JAMES B. FISK 



problems have sufficient merit. And they will be tempered 

 occasionally bv an associate's need for help in getting over a 

 particularly difficult hurdle. 



Freedom of publication and encouragement of sound and 

 timely publication, these, too, are important to the research 

 environment and can be achieved in industry. Most scientists 

 today understand the need for prompt patent applications, and 

 a well-organized laboratory can get such work done expedi- 

 tiously. Hence, patent questions need cause little delay in publi- 

 cation. But in any event secrecy is unattractive in basic research 

 — and is very seldom necessary. The communication of knowl- 

 edge is a responsibility of scientists, a most important mechan- 

 ism of scientific advance. Any research institution which 

 draws value from the work of others through their publications 

 has in some degree an obligation to return value in kind. The 

 extent to which a laboratory does so will weigh heavily in the 

 appraisal which scientists make of it as a place to work. 



Equilibrium with the scientific community is attained in 

 part by publication. However, more than publication is neces- 

 sary. The testing of one's ideas and results, and learning those 

 of others, by direct professional association in the community 

 of scientists is much to be encouraged. This is not primarily a 

 matter of professional prestige; it is importantly a part of the 

 continuing process of education, of intellectual stimulus and 

 preparation for the research problems that lie in the future. It 

 is a kind of "preventive maintenance," if you like, and it takes 

 many forms, among them, scientific meetings and symposia, 

 short or long visits to industrial laboratories by lecturers and 

 consultants, occasionally a "sabbatical" term, in reverse, for a 

 period of teaching and study in a university. 



Basic research should be organizationally autonomous. It 

 should not be confused with or subservient to development, or 

 it will not survive. This does not mean that research requires a 



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