Don Thompson in his introductory remarks, and many other speakers since then, have talked to the needs for NDE. These fall into three major categories: reliability of the complex constructs that seem increasingly to pervade our civilization; the role of NDE as an important factor in what I might call a rational approach to a "conservation ethic" or a "total life cycle cost" approach to systems;and the use of NDE as a tool for lower cost production. If we accept the validity of these and other needs let us consider the challenge posed by our keynote speaker.