Jantjaky 13, 1922] 



SCIENCE 



33 



must have felt that some of his time might 

 better be devoted to increasing the sensitivity 

 of the photogi'aphie plate, rather than to be 

 continuing the drudgery of keeping a telescope 

 accurately on a star for hours at a time. How- 

 ever, the astronomer knows well that the plate 

 makers themselves are fully alive to the desira- 

 bility of faster plates, which would have such 

 an enormous commercial value that the astro- 

 nomical applications would seem trivial in 

 comparison. Nevertheless, one can not but 

 speculate on the field which would be opened 

 to small telescopes if the photographic plate 

 were increased say tenfold in sensitivity, not 

 to mention the power which would then come 

 to large instruments. 



There is little need of discussing the relative 

 advantages of large and small telescopes, one 

 might as well discuss the possibilities of abun- 

 dant and meager resources ; but there is at least 

 the consolation to a possessor of a small instru- 

 ment that he does not need to use it all the time 

 simply to justify the capital expenditure in his 

 equipment. He is therefore much freer to try 

 out new ideas, and even to waste a great deal of 

 time, without the immediate necessity of pro- 

 ducing results in proportion to his facilities. 

 The large and well equipped institutions have 

 by no means a monopoly on revolutionary 

 improvements or discoveries. 



The choice of an individual between joining 

 a large or a small institution may or may not 

 be the same as the choice between observation 

 and experimentation. In some large places he 

 may become simply a cog in the machine, and 

 easily sink into a narrow routine. On the 

 other hand, the resources of a large place may 

 make it possible for him to try out various 

 schemes which would be quite impossible if he 

 were off by himself. On the whole, one must 

 balance the advantages of each type of institu- 

 tion, but he is a fortunate individual if he has 

 free choice in which direction he will work. 

 There is one resource, however, which is neces- 

 sary to all scientific investigation, and this is 

 the item of time. You may deprive the inves- 

 tigator of much of his physical equipment and 

 resources, and with plenty of free time he can 

 go on, almost with bare hands as it were; but 

 take away the opportunity to make continued 



effort, and he will cease to produce. As an 

 illustration of what may be done with almost 

 no equipment we may cite the case of the late 

 Simon Newcomb, who while visiting at a 

 summer resort made a determination of the 

 fundamental quantity, the total light of all 

 the stars. His apparatus comprised only sev- 

 eral spectacle lenses, but he succeeded in ob- 

 taining a result, and any possessor of a large 

 telescope would be satisfied if he could with 

 all his means occasionally produce something 

 as valuable as that work of Professor New- 

 comb. 



But after all, both the experimenter and 

 observer need to discuss their work, and this 

 entails a certain amount of computation. As 

 a rule the observer becomes more adept in the 

 art of computation simply because he has more 

 of it to do, but either observer or experimenter 

 will probably look upon long computations 

 simply as necessary evils. It has been said of 

 a certain astronomer that his dream of heaven 

 is a sky full of comets and a room full of com- 

 puters to work out their orbits for him. This 

 reminds us that most important of all is the- 

 orization; all of the routine of scientific work, 

 experimentation, observation, and computation 

 are simply a means to an end. The real joy 

 consists in sitting at one's desk and making 

 discoveries which come out of previous work, 

 either from one's own or from that of others. 

 Perhaps the ideal ease is where a single indi- 

 vidual is able to partake in all phases of inves- 

 tigation, from the preliminary securing of data 

 up to the final discussion of the theoretical 

 bearing of the results. In the old days this 

 was more easy to do than now, for as science 

 becomes more and more complex it is increas- 

 ingly diiScult for one person to master the 

 technique of all the processes involved in a 

 single problem, and with the growth of co- 

 operative research it is possible for several 

 workers to join hands and accomplish what 

 would be far beyond the powers of any one of 

 them. But in any cooperative scheme it should 

 be borne in mind that what is wanted is real 

 cooperation on a democratic basis, and not a 

 direction of individuals by a so-called master 

 mind. Efficient as an autocratic system may 

 be, in science as in other fields it ultimately 



