NATURE 



93 



THURSDAY, MARCH 25, 1920. 



than 



Knowledge and Power. 



TO-DAY, in almost every sphere of activity, as 

 is widely recognised, the majority of the 

 important problems that have to be handled are 

 largely technical in character ; this is so whether 

 these problems lie in the broad domain of national 

 policy, in the narrower limits of administrative 

 action, or in the restricted fields of executive per- 

 formance. To this situation is due, as is well 

 known, the need that has arisen in recent times 

 for that high degree of specialisation in certain 

 kinds of knowledge which has revolutionised the 

 scheme of organisation of the personnel in the 

 fields of commerce and industry, and is likewise 

 responsible for the introduction, in many enter- 

 prises throughout the world, of the regime of the 

 expert. 



Being, comparatively speaking, a newcomer in 

 the realms of officialdom, the modern technical 

 expert has still to be assigned his place of prece- 

 tdence there, and at the same time to have the 

 Ucope of his authority and the dignity of his status 

 [definitely determined and unequivocably declared. 

 fThese are matters calling for early attention, for 

 ■a suspicion exists, not without foundation, that, 

 'whilst in commercial and industrial circles the 

 |«xpert has been very generally permitted to occupy 

 [a position of influence compatible with the import- 

 ance of his metier, in the governmental sphere 

 ;the expert has, more often than not, been rele- 

 [gated to a position in which his every purpose is 

 [rendered more ,or less ineffectual, one, moreover, 

 ■in which the exercise of his legitimate activities 

 is barely tolerated by those occupying the clerical 

 or controlling positions. 



During the past few years the prevailing 

 uneasiness regarding the unsatisfactory footing 

 on which the technical staff in the public services 

 finds itself has been quickened, owing largely to 

 an appreciation on the part of the public of the 

 fact that it was the failure in governmental 

 quarters to give heed to the advice of the technical 

 expert that wa#>i responsible for bringing the 

 country to the brink of a dire catastrophe — one, 

 indeed, which, at the crisis of the late war, threat- 

 ened its continued existence as an independent 

 people, one from which it escaped with but a very 

 narrow margin. 



The British public had been persuaded to 

 believe that any deficiency in the military 

 NO. 2630, VOL. 105] 



establishments of the country was more 

 counterbalanced and compensated for by reason 

 of the high perfection to which every detail con- 

 nected with the Royal Navy had been brought. In 

 the circumstances, the public may well be par- 

 doned for the belief so firmly held by it before 

 the Great War that the British Navy had 

 nothing whatever to learn from either friend 

 or foe. 



That the popular conceptions on the foregoing 

 matters were in many respects erroneous now 

 stands out in cold print in the pages of Lord 

 Jellicoe's "The Grand Fleet, 1914-16." 1 In the pre- 

 face to this book it is stated in unequivocal terms 

 that the Germans were "superior to us in 

 material." The gallant Admiral does not limit 

 himself to generalisations, but on many a page 

 he particularises the specific matters in which the 

 equipment or arrangements on our battleships 

 were deficient, defective, or obsolete, and our 

 defence works wanting. For example, he states : 

 "The Jutland battle convinced us that our armour- 

 piercing shell was inferior in its penetrative power 

 to that used by the Germans." "Some delay 

 occurred in improving our range-finders. . . , Our 

 most modern ships were provided with range- 

 finders 15 ft. in length, but the majority of the 

 ships were fitted with instruments only 9 ft. long. 

 During 1917 successful steps were taken to 

 supply range-finders up to 25 ft. and 30 ft, in 

 length; a series of experiments with stereoscopic 

 range-finders was also instituted in the same year. 

 It had become known that the Germans used this 

 type of range-finders." "The use of smoke 

 screens was closely investigated as a result of our 

 experience of the German use of this device." 

 " Neither our searchlights nor their control arrange- 

 ments were at this time of the best type." The 

 foregoing are but a few of the specific matters in 

 which the foremost Navy in the world is recorded 

 to have been outstripped, at a critical period of 

 the war, by a rival of new creation. 



In other directions, too, was Great Britain lack- 

 ing in the matter of naval defence. For example, 

 reference is made by Lord Jellicoe to the fact that 

 harbour defences and obstructions were non- 

 existent in the early days of the war. Again, 

 it is stated that in the matter of gunnery and 

 torpedo practices considerable leeway had to be 

 made good. As regards the former, after the out- 

 break of war a great extension of the system of 

 director firing, by which one officer or man can 



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