MERLE A. TUVE 



trained in basic physical sciences had been demonstrated during 

 World War II, the idea of mission-directed basic research was 

 firmly implanted by our concerted efforts at numerous locations 

 in the dark recesses of the military budgets. We have all been 

 faithfully supervising the growth of this hybrid notion ever since, 

 in the halls of Congress and in the minds of the public. We all 

 know that only an extremely small fraction of the various bud- 

 gets we help to defend are for truly basic research in the sense 

 of intensive studies devoted to the perception and formulation 

 of new knowledge toward deeper understanding. 



Basic research was enlarged long ago to include the per- 

 sonal accumulation of information known to be of little or no 

 present interest to others. But first the engineers and chemists, 

 and then all of us, began to include under "Basic Research" 

 the systematic accumulation of measurements by organized 

 groups of technicians with a view to the usefulness of the re- 

 sulting tables of data for various technological purposes. This 

 kind of activity by large groups of technicians has expanded far 

 beyond systematic data-taking to include whole experimental 

 programs on a speculative basis, only very thinly flavored with 

 the personal interest of a competent individual and containing 

 only minute traces of the love of knowledge. The use of large 

 groups of technicians had enlarged the budgets and the support 

 of research Ions before World War II. We all embraced this 

 precedent heartily when the opportunity for much larger post- 

 war funds appeared, and we excused ourselves by saying that 

 even five per cent of these new big sums would underwrite 

 larger opportunities than were ever previously available for 

 studying the basic problems which really interested us. 



I might give a mild example. I have served for many years 

 on the Executive Committee of the United States National 

 Committee for the International Geophysical Year. When the 

 Russians announced that they would join this cooperative 



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