74 BURTON EDWARD LIVINGSTON 



After the first draft of these notes had been written, it was 

 well said in these pages, 1 that "the entrance of any person into 

 science in a serious manner is usually connected with the work 

 carried out during his candidacy for the doctor's degree." It is 

 this consideration together with that stated at the end of the last 

 paragraph, which makes the present seem to be such a critical 

 time in the development of physiological science with reference to 

 plants. For, as the note just cited points out, the facilities for 

 guidance into the realm of this subject are none too good in the 

 majority of American universities. If the university student has 

 made up his mind that the physics and chemistry of plant processes 

 is his chosen field, he is perhaps not apt to be discouraged by 

 instructors whose bent of mind makes the statics and the past 

 history of plant forms most interesting to them, but it is obvious 

 that he will not be especially aided, and, with the best of inten- 

 tions on the part of his leaders, he is apt to be obliged to seek his 

 experience by "hook and crook," without any very clear outlook 

 into the possibilities of the future. 



Conversation and correspondence with a considerable number 

 of beginners who belong to the class here considered, convince the 

 writer that such persons are frequently at a loss as to how they 

 should try to make their entrance into physiological work, as to 

 what sort of a problem they should attempt, and as to where they 

 should attempt it. In such cases it becomes apparent that 

 indecision here, as always, arises from a lack of serviceable cri- 

 teria by which to compare and judge. Without some sort of 

 criteria the beginner is too often constrained to flounder rather 

 than swim. Furthermore, a perusal of current publications in plant 

 physiology pointedly suggests that one of the most imminent 

 perils of the beginner in this sort of scientific research lies in the 

 relative ease with which he may unconsciously enter a cut de sac, 

 thus perhaps becoming, with his later development, a true expert 

 in some field where relatively few connections with other lines of 

 human activity render the most painstaking observations and the 

 deepest ponderings of comparatively little immediate importance. 



1 D. T. M., Plant World, 14: 252. 1911. 



