ADDRESSES 



*THE BOTANICAL OPPORTUNITY 



John M. Coulter,, University of Chicago 



In connection with the period of reconstruction, there 

 has come to the science of botany a great opportunity, and 

 botanists must rise to the occasion. It is a critical time 

 for our science, for we may lapse into our former state and 

 become submerged by more aggressive sciences that will 

 rise to the occasion. You realize that at the present mo- 

 ment the scientific study of plants is more fully recognized 

 as a great public service than ever before in the history of 

 botany. The recent pressure for food, and for a wide range 

 of plant materials and products has been met in the main, 

 not by so-called practical men, but by trained botanists. 

 Not only the practical government service, but also many 

 industries are calling for botanists with fundamental 

 training, realizing as never before that progress is based 

 upon research. 



A response to this opportunity for public service does not 

 mean less science, but more science; but it ties up our 

 science so closely to the human interest that it will be in 

 large demand. We are on the rising tide of the greatest 

 demand for trained botanists we have ever known, and it 

 is our task to see to it that the tide does not ebb and leave 

 the profession stranded. If we respond, the opportunities 

 for research will be greater than ever before, as they 

 always are when a science is recognized as of large service. 



My purpose is to indicate certain things we must stress 

 in ourselves and in our students if we are to rise to the 

 opportunity. 



1. The synthetic vieic. — As we all know, botany has 

 developed many fields of research, and as these fields have 

 multiplied, botanists have become more and more segre- 

 gated into groups ; in fact, in the history of botany we have 

 just been passing through the phase of "^ the analysis of our 

 subject. 



The development of research increased this narrowing 

 process, for it deals with special regions of a general field. 

 For example, in research there came to be as many kinds 



• Complete paper published in Science. N. S. Vol. XLIX, page 363. 



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