ROBERT S. MORISON 



of experiments which overthrow the doctrine of the individu- 

 ality of the gene. In a word we have become used to the tenta- 

 tive nature of natural science and are inclined to expect that 

 todays truth will soon become tomorrow's special case. The 

 real difficulty confronting foundation officers and others re- 

 sponsible tor the selection of imaginative research is of a differ- 

 ent sort. Sometimes, but actually not nearly so frequently as is 

 often supposed, imaginative people are odd characters who 

 make trouble for their superiors. In occasional instances their 

 anxiety to make a real leap into the future causes them to 

 overlook certain traditional niceties in experimental method 

 in a way which gives their work an initially uncertain and 

 inelegant character. By the usual criteria the work simply 

 doesn't look very good. Maybe the worker has an additional 

 tendency to overlook evidence already in the literature which 

 tends to throw doubt on the big new idea. Indeed, the most 

 original and inventive person I happen to know has told me 

 that he never tells his friends about a new idea until he has 

 worked on it for some time. If he did, he feels sure that thev 

 would think up any number of perfectly valid reasons for be- 

 lieving it to be no good. 



It is situations such as this that give foundation officers 

 and other research underwriters their gray hairs. Boldness is 

 indeed needed to pick out and support the new idea brought 

 in by the relatively untried investigator. But where does bold- 

 ness end and recklessness begin? After all, the boards and staffs 

 of foundations hold their funds as a public trust and by tem- 

 perament are far too conscientious to gamble continuously. 

 Actually it is not immediatelv obvious why the private foun- 

 dations should be any bolder than the government agencies in 

 dealing with the possibly highly original project which does 

 not meet the usual methodological criteria. Indeed the case 

 can be made that the government agencies are frequently in a 



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