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WEATHER
TOMORROW’S FORECAST:
Cloudy with a high chance of
thunderstorms
HIGH: 64 LOW: 48
Vol.89 No.86 USPS 045360 10 Pages
College Station, Texas
Friday, February 2,1990
Storm tears off section of Rudder Auditorium
The severe thunderstorm with
60 to 80 mph winds that rolled
through Bryan-College Station
Thursday night did extensive
damage to the Texas A&M cam
pus.
A 30 ft. by 50 ft. section of
Rudder Auditorium was blown
off between 6:03 P-m. and 6:15
p.m., Bob Wiatt, director of the
university police department,
said. At the time, people were in
side the auditorium waiting for
the Wayne Watson piano concert
scheduled for 7:30 p.m., but
there were no injuries, Wiatt said.
As the roof section fell, it
crumbled into chunks and dam
aged an Oldsmobile Regency
parked on the street in front of
the auditorium, he said.
The auditorium suffered mini
mal water damage inside, but
nothing that could not be cleaned
up, Tom Baxter, technical direc
tor of Rudder Complex, said.
University maintenance crews
were called in to begin clean-ups
immediately after the damage oc
curred, Wiatt said.
On other parts of the campus,
Wiatt said exterior doors of Wise-
nbaker Engineering Research
Building and Rudder Tower
were blown off. Tree limbs were
reported down and streets were
flooded, he said. Near the north-
gate post office, the wind broke
one tree at its base.
While the storm system caused
car accidents in College Station,
no car accidents were reported on
campus, Wiatt said. The Bryan
Police Department said no one in
the city reported accident calls
caused by the storm.
Weather wrath
Photos by Phelan M. Ebenhack and Jay Janner
(Clockwise from top)Thursday
night’s storm damaged an Old
smobile Regency hit by a sec
tion of Rudder Auditorium’s roof,
blew a door off the second floor
of Rudder Tower, and broke a
tree in half near the MSC post
office.
Professor: Panama invasion inevitable
By JILL BUTLER
Of The Battalion Staff
The United States’ invasion of
Panama in December 1989 contin
ues to be controversial.
Dr. Jonathan Brown, associate di
rector of the Institute of Latin
American Affairs at the University
of Texas, spoke last night at MSC
Political Forum about the United
States’justifications for the invasion.
“The invasion was more or less in
evitable,” Brown said.
He said the United States’ interest
in Panama, because of the Panama
Canal and the presence of U.S. citi
zens in Panama, added to the inevi
tability of the invasion.
Brown said the canal was not in
physical danger before or during the
invasion.
“The danger was that Noreiga
wanted to gain control of the Pan
ama Canal Company,” he said.
The Panama Canal Company con
trols the locks and gates of the canal.
If Noreiga had gained control of
the canal, Panama would have had
power over the United States in ma
naging the canal.
Brown, an associate professor of
history at the University of Texas,
served as an officer in the U.S. Army
in Panama from 1968 to 1971.
“I’m not certain I’m in favor of
the invasion,” he said. “It was done
to salvage very bad U.S. policy in
Panama.”
He asked, “If the policy is bad,
how can the invasion be exactly
right?”
Brown said the United States’
“bad policy” included ignoring Gen
eral Manuel Noriega’s alleged illegal
activities for years before the inva
sion.
“The United States ignored No-
reiga’s drug-trafficking and money
laundering because Noreiga was
very useful to the United States,”
Brown said. “Noreiga told the CIA
about Castro’s activites and Sanda-
nista activities.”
President Bush gave Panama $1
billion and promised Wednesday
night to withdraw troops from Pan
ama at the end of February.
However, damage in Panama is
estimated at $2.2 billion.
Regents
consider
new arena
By TODD L. CONNELLEY
Of The Battalion Staff
Basketball and graduation at
G. Rollie White Coliseum might
soon become a thing of the past.
A new special events arena will
be considered soon by the Texas
A&M Board of Regents.
“President Mobley asked me to
get this project moving, so a pre
liminary study should be ready
for the Board within 60 days,”
Dr. Perry Adkisson, Texas A&M
University System Chancellor,
said.
A preliminary study will in
clude elements such as architectu
ral planning, cost estimates and
size.
“Ordinarily if there’s an
agreement in funding, it would
take about a year to get construc
tion off the ground,” Adkisson
added. “Right now everything is
really just in the preliminary
stages, we haven’t even picked an
architect yet.”
Regents Chairman William H.
McKenzie said construction of
the arena will be planned care
fully.
“We badly need a new arena,
but we are not going to proceed
with this matter in a haphazard
way,” McKenzie said.
Although the project is still in
its infant stage, a site has been
chosen at the West Campus near
the new track facility.
“That location has been in con
sideration for the new facility for
at least seven years,” McKenzie
said.
Adkisson said the Board would
visit different facilities across the
country to get a feel for a new
arena.
“The University of North Car-
olinia and the University of Mi
ami have recently gotten new are
nas,” Adkisson said. “Members of
the Board will travel there some
time after the preliminary study
is submitted and investigate.”
Like arenas at the other uni
versities, A&M’s new arena will
not be limited to basketball.
McKenzie said construction of
the new arena will proceed differ
ently from the expansion of the
University Center.
“I can tell you one thing for su
re,” McKenzie said. “W’e won’t be
cutting down any trees.”
Rats play games for research
By BILL HETHCOCK
Of The Battalion Staff
Everyone expects to find rats running mazes in psy
chology experiments and science labs, but in the Texas
A&M economics department, rats play slot machines.
Dr. Raymond Battalio, a Texas A&M economics pro
fessor, is putting fundamentareconomic theories to the
test, using both rats and humans as research subjects.
Battalio’s research is in the area of experimental eco
nomics, in which economic theories are tested under
controlled conditions to see if they will work in the over
all economy. Experimental economics is still a new idea,
but its popularity is growing, Battalio said.
“Give me a theory,” Battalio said. “If it doesn’t work
well in my very simple, controlled, abstract world, then
why do you think it should work well in that one?”
Some of Battalio’s experiments are conducted using
laboratory rats as subjects.
“To the economist, there are some things that are al
most impossible financially or ethically to answer with
human subjects,” Battalio said.
“We use the animals for two things. One is parallel
studies. The other is to do things that are ethically, le
gally or financially difficult to do with humans.”
Battalio said he has done a series of research on
choices when the world is uncertain, using both rats and
humans. These studies can be related to gambling
games, Battalio said. He found that the risk-taking ten
dencies of rats closely parallel those of humans.
“The animals sit in a cage with two levers,” he said.
“On the left lever, they may get six pellets every time.
On the right lever, half the time they get twelve pellets
and half the time they get zero. Clearly, this is the ani
mal’s real world.
“What we find is almost the same results as with hu
mans. They’re risk-averse. Where humans contradict
the theory, the rats contradict the theory.”
In his experiments Battalio has also tested ideas such
as Adam Smith’s theory on free markets. This basic eco
nomic theory says that people exchange goods and
services to maximize their individual profits. By doing
this, the traders arrive at the price that brings the sup
ply and demand for the product into balance. Accord
ing to the theory, trading at this price will maximize
benefits for society.
Battalio uses students to test theories like these. He
creates a market situation and pays students different
amounts of money based on how well they trade units
of an unnamed commmodity.
Dr. Raymond Battalio
“These are real markets,” Battalio said. “It’s not a
simulation. Students take it seriously. Once you recog
nize that we can build a real market, then there are tons
of questions you can answer.”
Battalio’s research supports basic economic theory in
most cases, he said.
“By and large, the kinds of theories you get in 204 (a
beginning economics course) work very well,” he said.
Part of Battalio’s research is funded by a new
professorship in the College of Liberal Arts.
He is the first holder of the Mary Tucker Currie
Professorship in Liberal Arts, endowed by Dorothy and
Jack Currie.
Dr. Thomas Saving, head of the economics depart
ment, said this professorship will give Battalio a certain
amount of freedom in doing his research.
“You don’t have anyone looking over your shoulder
on a professorship, seeing whether you’re doing what
they gave you the grant to do,” Saving said. “Dr. Batta
lio has the professorship to do what he thinks is best.”
Battalio said he appreciates the financial support that
the professorship provides.
“Having this professorship, to me, means I don’t
have to worry about losing funding and dropping the
research,” Battalio said. “We will always have money to
do our research.”
Battalio said A&M’s support of his research and good
quality faculty are the main reasons he has stayed at
A&M for 20 years.
“A&M has been very good to me. They’ve supported
my research when almost no one else would,” Battalio
said.
“There probably aren’t three schools in the country
where I could have done animal research in economics.”