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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLIV. No. 1126 



boundaries between them are by no means 

 fast and one crosses readily from one into 

 the other field, but with less and less fre- 

 quency does one attempt to do both types of 

 work at once. The relations between these 

 workers are highly cooperative, and usually 

 mutually appreciative. The practitioner, 

 as the original patron of the medical sci- 

 ences, was at first inclined to regard his 

 laboratory colleague as a high-grade tech- 

 nical assistant, and, being closer to the 

 source of human disease problems, he still 

 at times assumes a somewhat ex cathedra 

 attitude as to what problems the medical 

 scientist should investigate. Concerning 

 the actual method of investigation he has, 

 through lack of experience, become tacitly 

 acquiescent. The relation of these workers 

 in regard to the problems themselves is an 

 interesting one and worthy of fuller elabo- 

 ration. 



It is obvious that the practitioner, 

 through constant contact with the sick, 

 knows of more problems that need solution, 

 but through failure to appreciate the 

 limitations of scientific method he does not 

 usually appreciate those problems whieh 

 can be solved. The clinician is constantly 

 asking the laboratory man for explanations 

 or help that can not as yet be given, and is 

 often surprised when he asks whether A 

 and B in conjunction will produce a condi- 

 tion C to be answered evasively, or told 

 that D equals E. The clinician has had the 

 tables reversed on him and must perforce 

 content himself with what is given him to 

 apply and not ask for what he would like. 

 A slight misunderstanding each in the 

 other's point of view must arise when we 

 consider the differences in the material with 

 which each man has to deal. The clinician 

 is interested primarily with the needs of 

 individuals, with the problem of a case ; the 

 scientist with disease entities, with a com- 

 plex composed of all the cases of a partic- 



ular malady that have existed, or that may 

 exist, or frequently with some more abstract 

 line of investigation arising from them. In 

 the first instance the problem, though acute, 

 is a personal and passing one that in the 

 particular case will disappear before the 

 question that has arisen can possibly be an- 

 swered; in the latter case the solution is 

 acceptable however long it may be in com- 

 ing. It is easy to understand the impa- 

 tience of the clinician who wishes results in 

 order that he may apply them to Mr. A, 

 and on the other hand it is reasonable to 

 appreciate the refusal of the laboratory 

 man to be dragged from a promising prob- 

 lem of fundamental import to investigate 

 superficially an ephemeral individual symp- 

 tom. "While it is still possible for the labo- 

 ratory man to be influenced in choosing his 

 problems, he travels fastest by following 

 attentively those problems which his own 

 work has suggested. It is often more prof- 

 itable in the end to follow what appear to 

 be irrelevant ramifications rather than to 

 attempt direct determination, let us say of 

 the cause of cancer, or a specific cure for 

 tuberculosis. I venture to say that these 

 questions will not be answered by what we 

 consider direct attack, for it is the habit of 

 nature to respond to our interrogations with 

 apparent indirectness. The real indirect- 

 ness of course lies in the way we put our 

 questions and not in nature 's response. "We 

 plan an experiment and await a result 

 which shall be firmly yes or no ; the answer 

 is neither of these, but something that 

 throws no light on the original inquiry. 

 Blessed is the man who sees in this incom- 

 prehensible reply the starting-point of a 

 new line of inquiry which may take him 

 far afield from the goal he had first in 

 mind. "We scientists are like rag-pickers, 

 some fumble through masses of rubbish 

 looking for a certain coin, while the true 

 investigator takes up each object that is 



