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Concluding Remarks
Jorma Routti
Director-General DGXII
European Commission
The statue of Albert Einstein outside the National Academy of Sciences'
main building in Washington, D.C., reminds us of the search for the simple and
beautiful laws of nature. Einstein's insight on the relationship between energy
and mass is a good example of such scientific simplicity and elegance. On the
other hand, a quotation credited to Einstein "Everything should be made as
simple as possible but not simpler" cautions us about oversimplification. It is
useful to keep this idea in mind when we seek solutions to the complex problems
of today's world.
The study of complex phenomena has progressed rapidly in recent years.
Fractals, bifurcations, and chaotic phenomena are found in mathematics, weather
patterns, biology, and economic theories. The work of Belgian Nobel Prize win-
ner Ilya Prigogine has contributed greatly to the understanding that seemingly
simple things, even at the atomic level, have great uncertainties. Prigogine's re-
cent works, The End of Certainty and The Laws of Chaos, shed light on the inher-
ent complexity of the early universe. To improve the understanding of complex
phenomena, the Santa Fe Institute in New Mexico brings together many Nobel
Prize winners to explore complexity. Researchers in Santa Fe have found that our
world is not predetermined, that it is far more unpredictable than we have imag-
ined and hence much more challenging than the deterministic Newtonian world.
In the economic realm, complexity theory points to the difficulty in predicting the
economy's evolution and that small changes in economic conditions can lead to
swift and dramatic changes in market shares within industries. The dynamism of
knowledge-based companies in the communications, electronics, and biotechnol-
ogy sectors is a manifestation of complexity in the economy. The end result is the
94
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JORMA ROUITI
95
growth of opportunities for entrepreneurs, who may be able to reap large rewards
in a fast-changing, though risky, economy.
As we all know, science and technology are among the principal driving
forces of the world today. They form the foundation of knowledge-based indus-
tries, and they are needed to develop solutions for complex problems facing our
societies. Science, The Endless Frontier, the classic book by Vannevar Bush
(1945), has defined science policies in the United States for decades. In 1997 the
European Commission published Society, The Endless Frontier, which analyzes
links between science and society and defines the challenges of today and tomor-
row. The United States and Europe should draw lessons from each of these im-
portant documents so that science on both sides of the Atlantic complements each
other in the best possible way.
The new approach, from Society, The Endless Frontier, is also the basis of
the new European Union' s Framework Programme for Research and its problem-
driven structure. This approach should interest our American colleagues because
the framework's key recommendations open wider access to European research
while asking for complementary American contributions. The important feature
of such science collaboration is that it is not a zero-sum game where one party
wins at the expense of the other. Rather it can lead to win-win results in many
areas of common interest, on the basis of reciprocal contributions and mutual
benefits.
We have discussed many issues and technologies during this conference. To
draw conclusions from the rich program is not an easy task. Specific recommen-
dations and conclusions have already been reported from the parallel workshops.
So my conclusions are of a more general nature, and I will summarize them in
eight points.
High level of interest. We can fairly say that the new U.S.-European Union
(KU) science and technology (S&T) cooperation agreement has generated a lot of
interest on both sides of the Atlantic. The agreement is an instrument to promote
scientific cooperation across the Atlantic. This legal and administrative frame-
work should be used in a proactive way.
2. Broad-based involvement. Although public authorities and their agencies
will play a very active role, a top-down approach alone is not sufficient. Industry
(large and small), academia, and individual laboratories and researchers must
actively engage themselves in joint projects in areas of common interest. We
should use our agreement as a tool for efficient cooperation to avoid unnecessary
and costly duplications on each side.
3. Use of advanced communications technologies. Building timely and eas-
ily accessible information channels and using modern high-technology informa-
tion and communication are of the utmost importance for efficient implementa-
tion of the agreement. We need to make all interested researchers and
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96
CONCLUDING REMARKS
policymakers aware of the potential that this agreement offers. Otherwise, there
is a risk that it will remain a skeleton.
4. Continue to develop priority areas for cooperation. The reports from our
conference sessions on the priority areas indicate that there are topics to be ex-
plored further. This should be done soon, and indeed efforts are already under
way. On the European Union side, the Fifth Framework Programme will be quite
well synchronized with the U.S.-EU S&T agreement in the beginning of 1999.
However, those that are directly concerned in the already-selected priority areas
should begin to launch concrete collaborative actions now. The EU will continue
the process of selection of further priority areas after this conference. I also be-
lieve that the EU's new approach to research, with its focus on finding solutions
to major problems facing society, is of great interest to the U.S. side.
5. Maintain momentum for cooperation. A follow-up to this conference will
held in Europe in 1999, and at that time we will continue to explore areas for
cooperation. Some areas will be jointly selected during an upcoming informal
meeting of the Joint Consultative Group here in Washington and the forthcoming
formal meeting in Brussels. In the meantime the momentum generated by this
first conference should not be lost. Contact persons designated by each side shall
pursue the follow-up jointly with their colleagues responsible for S&T collabora-
tion in the European Commission and in the U.S. government agencies.
6. Continue bilateral cooperation. With increasing S&T cooperation be-
tween the European Community and the United States, we should neither forget
nor underestimate the numerous opportunities for collaboration at the bilateral
level. Collaboration can proceed between the United States and EU member states
or directly between universities and industries from both sides. Hence, it is im-
portant to use the U.S.-EU S&T agreement in a selective and intelligent way and
to respect what we call "subsidiarily" in the KU. Let us choose the most efficient
level and channel of cooperation and avoid unnecessary duplication.
7. Engage all types of businesses. Effective action also needs industrial part-
ners, including small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). We must not forget
that SMEs have an important role to play in all sectors of technological develop-
ment. The role of SMEs in transatlantic cooperation opportunities should be em-
phasized.
8. Engage young scientists and engineers. We should involve our young
scientists and engineers in transatlantic cooperation. This is a very cost-effective
way of building international collaboration. It will make young researchers aware
of the possibilities for cooperation as well as the challenges inherent in transat-
lantic relationships that can be both complementary and competitive.
On behalf of the European Commission, let me express our sincere thanks to
the National Academy of Sciences and the National Research Council for the
excellent arrangements for our meeting. Chairpersons and rapporteurs also de
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serve our thanks for summarizing the contributions in the workshops. And all of
us have enjoyed the excellent speakers from both sides of the Atlantic.
I also want to thank the United States for its tradition of opening up its uni-
versities to students from other countries. My country, Finland, has been fortu-
nate enough to have an aggressive program of sending students to the United
States. I want to express my personal thanks for the opportunity I had in the
United States; many others from Europe have similarly benefited from U.S. open
ness.
In closing I want to talk about the brain as a model for collaboration between
the United States and the European Union. Gordon Moore's speech reminds us of
the increasing miniaturization of computing power, as reflected in Moore's law.
Ongoing efforts, such as I300I among semiconductor manufacturers, will make
smaller and more powerful chips. Before too long, shrinking chip size could mean
that electronic circuitry could approach the size of neurons in the brain.
The brain is still better than a computer because of superior pattern recogni-
tion. For example, when we notice a person we have seen before, our brain takes
one-tenth of a second to tell us whether we know that person. With each neuron
connected to 10,000 other neurons by synapses, our brain can make this calcula-
tion. Although today's neural networks can do some truly astounding things in
completing complex tasks, not even the most advanced supercomputer today can
accomplish pattern recognition with the speed and accuracy of the brain.
Why can the brain work so quickly? It works so fast because it must: millions
of years ago, if we did not quickly recognize a lion on the prairie, we would have
been killed. Today, if we cannot recognize the truck coming around the corner at
us, we are in danger.
Lots of connections make the brain work so swiftly and effectively. The
model of the brain is also the best model for scientific collaboration. Fostering
many connections between European and U.S. scientists will be the key to mak-
ing increased transatlantic S&T collaboration fruitful for both sides. Collabora-
tion is increasingly the model for the economy today in which small research
organizations team with large companies for production and marketing. Like the
brain, however, scientific collaboration needs many neurons and a large number
of connections.
To take another analogy from computer science, Control Data Corporation
made computers in the 1960s with some of the most powerful processing capa-
bilities of that time. But the computer was connected to "dumb terminals" and
thus greatly limited in its scope of use. Today, powerful computers involve inter-
active networks of intelligent workstations. That is what we need today in our
economies and our approaches to scientific work-intelligent networking.
Representative terms from entire chapter:
endless frontier
