THE PARADOX OF CHOICE 



tions that theory in science has sometimes got a bad name. 

 Thus Professor Weisskopf, in referring to the position of atomic 

 theory by saying: "If you understand hydrogen, you under- 

 stand everything that is understood," makes a good contribu- 

 tion to a true philosophy of ignorance. He makes it plain that 

 only in such cases can theories be expected to rule out possi- 

 bilities. However, in a multitude of other cases they can be 

 counted on to rule in new ideas. 



In the physics of solids no one yet understands anything 

 quite completely. Nevertheless it was the theories of Wilson, 

 and later those of Shockley and Bardeen which led toward the 

 finding of transistor action. This was so no matter how many 



O J 



government and industrial institutions wanted however des- 

 perately to fortify the coming age of electronics by facilities 

 beyond the vacuum tube. No one had been led to examine be- 

 fore what the behavior of electric charges traveling at about 

 one thousandth the speed of light would be in a crystal medium 

 in which they could move for about iooo atom distances before 

 being diverted to some other direction. The theoretical possi- 

 bilities of such a medium, and not the finding of a material 

 which would yield transistors, led to interactions by Bardeen, 

 Brattain, and Shockley with others. One was Pfann, who was 

 aware of different sets of theories about how to achieve perfec- 

 tion and ultimate purity in crystals of matter. The outcome of 

 this is an already established chapter in the history of science, 

 involving the new process of zone refining. Even the traditional 

 view of the pure scientist that so important a practical finding 

 as the transistor can be a Frankenstein and devour or destroy 

 the very freedom of inquiry which led to its creation is un- 

 founded in the continuing research effects of zone melting. For 

 still other theories next stood out; those of the perfection pos- 

 sible in crystals as proposed by Bragg and Burgers decades ago, 

 and more recently by Read. His theoretical monograph on 



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