Vannevar Bush

[2024-05-28 Tue]

1. Pieces of the Action, On Organizations

   1. The organization we analyze is NDRC, which later became a part of OSRC

   2. According to Vannevar, the two most important aspects of NDRC was that it reported directly to the president of the United States, and had its own funds (and effectively unlimited funds to work with).

      The National Defense Research Committee was launched over a year before we entered World War II, as a civilian organization of scientists and engineers for the purpose of developing new weapons for military use. A year later, it became part of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, which included research on military medicine.‡ It had two very important aspects: it reported directly to the president of the United States, rather than through military channels, and it had its own funds with which to work.

      1. I assume the main benefit of reporting directly to the president is that you bypassed all the complex bureaucracy and politics inherent to operating within the existing legal framework, and therefore enabled you to do things that you wouldn't be able to do normally

         1. Vannevar agrees

            There were those who protested that the action of setting up NDRC was an end run, a grab by which a small company of scientists and engineers, acting outside established channels, got hold of the authority and money for the program of developing new weapons. That, in fact, is exactly what it was. Moreover, it was the only way in which a broad program could be launched rapidly and on an adequate scale. To operate through established channels would have involved delays—and the hazard that independence might have been lost, that independence which was the central feature of the organization’s success. The one thing that made launching it at all possible was the realization by the president that it was needed.

         2. His term is "established channels", and claims that the independence was the central feature of the organization's success

            1. What concrete failure modes does he have in mind when talking about independence?

         3. Another extremely important point is that he got the unanimous support of someone in power for this

            1. Even if he had immense amounts of money, that wouldn't have been enough given the scale of his ambition, and the constant friction that other people would cause if his actions weren't backed by the authority of someone like the president

            2. Well, I guess that's only because of the specific goal he was working on – developing weapon technology for US in anticipation of their involvement in WW2. If he was doing something else that didn't inherently involve the cooperation of military and government, he would probably have done better by routing around obstacles

         4. So the main features are speed due to avoiding "established channels", and immense amounts of funding backing him

   3. Vannevar Bush had built up legitimacy with his co-consipirators, especially because he had experience with dealing with Washington

      It was natural that the group should depend on me to take the lead in trying to get action. I was a resident in Washington. I was chairman of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, and as such had had some relations with the White House and with appropriations committees of Congress, and under the tutelage of such men as John Victory23 had learned quite a bit of the mysterious ways in which one operates in the Washington maze.

      1. I wonder how contingent his leadership of NDRC was for this

   4. Vannevar had a John Victory – a man who had experience navigating the political scene in Washington, and had him as a mentor

      As the head of an agency, I had to sign many documents filled with figures in millions and certify them as correct. If John Victory told me they were correct, I could sign with assurance and sleep at night. To any man carrying heavy responsibility, especially in the maze of government, my advice is clear. Find yourself a John Victory and relax.

      1. Wow, there's a lot of specialization required to deal with bureaucracy

      2. Essentially, exposure to scale and complexity is dealt with by an organization by specialization of its constituents

   5. Vannevar had to sell the idea of NDRC to FDR's aide, who then pre-sold it to FDR, and then allowed Vannevar to sell to FDR

      I well remember our first discussion in 1940. Each of us was trying to sell something to the other. I was promoting the scheme that became NDRC. He had before him a plan for an Inventors Council, of which more later, which he wanted me to take over. I won. He later took the inventors into his Department of Commerce, and he agreed that NDRC made sense.

      1. The ability to persuade people seems like an extremely important skill

         1. As per ACiM, 'persuasion' involves literally everything you write to people

   6. Oscar Cox, a co-consipirator, found a legal loophole to allow the establishment of NDRC such that it was answerable only to FDR, and got funds effectively at FDR's permission

      A legal framework was needed, and Oscar Cox found a structure convenient for NDRC. During the first war, there had been established by law a Council of National Defense; the law had never been repealed, and the council, made up of cabinet members, could still act. Of course, these members quite likely did not know that they existed as a council. But they would readily sign something that had “OK—FDR” on it. So NDRC was to be launched as a creation of the council. As such, it would become a part of the Executive Office of the President, and it could draw on the funds of that office, the White House willing.

      Harry and I then went in to see the president. It was the first time I had met Franklin D. Roosevelt, although I had done some small job under his orders in NACA. I had the plan for NDRC in four short paragraphs in the middle of a sheet of paper. The whole audience lasted less than 10 minutes. (Harry had no doubt been there before me.) I came out with my “OK—FDR” and all the wheels began to turn. The council signatures were obtained, the executive order issued, we found out how to get money, and we organized in a hurry. The order specified that the president of the National Academy of Sciences, the commissioner of patents, and a representative of each of the Army and Navy were to serve on the committee. I had to make the nominations of the other members. That was easy; they were the group that I have named above, and they were soon presidential appointees. Conway P. Coe,26 the commissioner of patents, Brigadier General George V. Strong,27 representing the Army, and Rear Admiral Harold G. Bowen,28 representing the Navy, with them constituted the Committee.29 Then we had our first formal meeting.

      1. I think I've systematically underestimated the importance and/or feasibility of legal loopholes and gray area stuff, mostly because I've been a literalist all my life.

         1. Either things conform to the spirit, or it doesn't and then its wrong!

         2. Yeah, while the letter is not the spirit, the spirit is not usually what you think it is (as a 'fundamental' notion). The spirit is also usually contingent and sometimes more of a letter to another spirit.

         3. You can do a degen play on your university academics, for example, and just do the absolute minimum to pass courses, and maximize the speed at which you graduate

            1. But I don't expect I'd be able to do this, mostly because I am yet unsure of whether it is worth the effort, and degen plays are just really hard when you are in a prestigious university that is known for being difficult

      2. I wonder if people systematically delude themselves in an attempt to socially look as if you are conforming to the spirit, while actually conforming only to the letter and doing a degen play

         1. And when dealing with superorganisms, for example or internal games, this actually works pretty well, to the detriment of the superorganism

      3. Its like most of social skills consists of making degen plays

         1. Except lots of people perhaps actually implicitly believe it in the moment so that they are good at the degen play

         2. eg. being polite, showing warmth and friendliness, all the while you are an opposing lawyer trying to get someone to sign an antimemetic NDA

            1. People who take things at face value instead of doing a sort of reductionist? non-agentic? Hannibalic? non-literal / pragmatic? surrogation-aware! analysis would be likely taken advantage of. Badly.