THE SUPPORT OF BASIC RESEARCH 



But suppose that the private foundations do have "a vital 

 and unique role," as the President's Science Advisory Com- 

 mittee says, "in supporting imaginative and audacious research 

 that industry or Government may not always support." There 

 are some puzzling implications. The foundations control only 

 a very small fraction of the total money available for research 

 support. As government and industrial funds grow larger and 

 larger, the foundations are quite likely — indeed some of them 

 feel impelled — to follow their historic role of pace setters by 

 transferring their support from the physical and biological 

 sciences to the social sciences and humanities. Does this leave 

 the most imaginative research in the natural sciences with 



O 



no source of support? Government agencies cannot blandly 

 leave to private foundations the double responsibility of pioneer- 

 ing new fields and supporting all the bolder and more risky ven- 

 tures in the old fields. The foundations simply do not have 

 enough money to run the risks in all fields. 



This particular puzzle went unresolved, but the discussion 

 made it clear that the private foundations have in the past 

 played a uniquely effective role in recognizing the importance 

 or new fields and in supporting pioneering research with a 

 flexibility and boldness that government agencies and many 

 universities could not match. The continuing importance of 

 such support was pointed out again and again during the 

 symposium discussion. 



Communication 



It has long been recognized that the progress of basic re- 

 search is vitally dependent on the freedom and effectiveness of 

 communication among scientists. Symposium participants did 

 not have a great deal to say about this problem, partly because 

 it was taken for granted that the present major efforts to improve 

 communication would be continued. But several points were 



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