December 24, 1920] 



SCIENCE 



601 



discuss the advisability of drawing up stand- 

 ard specifications for laboratory apparatus to 

 be used in their industrial research and works 

 control laboratories : Barrett Company, Gen- 

 eral Chemical Company, Atmospheric Nitro- 

 gen Corporation, Grasselli Chemical Com- 

 pany, N'ational Aniline & Chemical Company, 

 New Jersey Zinc Company, Solvay Process 

 Company, Standard Oil Company of New 

 Jersey, and E. I. DuPont de Nemours & 

 Company. 



It developed at this meeting that material 

 savings might be expected to develop from 

 this work. Since most of these companies 

 are members of the Manufacturing Chemists 

 Association of the United States, a committee 

 composed of these members was appointed by 

 the Manufacturing Chemists Association to 

 pass on the proposals of the informal com- 

 mittee and to recommend the adoption of the 

 specifications resulting from the informal 

 committee's work as standard for the members 

 of the Manufacturing Chemists Association. 



Arrangements have been made for full 

 cooperation with the Committee on Guaran- 

 teed Reagents and Standard Apparatus of 

 the American Chemical Society, and also with 

 the committee on standards of the Association 

 of Scientific Apparatus Makers of the United 

 States of America. These specifications will 

 be considered carefully by committees of these 

 three societies, and it is expected that they 

 will then be published as tentative for a 

 period of six months in order to give time for 

 general criticism. At the end of that time 

 the specifications will be adopted as final. 



In carrying on this work an effort will be 

 made to obtain specifications which will in- 

 sure the cheapest mode of manufacture of a 

 given instrument consistent with the duties 

 that it must perform. 



To date, three meetings of this committee 

 have been held and considerable progress has 

 been made. The committee desires to co- 

 operate fully with all industries, and any 

 communications should be forwarded to the 

 chairman, Dr. E. C. Lathrop, E. I. duPont de 

 Nemours & Company, Wilmington, Delaware. 



NEEDS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SURVEY 

 PROGRAM 



One of the features of the forty-first Annual 

 Report of the Director of the United States 

 Geological Survey, just made public, is the 

 statement that though, during the 40 years of 

 its existence, the Geological Survey's policy 

 has been to contribute material for a national 

 plan to gain scientific knowledge of the na- 

 tion's mineral resources, yet the greatest need 

 of the Geological Survey to-day is a plan for 

 itseK— a program. The recognized function 

 of a scientific bureau is to collect and arrange 

 facts upon which the nation may base its plans 

 for future development, but the Geological 

 Survey now finds itself unable to plan ade- 

 quately its own development. It lacks that 

 assurance of continued appropriations that 

 would encourage or warrant long-term investi- 

 gations, a few of which are absolutely essen- 

 tial to any forward-looking program of scien- 

 tific research. The increasing gap between the 

 government scale of professional salaries and 

 the scale prevailing in commercial employ- 

 ment causes a continual change in personnel 

 that makes the administration of scientific 

 work almost hopeless. The responsible official, 

 in arranging to have the work done that is 

 most needed, actually has his choice of pro- 

 jects determined for him by the personnel 

 available. For each scientist of fully tested 

 ability the choice has to be made between sev- 

 eral pieces of work, all of which deserve im- 

 mediate attention. Even less satisfactory is 

 the situation in which an urgent call for a 

 geologic field examination has to be met by 

 assigning to it an untried worker. The report 

 holds that the net result is that the Geological 

 Survey is not fully occupying the field which 

 is recognized as peculiarly its own. It could, 

 however, occupy that field. With slightly in- 

 creased appropriations, and especially with the 

 declaration of intent by Congress to regard 

 the scientific bureau as having successfully 

 passed its probationary period, greater stabil- 

 ity might be expected and some progress might 

 be made in the adoption of a program fitted to 

 the country's needs. 



