24 THE PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS 



it, according to public mentality. The economics of a community 

 not economically self-conscious are quite different from those of a 

 people who watch every sign and act accordingly. Thus the 

 common notion that economics should be judged by its ability to 

 forecast (especially to a particular date) is quite fallacious, for the 

 prophecy, if ' true ' and believed, must destroy itself, inasmuch as 

 the economic conduct involved in the forecast is different after the 

 forecast from what it would have been before. The paradox is 

 just here, for example : if a people are told that the peak of prices 

 in a commodity will actually be on June 10, they will all so act that 

 they anticipate the date and destroy it. Economics, thoroughly 

 comprehended, can well foretell the effects of a tendency, but hardly 

 ever the precise date or amount of critical events in those effects. 

 The necessity for a concentration upon new theoretical and analytical 

 analysis, and upon realistic research, is very great. But so also is 

 the need for widespread and popular teaching. For a single chemist 

 or engineer may by his discovery affect the lives of millions who 

 enter into it but do not understand it, whereas a conception in 

 economic life, however brilliant, generally requires the conformity 

 of the understanding and wills of a great number before it can be 

 effective. 



But not alone economics : if the impact of science brings certain 

 evils they can only be cured by more science. Ordered knowledge 

 and principles are wanted at every point. Let us glance at three 

 only, in widely different fields : man's work, man's health, man's 

 moral responsibility. The initial impact of new science is in the 

 factory itself. The kind of remedy required here is covered by the 

 work of the National Institute of Industrial Psychology. Some of this 

 improves upon past conditions, some creates the conditions of greater 

 production, but much of it combats the evils arising from new 

 conditions created by modern demands, speed, accuracy and 

 intensity. It invokes the aid of many branches of science. It is the 

 very first point of impact. Yet its finance is left to personal advocacy, 

 and commands not 10 per cent, of the expenditure on research in 

 artificial silk, without which the world was reasonably happy for 

 some centuries. We can judge of the scope of this by the reports 

 of the Industrial Health Research Board. Again, the scientific 

 ancillaries of medicine have made immense strides. Clinical medi- 

 cine as an art makes tardy, unscientific and halting use of them. 

 The public remain as credulous as ever, their range of gullibility 

 widened with every pseudo-scientific approach. (We do not know 

 what proportion of positive cases can create the illusion of a signi- 

 ficant majority in mass psychology, but I suspect that it is often 

 as low as twenty per cent.) For a considerable range of troubles 

 inadequately represented in hospitals, the real experience passes 



