DAEL WOLFLE 



must take steps to have the practice more generally adopted." 

 For the man who is really qualified for such an appoint- 

 ment, this, surely, is a more effective method of using talent 

 than is the method of requiring him to hunt around for a new 

 grant for each new idea. Confidence and trust are required, 

 and some of the career appointees will turn out to be disappoint- 

 ments. But the ones who are not disappointments will he able 

 to concentrate on research and not on getting money for each 

 new problem. Extra funds will sometimes be needed, for some 

 of the lifetime investigators will turn up ideas that require ex- 

 pensive equipment, but special grants can always be used to 

 supplement the resources of the lifetime appointment when 

 extra money is necessary. 



The career investigator ship, or research professorship, is a 

 means of furthering basic research that the symposium par- 

 ticipants recommend be used more widely. 



Support for U uiversities 



The system recommended by Dr. Tuve is designed to give 

 outstanding research scholars freedom to work uninterruptedly 

 on what seem to them the most important scientific tasks. This is 

 fine, for a relatively small number of outstanding scholars. But 

 the freedom and flexibility of support that are essential for their 

 work are also — though perhaps to a lesser extent and in modified 

 form — important for the furtherance of all basic research. In 

 the universities, the way to support all competent scientists is 

 to improve and support the universities. 



Support of universities contrasts sharply with the system of 

 individual project grants, a system that came in for much and 

 varied criticism. The project grant is made for a limited time, 

 frequently for too short a time. It is awarded to support work 

 that the researcher can describe in some detail, frequently too 

 early in the course of the work to permit him to give an accurate 

 description of what will turn out to be most worth doing. The 



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