Makch 2, 1917] 



SCIENCE 



215 



Nothing is said, however, of what rewards, 

 either financial or social, are for him. Ap- 

 parently he should be willing to be a cog in a 

 machine in an institution. It is difficult, says 

 the Eeport, to locate " a skilled private assist- 

 ant — one who possesses not only originality, 

 but also sound judgment and intellectual hon- 

 esty." If you add to these qualifications a 

 handsome appearance, you will have nearly 

 the perfect man — and then you oifer him the 

 glorious position of private assistant. Happily, 

 however, he will not be foolish enough to take 

 it. He will make more money, have more in- 

 dependence, and win more social esteem if he 

 devotes his originality to writing " compell- 

 ing " soap advertisements. He will also have 

 an infinitely easier life. 



The amazing statement is made that " the 

 individual can exert only a very small influence 

 except as a member of an organization." One 

 wonders what institution or organization IN'ew- 

 ton or Darwin belonged to, without which 

 " they would have exerted only a very small 

 influence." Coming nearer home, to what in- 

 stitution does Mr. Baekeland or Mr. Elihu 

 Thomson belong? 



The best possible thing that executives can 

 do for science is to efface themselves as much 

 as possible. Thank heaven, the " centralizers 

 and coordinators" (as Sir Ronald Ross calls 

 them) did not get hold of Dalton or Faraday 

 or even Shakespeare, for creative originality 

 is the same, substantially, to whatever it may 

 be applied. ISTot only do executives often ab- 

 sorb salaries that ought to be paid to research 

 workers, but they create a public impression 

 that the workers are their subordinates, as if 

 a scientific worker were an inferior sort of 

 animal who needed some one to coordinate his 

 activities. 



Executives also absorb some of the most 

 stimulating parts of the work — the planning 

 and prominent public expression. Worst of 

 all, they operate to deprive a scientific worker 

 of that independent position which is the life 

 blood of a man of original and vigorous habit 

 of mind. The proper model of the scientist is 

 the judge. The lack of independent position 

 surely drives many away from fruitful work. 



The writer knows two men of scientific train- 

 ing and of vigorous and original minds who 

 went into the advertising business. Needless 

 to say, they are earning vastly more, and are 

 enjoying a far more independent position, than 

 tlie majority of scientific workers. ISTo execu- 

 tive tells them to " cooperate." They cooper- 

 ate or not, just as they see fit. 



Of course cooperation comes in strong in 

 the report, even if it works to deprive talent 

 of its just rewards. Originality is not joint 

 but personal. An army wins a battle, but the 

 creative thinking is commonly done by some 

 one Napoleon. The writer knows of a case re- 

 cently where an organization worked on a 

 problem for many months without achieving 

 anything except more or less useful (mostly 

 trivial) data. But one day a member not 

 working on that problem, devoted some high 

 tension thinking to the subject, aided by a 

 happy combination of other knowledge, and 

 was able to see the solution of the whole ques- 

 tion on radically different lines. If he had 

 turned in his contribution, he would have re- 

 ceived only minor recognition, as he had spent 

 only a short time on it. As it was, he kept it 

 to himself and is now reaping a legitimate 

 reward. How could his inventive originality 

 be asked to divide the credit and rewards with 

 mere data collecting — for the two things are 

 not commensurate? To use a current expres- 

 sion, they are " not in the same class." And 

 yet he should not be secretive, i. e., talent 

 should give its ideas to mediocrity. There are 

 kinds of cooperation where one eats the din- 

 ner, and the other pays the check and tips the 

 waiter and cloak room girl besides. 



Other scientists would do well to take a leaf 

 from the surgeon's book. Certainly in part, 

 the high position of American surgery is owing 

 to the fact that the surgeon's work is his own. 

 I presume that the Mayo brothers have an 

 " executive," precisely as any hospital has a 

 manager, who attends to the buying of sup- 

 plies, etc., but nobody ever heard of him. It is 

 curious how American surgeons have been able 

 to do such good work with no " executive sur- 

 geons " to occupy the center of the stage, and 

 make them cooperate. Incredible as it may 



