THE PRODUCTION OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE 185 



Science^ the Endless Frontier, include a new organization for 

 the production of scientific knowledge in the United States. 

 It is to be known as the National Research Foundation. It is 

 intended to make available a considerable amount of money 

 estimated to start at $33,500,000 and to reach §122,500,000 in 

 five years, these sums to be supplied by the federal govern- 

 ment from taxation. It is not proposed that the Research 

 Foundation should build, own, or operate laboratories. In- 

 stead, continuing the practice of the Office of Scientific Re- 

 search and Development through the war, programs will 

 be organized and supported in existing laboratories and 

 especially in the universities, and funds will be available for 

 assisting in the training of research workers and in the sup- 

 port of publication. This wide proposal has not yet been 

 implemented by legislation, so that it is too early to judge its 

 effect upon the future organization of scientific research in 

 the United States. The effect should, of course, be very bene- 

 ficial though there is certainly some danger that the support 

 of scientific research in the universities by an external body 

 might limit the freedom of choice of subject. No doubt this 

 danger will be recognized by the members of the Foundation, 

 and they will do their utmost to guard against it. Neverthe- 

 less, the history of science is full of cases where the interests 

 of some scientific worker have been so opposed to the general 

 trend of thought at the time that it would have been quite 

 impossible for him to obtain support for his ideas, and he 

 has been subject to active opposition and ridicule (Chapter 

 VII, page 170). 



The most important advances in science will continue to 

 be unexpected, improbable, and even unpalatable, and it is 

 essential that the men who are to make them should not be 

 prevented from doing so. In consideration of this matter, it 

 must not, however, be forgotten that universities at the pres- 

 ent time are tending more and more to embark upon indus- 

 trial research in co-operation with industry, much of this 

 so-called research being really development work of a type 

 calling for energy and inventive ability rather than for scien- 



