to be less careful of life than they should be, and separate them from nature in a way that leads to some contempt on their parts of individual living things. The leaders of religious cults, like that of Jonestown, overexaggerate grandiose ideals of brotherhood and love, for example (as Seth has mentioned), while often forbidding the natural expression of love on the part of one individual for another — assaulting family affiliations and so forth. As a result, the idealized love becomes more and more inaccessible, with the growth of more guilt and despair.