What is the subject of the conference?

M: Ladies and gentlemen. As we all know, there are great problems inherent in specialist conferences concentrating on specific areas of scientific research. This was the chief reason for us to plan a truly interdisciplinary conference on the complex subject of decision sciences. Equally, however, there are dangers in bringing together so many experts from so many different disciplines. It takes a genuine effort for a person in one discipline to listen to something else which may be totally unfamiliar to him. Not only to listen, but to absorb. The benefits from it are, however, substantial. The work of others may help us define our own work more clearly and may give us ideas for future work which we would not otherwise be able to obtain.
    Well, now, in the final session, we are going to consider societal decision making, and this theme will be introduced by our first speaker, Dr. Martin from Cambridge University. Dr. Martin!
W: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. At first, I would like to make a statement on behalf of the committee of this conference. In attempting to prepare our summaries of the groups’ discussions, my fellow committee members and I have found the task to be considerably more difficult than we had envisaged. We would like to be able to present in brief and rather simple language the main themes of your discussions and the questions remaining in particular areas. We have discovered that the different vocabularies used by the different groups of experts have caused considerable confusion among many of the conference participants. For this reason we would like to ask the main speakers from the different sections to meet in the lobby immediately after this session. Thank you.
    Now, my subject today is...