794 JOURNAL OF FORESTRY 



over again or by observing the same phenomena many times. By this- 

 means we study merely effects. We may learn the causes involved by 

 this method and we may not. At any rate it is a hit-or-miss process. 

 There is where research comes in ; it teaches us to co-ordinate our ob- 

 servations logically and to ultimately arrive at the cause which is 

 behind the effect observed. A recent editorial^ in the Experiment 

 Station Record, although it deals with agricultural research, explains 

 the reason for research very fully : 



"The reason for agricultural investigation and experiment is that our informa- 

 tion may be sound, that reason may prevail, that man may act and conduct his 

 operations rationally. In a large sense it is a study of the relationship of cause 

 and effect. Wherever an effect has been observed, there has been a cause, and 

 this cause becomes the object for study. If the purpose is to produce a certain 

 effect, knowledge of the phenomena which cause such effects or influence them 

 must be acquired before the effort becomes more than a hit-or-miss process. 

 The scientific method is that which takes account of all the forces acting. To 

 know the law we must understand the law, and this is equally true of a fact, or 

 a spray mixture, or a method of making cheese. 



"Science, whether pure or applied, proceeds on the principle that the same 

 causes acting under precisely the same conditions will produce exactly the same 

 effects. In other words, that nature is ordered by law and that there is nothing 

 arbitrary or capricious in its operations. Chance plays no part, and what we 

 observe is a lawful, natural consequence of causes which we may or may not 

 understand. When we do not understand why certain events occur, it means 

 that we do not understand the forces which acted to produce the events. But 

 there is nothing fortuitous or incapable of being understood through science, 

 either in the elaboration of starch in the growing plant or the benefits from- 

 fall plowing." 



Thus we begin to understand what research is, what it does, and why 

 we need it. But I cannot leave this part of the subject until I have 

 briefly spoken of the application of research to our present and future 

 prosperity. I wish, for a moment, to digress to the subject of the pres- 

 ent war. I think we foresters can learn a valuable lesson from it. At 

 least it ought to broaden our perspective. 



The present world conflict has brought out the fact, most forcibly,, 

 that we are living in an age of the intensive application of science to 

 the social, economic, and industrial affairs of modern civilization. In 

 fact, in its application to modern warfare, science has progressed to 

 such an extent (or degenerated, if you will) that it threatens to destroy 

 civilization itself. We are living in an age of "applied science" par 

 excellence. Peace, when it comes, far from changing the situation, will,, 

 if anything, intensify the application of science. 



* Experiment Station Record, 36 : 4, pp. 302, 1917. 



