Symposium on unidentified flying objects: hearings before the Committee on Science and Astronautics, U.S. House of Representatives, Ninetieth Congress, second session, July 29, 1968.

16
Scientific
inquiry
has
paid
off,
even
though
pioneers
like
.
Faraday,
Curie,
Hahn,
Pasteur,
Goddard, and
many
others
little
realized
where
the
paths they
blazed
would
lead.
As
far
as
UFO's
are concerned,
I
believe
we
should
investigate
them
for the simple
reason that
we
want
to
know
what
lies
behind
this utterly
baffling
phenomenon—or
even
more
simply,
we
want
to
find
out
what
it's
all
about.
Thank
you.
Mr.
RousH.
Thank
you,
Dr.
Hynek.
Although
we
have
reserved
the
latter
part
of
the
afternoon
for
our
roundtable
discussion,
the
Chair
is
well
aware
the
Members
of
Con-
gress,
because
of
other
duties,
may
not
find
it
possible
to
be
here
during
that time.
If
any
of
my
colleagues
do
have
questions
and
can keep
them
brief,
which
I
realize
is
impossible,
I
will
entertain
those questions
at
this
time.
But
keep
in
mind
that
we
have
two
more
papers
this
morning,
and
three
this
afternoon.
Mr.
HECHLER.
Mr.
Chairman.
Mr.
RousH.
Mr.
Hechler.
Mr.
HECHLER.
First
I
would
like
to
commend
you,
Mr.
Roush,
for
your
initiative
in
setting
up
this
symposium.
I
would
like
to
ask
you,
Dr.
Hynek,
whether you
consider
this
sci-
entific
board of
inquiry
which you
outlined
as
a
sort
of
a
one-shot
thing
which would
make
its
report,
or
do
you
consider
this
to
be
a
con-tinuing
body
that could
examine,
as the
Air
Force
has, reports
and
analyze
them?
And
with
this
question,
I
would
like
to
ask
if
yourassumption
is
that the
Air
Force,
because
of
its
emphasis
on
national
security,
has
really
not
measured
up
to
a
thorough
scientific
analysis
of
UFO's?
Dr.
HYNEK.
Well,
in
answer
to the
first
part
of
that
question,
sir,
I
would
say
I
don't
believe
in
a
problem
as
complex
as
this
the
one-
shot
approach
would
be
sufficient.
I
think
there
should be
this
board
of
inquiry
which
should be
a
continuing
board
in
the
same
sense
that
we
have,
I
presume, boards of study for
world
population
problems,
of
pollution
problems,
of world
health,
and
so
forth.
The
letter
that
came
with
the
invitation
to
speak
here, strongly
stated
that
we
would
not
discuss
the
Air Force
participation
in these
matters,
and
I
would
like
to
therefore
not speak
to that
point.
Mr.
Roust'.
Mr.
Rumsfeld.
Mr.
Ru
-
msFELD. Because of
the
fact
it
does look as
though
we
will
have
a
busy
afternoon
on
the
floor,
I
very
likely will
not be
present
for the remainder of the
discussion.
I
would
like
to express the
hope
the other
members
of the panel
might
at
some
point
comment
on
the
two
recommendations
that
Dr. Hynek
has
set
forth in
his
paper.
Fur-
ther,
I
would hope
that each
member
of
the panel,
during the
after-
noon
session,
might
address himself to the
questions
of
priorities.
.
Assuming
that there
is
some
agreement with
Dr. Hynek's
conclu-
sion
that
this
is
an
area
worthy of
additional
study, then the
question
for
.
Congress,.
of
course,
becomes what
is
the
priority?
This
is
a
rather
unique
situation
in that
it is
a
scientific
question that has reached thepublic prior to the time that anything
beneficial
can even be imagined.
In many
instances
a
scientific effort
is
not widely
known
to the publicuntil
it is
successful.