November 14, 1919] 



SCIENCE 



461 



Sir Clifford AUbutt, K.C.B., F.E.S., Dr. E. T. 

 Leiper, Professor Benjamin Moore, F.R.S., 

 Mx. E. B. Turner, F.R.C.S., Professor J. S. 

 Haldane, P.R.S.; and for the British Science 

 Guild, Professor Bayliss, F.R.S., and Dr. 

 Somerville (Chairman and Secretary of the 

 Guild's Health Committee), Sir Alfred 

 Keogh, G.C.B., and Sir Ronald Ross. 



We have called attention to this matter 

 in Science Progress over and over again, 

 without any definite result hitherto. There 

 is imlimited talk just now about the encour- 

 agement of science, but the vital point is 

 almost always omitted. This point is that, 

 unless you make it worth their while for men 

 of great abilities to investigate nature, they 

 will in many cases not be able to do so even 

 though they have the strongest inclination in 

 that direction. We are now spending large 

 sums of money for scientific work, but most 

 of it goes in providing laboratory facilities 

 and small salaries to junior men for " pot- 

 boiler work." This is certainly essential, and 

 we lodge no objection to such expenditure; 

 but, in addition, we must pay adequately for 

 the best possible brains. There is only one 

 way to do so — by paying for discoveries which 

 have already been made. There is really no 

 other way of detecting the best possible brain 

 when it exists. The proof of the pudding is 

 in the eating, and, of the best brain, in the 

 restJt obtained by it. We therefore think 

 that the world should organize a system of 

 pensions, not only for medical, but for all 

 work which has been of great value to the 

 public at large without being remimerative to 

 the worker. Such a thing is only common 

 sense, common justice and common morality. 



The case of the medical scientific worker is 

 the strongest of all. Few people recognize 

 that medical science brings in almost no pay- 

 ment even when it results in discoveries 

 which are really revolutionizing civilization. 

 The fact is that, of all great events in history, 

 perhaps none exceed in importance the dis- 

 coveries made during the last century regard- 

 ing the natirre of human diseases and their 

 prevention and cure. Yet the people who 

 have made these discoveries have generally 

 lived, we might almost say, in extreme 



poverty. We believe that the salaries of 

 pathological professors amount generally to 

 only a few hundred a year, and seldom, if 

 ever, exceed one thousand pounds a year. 

 Even these posts appear to be seldom given 

 to men who have themselves made leading 

 medical discoveries. Some people seem to 

 think that such men are remunerated by 

 medical practise; but that is far from the 

 case, and anyway it is a poor kind of remun- 

 eration which is given only b.y means of addi- 

 tional work. For example, Jenner, the great 

 discoverer of vaccination, found that his 

 reputation in this line actually ruined his 

 medical practise; and it was partly for this 

 reason that early last century the British 

 Parliament (which was then a rational and 

 virile body) gave him £30,000 as a reward. 

 The reason for this is that everyone con- 

 siders a famous discoverer to be only a faddist 

 or a charlatan! Of course many other pur- 

 suits which are invaluable to civilization are 

 in precisely the same boat — other branches of 

 science, music, literature and sometimes even 

 painting, travel, etc. Our proposal is that 

 every nation should keep a pension fund for 

 really great work in these lines. We do not 

 suppose that the British Empire would have 

 to pay more than, say, £30,000 annually for 

 such pensions, as against many millions of 

 pounds which it now gives as a subvention for 

 loafing, incompetence, and unemployment. — 

 Science Progress. 



SPECIAL ARTICLES 



A METHOD OF ASSIGNING WEIGHTS TO 

 ORIGINAL OBSERVATIONS 



Persons accustomed to making precise 

 measurements know that the circumstances 

 attendant upon their work vary to such a 

 degree as to render some observations much 

 more reliable than others. When a series of 

 such results is adjusted, as by averaging the 

 measurements on a single quantity, it is 

 logical that some should be given greater 

 voice in deciding upon the most probable 

 value. This is done by assigning to each 

 observation a number, called its weight, which 

 represents the relative degree of reliability of 

 the observation in question. The practical 



