2 FREDM. UBER 



subscribe, I believe, to the assertion that numerous research articles 

 are either meaningless or destined to be fruitless. Some published 

 evidence exists to support this statement (see Sect. H) and if scientists 

 were less courteous to their fellow workers, there probably would be 

 much more. 



The freedom to exercise scientific curiosity experimentally in a 

 laboratory is a priceless heritage of modern science. This freedom, 

 unexploited in ancient times and even denied during the middle ages, 

 should be guarded zealously; it should not be jeopardized by careless 

 indulgence and irresponsibility on the part of some investigators. 

 To be valuable, contemporary research must place increasingly 

 greater stress on the careful analysis, design, and often on the co- 

 operative execution of experimental programs. To point a finger at 

 some of the pitfalls which needlessly embarrass too many naive experi- 

 mentalists is the aim of this introductory chapter. The writer is 

 conscious of some of its limitations, but would welcome constructive 

 suggestions from any source for its improvement. Specific examples 

 and illustrations particularly are solicited. It is a pleasure to ac- 

 knowledge my indebtedness to several of the sources mentioned in 

 the bibliography and especially to an inspiring lecture by T. S. Hamil- 

 ton {22). 



A. APPROACHES TO IMPORTANT DISCOVERIES 



To prescribe what must be done to avoid meaningless or fruitless 

 experiments is relatively easy compared to the task of outlining a 

 procedure for selecting the most meaningful and important problems. 

 Were this not true, science would be much further advanced. No 

 attempt will be made in this chapter to outline any such procedure, 

 for reasons which probably are or will become obvious to the reader 

 very soon. It is felt, however, that the time which could be saved by 

 avoiding fruitless experiments might result in appreciably increasing 

 the number of important discoveries. Some widely held, but conflict- 

 ing, viewpoints on how to make fundamental discoveries will be pre- 

 sented now for the purpose of background to the fundamental re- 

 search situation. 



1. Accidental Approach 



Not infrequently in the past, important scientific discoveries have 

 been made by workers who were not trained to look for them. The 



