4 THE PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS 



acceptable. Time makes ancient good uncouth. When two bodies 

 are violent or ungainly in impact, both may be damaged. If the 

 written constitution of the United States, devised for the ' horse and 

 buggy ' days, still proves not to be amenable to adjustment for such 

 demands, it will be difficult to overstate the repercussion upon 

 economic developments and the scientific enterprise that originates 

 them. Let the Supreme Court Decision of unconstitutionality on the 

 Tennessee Valley experiment in large scale applied science to natural 

 problems on a co-ordinated plan bear witness. Such unnecessary 

 resistance may be responsible for much of what has been aptly 

 called ' the frustration of science.' Avoidable friction in the recep- 

 tion given to scientific discovery not only deprives the community 

 of advantages it might otherwise have enjoyed much earlier, or 

 creates a heavy balance of cost on their adoption ; it may also 

 discourage applied science itself, making it a less attractive and 

 worthwhile pursuit. In that sense we are considering also the 

 impact of society upon science. This too is not new. The Associa- 

 tion had as one of its first objects ' to obtain a more general attention 

 to the objects of Science, and a removal of any disadvantages of a 

 public kind which impede its progress.' The first address ever 

 offered affirmed that the most effectual method of promoting science 

 was the removal of the obstacles opposing its progress, and the 

 President instanced the very serious obstacles in the science of 

 optics due to the regulations relating to the manufacture of glass. 

 To-day perhaps the scientist places more stress upon the failure 

 of governments to encourage, than upon their tendency to dis- 

 courage. So much then for the idea of impact. Is the scientist 

 or inventor responsible for impact, and if not, who is ? 



Elsewhere I have retouched Jeremy Bentham's poignant picture 

 of the inventor of over a century ago, plans and cap in hand, on the 

 doorstep of the rich or influential, waiting for someone to believe 

 in him. From this type of external ' sport ' amongst engineers and 

 scientists came much or most industrial innovation, external to the 

 processes of business. To-day, in the older and applied sciences 

 affecting industry the solo scientist is the exception and, with the 

 large research departments of particular businesses and trade research 

 associations, the picture is quite different — the expenditure higher, 

 but the results much more rapid and numerous even if for a time 

 they may be kept secret. Although records of finished work may 

 be available over the civilised world, there is much overlapping of 

 current work, but the price of this as a whole is a far smaller fraction 

 of the total result, if we omit from our consideration the first magni- 

 tude discoveries of epoch-making influence. The industrial com- 

 munity is now far more amenable than hitherto to scientific influence, 

 indeed it is often the instigator in the mass of minor advances. The 



