Trans-science

The term trans-science was coined by Alvin Weinberg (1972). Weinberg was an American nuclear physicist who was the administrator at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) during in Manhattan Project period. He studied the risks of low dose ionizing radiation from nuclear technology for the American population.

Weinberg noted that many of the issues which arise in the course of the interaction between science or technology and society--e.g., the deleterious side effects of technology, or the attempts to deal with social problems through the procedures of science--hang on the answers to questions which can be asked of science and yet which cannot be answered by science. He proposed the term trans-scientific for these questions since, though they are, epistemologically speaking, questions of fact and can be stated in the language of science, they are unanswerable by science; they transcend science.

His key example was the biological effects of exposure to low-level ionizing radiation:
"Let us consider the biological effects of low-level radiation insults to the environment, in particular the genetic effects of low levels of radiation on mice. Experiments performed at high radiation levels show that the dose required to double the spontaneous mutation rate in mice is 30 roentgens of X-rays.
Thus, if the genetic response ,to X-radiation is linear, then a dose of 150 millirems would increase the spontaneous mutation rate in mice by 0.5 per cent. This is a matter of importance to public policy since the various standard-setting bodies had decided that a yearly dose of about 150 millirems (actually 170 millirems) to a suitably chosen segment of the population was acceptable. Now, to determine at the 95 per cent. confidence level by a direct experiment whether 150 millirems will increase .the mutation rate by 0.5 per cent. requires about 8,000,000,000 mice! Of course this number falls if one reduces the confidence level; at 60 per cent. confidence level, the number is 195,000,000. Nevertheless, the number is so staggeringly large that, as a practical matter, the question is unanswerable by direct scientific investigation."

In a letter to the editor Harvey Brooks added another dimension to "trans science": the evolution in time of systems governed by large classes of nonlinear equations. 

In 1985, W. Ruckelhaus admitted that many of the US Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) regulations hang on the answers to questions that can be asked of science but cannot be answered by science - that is they are trans-scientific.

References

Alvin Weinberg (1972) Science and trans-science, Minerva, 10, 1972, 209-222.

Alvin Weinberg (1991) Origins of Science and Trans-Science, Citation Classics 34 S18,

Harvey Brooks (1972) Science and Trans-Science - Letter to the Editor, Minerva 10, 484-486.