302 EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD. 



'•(1) The devolopnu'iit of research effort has not been symmetrical 

 and logical. Adeciuatoly trained men have not been provided in 

 sufficient nuinbers to expend in the way of capable investigation the 

 entire amounts of national and state appropriations that have been 

 applied to agricultural research. This is one of the reasons why the 

 more difficult agricultural problems have so largely remained 

 untouched. . . . 



"(2) Many persons nominally holding research positions have been 

 investigators only in name, for their time and energy have been 

 absorbed by other duties. . . . 



"(3) The jDcrsistent and widespread promotion of popular educa- 

 tion and of public good will has unquestionably had a profound, and 

 not always immediately healthful, influence on the extent and 

 character of . . . agricultural research. . . . 



"(J:) The urgent and natural call for results that would produce an 

 immediate and favorable reaction upon the public mind has not only 

 brought about an era of the diffusion, rather than of the acquisition, 

 of knowledge, but has. quite generally, led to the study of problems 

 admitting of prompt conclusions, more particularly problems of a 

 business character directly related to financial benefit, rather than 

 those that are fundamental. . . . 



" (5) As one result of the close association of scientific inquiry and 

 popular education a true conception of real and efficient research has 

 not been fully maintained in the minds of all those engaged in the 

 work of agricultural investigation. The effect of such a situation 

 upon the progress of agricultural knowledge is obvious." 



Among the recommendations which in the judgment of the com- 

 mission "should guide in the promotion, organization, and prosecu- 

 tion of research in agricidture "' and Avhich are regarded '"" as essential 

 to bringing about the conditions that all friends of agricultural prog- 

 ress desire to see established, " are the following : 



"(l)Eveiy effort should be made to promote the training of com- 

 petent investigators in agriculture both in the agricultural, and, so 

 far as practicable, in the nonagricultural, colleges and universities, 

 and their training should be as broad and severe as for any other field 

 of research. 



"(2) The progress of agricultural knowledge now demands that 

 agricultural research agencies shall deal as largely as possible with 

 fundamental problems, confining attention to such as can be ade- 

 quately studied with the means available. 



"(3) The work of research in agriculture should be differentiated 

 as fully as practicable, both in the form of organization and in the 

 relations of the individual investigator, from executive work, routine 

 teaching, promotion, and propaganda, and should be under the imme- 



