386 



NATURE 



[July 17, 1919 



of co-partnery in the vessels built as patrols 

 during the war having been opposed by the 

 trawler owners because of its financial unsound- 

 ness. The vessels themselves are now offered for 

 public sale. The situation obsesses anyone who 

 has anything- to do with it, and has become in- 

 tolerable — if not farcical. 



It is to be hoped that the confusion is only the 

 means towards some satisfactory solution of the 

 difficulties, that the time will come when every- 

 body will be thinking alike — a psychological 

 moment, as the phrase goes — and that then the 

 problem will resolve itself. Anything that is pub- 

 lished at the present time is interesting in view of 

 this consummation, and several utterances of late 

 seem to help a little. The report of the Executive 

 Committee of the British Science Guild presented 

 to the general meeting on June 17 last. Prof. 

 Herdman's report to the Lancashire Fisheries 

 Committee, recently issued, and a lecture by Prof. 

 Mcintosh, published in the columns of Nature 

 of July 3 and 10, all have interest in this con- 

 nection. The guild's report will be received with 

 general approval by men of science, though it 

 may offend the Philistines in Government offices 

 and in the industry. It agrees with the recom- 

 mendations of the Machinery of Government 

 Committee, regards thought and investigation as 

 desirable preliminaries to action, and urges that 

 the organisation of scientific and industrial 

 research should be the task of a State Department 

 presided over by a Minister. Investigations con- 

 trolled by administrative officials, the report 

 suggests, are likely to be narrowed in scope and 

 abandoned if they should not prove to be " prac- 

 tical. " Probably this is true, but one seems to 

 notice that fishery administration is becoming less 

 important than it was, while scientific and indus- 

 trial research is much more so, and is attract- 

 ing a greater share of public attention. Develop- 

 ment can be helped very much by investigation, 

 but is only likely to be hampered by restrictions 

 and regulations (which have been the motives of 

 the "administration " of the past). Governmental 

 and other fishery authorities are, therefore, 

 unlikely to neglect scientific and industrial 

 research in the future. 



Probably both the administrative people and 

 the researchers will approve of Prof. Herdman's 

 summary of the situation. There are, he says, 

 two categories of fishery research, one having 

 practical administrative, and the other specula- 

 tive, value. And yet there are not two categories, 

 but only one, for the same mechanism of research 

 can, and does, achieve both kinds of results. 

 Practical results raise questions of strictly 

 scientific interest, while speculative results may 

 at any moment become of practical importance. 

 So also there might be two ways of controlling 

 and organising research, one by a Department 

 of State, which might only think and suggest, 

 and the other by the administrative authorities 

 making the universities their instruments. To 

 deprive the authorities of the privilege of doing 

 research would tend to sterilise their activities, 

 NO. 2594, VOL. 103] 



while to create a Government Department quite 

 out of touch with the industry would tend to 

 set up a kind of Olympic pedantry. So these two 

 means of controlling research must also be one. 

 In short, Prof. Herdman adopts the methods of 

 Athanasius, and in seeking to reconcile the 

 intransigents suggests a way out from the con- 

 fusion. 



Lastly, Prof. Mcintosh, after a long life spent 

 in marine biological research and a greater experi- 

 ence of fishery investigation than anyone else, 

 seeks to summarise his views as to what has 

 been achieved by the International Council for 

 Fishery Investigations during the last dozen years 

 or so. That research was instigated, on 

 one hand, by the "melancholy anticipations of 

 the pessimists," and, on the other, by the far 

 sounder motive of seeking to discover the reasons 

 for seasonal physical and metabolic changes in the 

 ocean and in its inhabitants. Pessimism as to 

 the future of the fisheries was well expressed by 

 Prof. Garstang in his paper on " The Impoverish- 

 ment of the Sea," and a vigorous optimism was 

 proclaimed by the doyen of marine biologists in 

 his book "The Resources of the Sea." There 

 were thus two opposed theses, one that the 

 exploitation of the fishing-grounds was exceed- 

 ing their recuperative power, and the other 

 that fishing operations were carried on on too 

 small a sc^le to make any appreciable difference. 

 Now nobody is quite sure which thesis is proved, 

 and anybody who is asked to give an opinion will 

 certainly be inclined to hedge. 



This back-number controversy, of which Profs. 

 Mcintosh and Garstang were the protagonists, 

 has not so much interest for us just now. Some 

 time must elapse before fishery operations' will 

 attain, much less surpass, their pre-war intensity ; 

 it will be a long- time before the transport 

 systems of Europe will be able to take fish every- 

 where that it is required, and so long as the 

 prices of inferior categories of fish remain high 

 not so much complaint of impoverishment of the 

 superior categories will be heard from the entre- 

 preneurs. But it is certain again to arise, and 

 as we ought to possess the means of closuring it 

 we cannot afford to scrap the mechanism of inter- 

 national investigation or kill the germ of inter- 

 national regulation. Even if it should be proved 

 that the cherished fear of progressive impoverish- 

 ment is a real one, that would be a result of 

 exceedingly practical importance, for we might 

 then be enabled to scrap the machinery of regula-" 

 tions, restrictions, prohibitions, and policing, all of 

 which Is expensive to maintain, and intolerable if 

 it is unnecessary. But even then there would 

 arise questions as to means of rendering this 

 superabundance of food available on a greater 

 scale by developing methods of preservation and 

 utilisation in ways not yet attempted. And since 

 man does not live by food alone, an international 

 organisation will have much to do in the promo- 

 tion of purely oceanographical discovery, which 

 may be regarded as quite properly a part of the 

 activities of civilised communities. J. J. 



