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NATURAL SCIENCE: 



A Monthly RevieAV of Scientific Progress. 



No. 20. Vol III. OCTOBER. 1893. 



NOTES AND COMMENTS. 



The Organisation of Science. 



ONE of the most gratifying announcements of the month in 

 British Science, is a statement by Lord Rayleigh to the effect 

 that the Royal Society of London has lately appointed a committee to 

 consider, in an entirely impartial manner, whether or not the prc- 

 cedure of that body can be altered with advantage. His lordship's 

 speech was made before Section A of the British Association, in the 

 course of a discussion on the publication of scientific papers. The 

 physicists have been much excited of Jate on the publication question, 

 and it was thought that a debate at Nottingham might do something 

 further towards a solution of difficulties. 



The anonymous author of a little pamphlet " On the Organisation 

 of Science," which we reviewed in June, 1892, seems to have been 

 the first, in recent years, to issue a reasoned plea for a more sys- 

 tematic method of publication of scientific papers, and the centralisation 

 of the publishing authority ; but as we pointed out at the time, and 

 as Lord Rayleigh remarked at Nottingham, there is the great 

 difficulty of censorship and the fear of a dominating clique. One of 

 the essentials for progress is absolute freedom ; and so long as there 

 are competitive journals and rival societies, there is little danger of 

 any novel views being suppressed merely on account of their unortho- 

 doxy. The physicists and mathematicians of the British Association 

 seem to have been agreed that there is no real necessity for inter- 

 ference with the " disorganisation " of present arrangements ; but 

 that there ought to be some recognised central authority for the 

 periodical issue of volumes of abstracts relating to each branch of 

 Science. This is the work that Professor Rlicker and some others 

 would like to see undertaken, or at any rate supervised, by the Royal 

 Society ; and the committee will certainly confer a great boon upon 



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