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V Pay; 2- I'LAI^KALKB-HERALD, WEDNESDAY MAY 15.1U85 Opinion/Politics y- ~K~ Thompson was Robots: from martinis to movies Gary Dotson is now free. Gov. Thompson announced Sunday that he had decided to commute Dotson's prison sentence to time served. Dotson has served nearly six years of his sentence, about the average of time served by others sen­ tenced for similar crimes. Thompson said that because of the testimony at the three-day Illinois Prisoner Review Board hearing, he was convinced that 1979 jury verdict finding i guilty was correct. Thus, ^turned down Dotson's request for a pardon. •* However, Thompson related that he believed it would not serve justice nor any other purpose for Dotson to return to jail and he commuted Dotson's sentence. From what we saw, heard and read, we tend to agree on both counts. No doubt we haven't heard the last of Gary Dotson and Cathy Webb. Dotson may still plan to appeal the most recent court decision involving his con­ viction. After that, who knows. Television, movies and books beckon the two main characters. Now that one part of the drama has ended, we are being bombarded by comments referring to the hearings as "a three-ring circus," "blatantly political," etc. These criticisms are missing the point. Sure the hearings made good copy, were en- itertaining theater and had some political implications. So what. The hearings did not make a travesty of the justice system. As a matter of fact, the hearings themselves served our justice system. Televised hearings can lead to abuse, but where would we be without having televised the Army-McCarthy and Watergate hearings? There may have been political overtones involved, but believe it or not, the two are not always mutually exclusive. There are some times when good politics, inadvertantly or not, makes good government. This was such an occasion. (A Shaw-Free Press editorial) Lakes Charter takps a stand to protect our greatest resource v It's not exactly an OPEC of water, but the anti-water- diversion coalition recently formed by leaders of the eight American states and two Canadian provinces that border on the Great Lakes has something of the same idea behind it. As keepers of the world's largest reservoir of v fresh water-65 trillion gallons of it- the Great Lakers know they have the lira's share of an essential resource that could soon be in great demand to quench the ever-deepening thirst of the Sunbelt. Thus they have agreed to resist any at­ tempts to draw water out of the Great Lakes basin into water- poor areas. The signing of what is called the Great Lakes Charter carries no enforceable authority. In the United States, allocation of water resources appears to be a congressional prerogative. But as a statment of regional policy, the charter is a prudent move- e n v i r o n m e n t a l l y a n d economically. Although there are currently no active plans to divert Great Lakes water, the idea has been discussed and pressure in that direction is forseeable. Ac­ cording to one analysis, the Ogallala aquifer that supplies much of the water to the American Southwest will run dry'l!v40 years. And proposals have been made to pipe water from the Great Lakes to western coal fields, where it would be mixed with crushed coal to form a slurry that would be piped to other parts of the country. But why shouldn't the Great Lakes ana provinces share their water wealth with their less fortunate fellow Americans? One reason is that the region itself is consuming ever-larger amounts of Great Lakes water- a trend that the International Commission on the Great Lakes Water costs the region $50 million a year in reduced power generation and cargo-carrying capacity plus, additional ex­ penses for increased channel dredging and water pumping. (Reprinted by permission of the Minneapolis Star and Tribune) WASHINGTON (UPI)-There's a lot of sadd- ness in the world. From my friend-Terry McHale, of Flint, Mich., comes the distressing news that his friend Clarence had a sinus operation that spoiled the taste of dry martinis. The surgery presumably ruined the patient's sense of smell, a common occurrence. But there is no need tc sue the surgeon for malpractice, another common occurrence. Help is on the way. According to Omni magazine, researchers in Pittsburgh are developing a robotic nose that eventually may surpass even the human nose's ability to recognize up to 1,000 different odors, including, I suppose, several hundred cocktails. "Our ultimate goal is low-cost, mass-produced, all-purpose noses that can be used anywhere and that are trainable," said one of the quoted ^scientists. If human npstrils can recognize the smell of Chinese cooking, then a robotic nose surely can be trained to identify a well-mixed martini. That part about "can be used anywhere" should be particularly encouraging to Clarence. For "anywhere" w would include Pittsburgh bars, or wherever he might go in quest of the proper blend and vermouth. would there be any reason for Clarence to feel self-conscious about cybernetic sniffing. If science can create mechanical hearts to function in place of the real thing, mechanical noses should become almost as commonplace as medical malpractice suits. What I fear is that Hollywood will get there first. Any scientific achievement with the potential of enabling "robot servants to cook without burning of gin Nor meals" also has the potential of becoming a first- rate motion picture. I can see it all now-major studios bidding for the right to produce "Close Encounters of the Olfactory Kind." Such a film could be more sophisticated that the garden variety sci-fi movie. I envision a robot nose named "Hal" become a sort of rogue inhaler in a Pittsburgh tavern. "Hal" has been programmed to blink red lights whenever it catches a whiff of the quintessential marriage of juniper juice and white wine steeped in aromatic herbs. But the poor thing's electronic nasal sensors have been distracted by the essence of beer. This situation gives the screenwriter all sorts of latitude in creatirteilramatic scenes in "which barroom patrons attempt to repair the robot's semiconductors. \ There also could be all sorts of jokes of the "How many drunks does it take to change a robot's microcircuitry?" variety. One obligatory scene would have the robot nose luring a customer into an alley outside the tavern, and then blinking red lights over the subtle fragrance of rotting garbage. Once "Close Encounters of the Olfactory Kind" has been through the late night television Reruns, maybe the, robot nose researchers can get on with the lab work necessary to make the receptors truly all-purpose.. Otherwise, Clarence may have to call his lawyer and go on the wagon. 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