May* 14, 1920] 



SCIENCE 



475 



desiderata. TMs would be efficiency in tlie 

 German sense and a reasonable regard for sucb 

 dem'ands is necessary and desirable. There are, 

 however, it seems to me, some more funda- 

 mental viewpoints that under stress of im- 

 mediate physical need may be overlooked. 

 And first among these is the fact that as noted 

 stimulation, initiation, regulation, coordina- 

 tion, do not furnish motive power, imply in- 

 deed an exhaustion of energy rather than its 

 increase. The withdrawal of men from the 

 active prosecution of their own investigations 

 in order that they may spend time on commis- 

 sions, boards and other executive agencies for 

 controlling and directing the research of others 

 is doubtless a necessary evil but is in danger 

 of being regarded as a useful end in itself. 

 The activity of such agencies in securing 

 funds and thus contributing to the motive 

 power 'back of research is quite another matter 

 but even there it is deplorable when a man of 

 first-class talent withdraws from his own work 

 and devotes his energies to obtaining financial 

 support for a group who thus become in a 

 sense his subordinates. If he makes efforts 

 to direct and coordinate in detail the activi- 

 ties of such a group with their diverse 

 capacities and widely separated lines of activ- 

 ity, his influence may even be positively harm- 

 ful. The importance and advantage of co- 

 operation in research have been very ade- 

 quately and effectively presented from many 

 quarters. The socialistic trend is obvious 

 here as in so many phases of modern thought 

 and action and it is at least worth while to 

 consider what may be said from other view- 

 points. Of spontaneous cooperation individ- 

 ually initiated there can not be too much, 

 but if it becomes the fashion to work only in 

 groups and on problems in which group inter- 

 est can be aroused in my opinion we shall be 

 disregarding many obvious teachings of ex- 

 perience. You may gather from this that I 

 am not hopeful that research can be socialized 

 in any very significant degree. It seems to me 

 that this is especially true of those higher 

 efforts of the human mind when it actually 

 breaks over age old barriers or enters on wholly 

 new and hitherto unsuspected fields for thought 



and action. Routine solutions of definite and 

 simple problems can be achieved by the factory 

 and piece work system but the highest achieve- 

 ments of the mind are always individual and 

 seem frequently to mock all attempts to re- 

 late them to the environment or the period of 

 their occurrence. In my opinion the distinc- 

 tion between routine research on the problems 

 which are already clearly stated and for which 

 methods of attack are oibvious from data 

 available and the studies which really open up 

 new fields of hitherto unperceived interest and 

 importance or solve problems long given up as 

 ridiculous, is more significant than that be- 

 tween so-called pure and applied science. This 

 distinction, it seems to me, has been over- 

 worked at leaist in its relations to the develop- 

 ment of research. On the other hand, whether 

 or no we conceive ourselves as either practically 

 or theoretically able, by taking thought, to in- 

 fluence the course of events, it may tend to 

 clearness of thought about what is actually 

 going on in these times of turmoil and excite- 

 ment if we recognize more fully that there are 

 these two types of research activity, each with 

 its own clearly marked prerequisites. The war 

 experience of the nation has shown plainly 

 enough that when the money and incentive are 

 at hand staffs of experts can be organized and 

 laboratories equipped on Short notice which 

 can solve a vast number of important problems 

 relating to the chemistry of dyes, high ex- 

 plosives, gas warfare, aeroplane engines, etc., 

 with a high degree of promptness and effi- 

 ciency. I am sure too that we should be mis- 

 taken if we expect from such efforts only new 

 applications of already known theoretic prin- 

 ciples. We are perhaps quite as likely to ar- 

 rive at theoretically significant new concep- 

 tions of matter and energy in the study of the 

 vastly practical problems of static disturb- 

 ances in wireless telegraphy (which problems 

 by the way the newspapers recently announced 

 had 'been solved by work in the laboratories of 

 a great commercial corporation) as in the 

 study of the wave theory of electricity as such 

 with no practical problem in mind. 



A vast amount of useful and theoretically 

 highly important work is being turned out 



