214 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLI. No. 1049 



ten months after the cyanide had been put 

 into it. Fernando Sanfoed 



QUOTATIONS 



THE ORGANIZATION OF SCIENCE 



Just before the beginning of the war much 

 fruitful discussion was going on in the 

 colunms of Nature, the Morning Post and 

 Science Progress on the subject of the en- 

 couragement of science; and those who are 

 interested in the theme should read Dr. E. S. 

 Woodward's address on the needs of research, 

 delivered on the occasion of the dedication of 

 the Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods 

 Hole, Massachusetts (Science, August 14, 

 1914). 



Dr. Woodward begins by exposing some of 

 the popular fallacies regarding research — that 

 it " is akin to necromancy " ; and that " the 

 more remarkable results of research are pro- 

 duced not by the better balanced minds, but 

 by aberrant types of mind popularly desig- 

 nated by that word of ghostly, if not ghastly, 

 implications, namely ' genius.' " He has also 

 exposed the absurdity that research institu- 

 tions should busy themselves in soliciting sug- 

 gestions from the amateur public outside, that 

 is " in casting drag-nets in the wide world of 

 thought, or in dredging, as biologists would 

 say, with the expectation that out of the vast 

 slimy miscellanies thus collected there will be 

 found by the aid of a corps of patient exam- 

 iners some precious sediments of truth." He 

 thinks that " important advances in knowledge 

 are far more likely to issue from the expert 

 than from the inexpert in research." 



Dr. Woodward traverses the idea " that re- 

 search is a harmless and a fruitless diversion 

 in the business of education " ; and gives some 

 figures as to the comparative expenditure of 

 the United States on education and research 

 respectively. 



The number of higher, or degree-giving, estab- 

 lishments in the United States is now upwards of 

 six hundred; the aggregate annual income of these 

 is upwards of one hundred millions of dollars; and 

 the number of officials connected with them is up- 

 wards of thirty thousand. On the other hand, the 

 number of independent research organizations in 



the United States is less than half a dozen; their 

 aggregate annual income is less than two million 

 dollars; and the number of officials primarily con- 

 nected with them is less than five hundred. 



Something very like this holds also in 

 Britain, and indeed throughout the world. 

 Men can not be made to understand, even with 

 the astonishing results which investigation has 

 placed before us, the supreme importance of 

 such effort. They still conceive that it is more 

 important to teach boys how to do things than 

 actually to get the things done. 



The war now raging will at least demon- 

 strate one thing to humanity — that in war, at 

 least, the scientific attitude, the careful inves- 

 tigation of details, the preliminary prepara- 

 tion, and the well-thought-out procedure bring 

 success, where the absence of these leads only 

 to disaster. So also in everything. After all, 

 the necessity for research is the most evident 

 of all propositions. But the question (which 

 I hope will receive still more careful attention 

 when the war is over) is. What can the state 

 do to make the machinery of investigation the 

 most efficient possible? The mere citing of 

 popular misconceptions is not enough; we need 

 to have specific programs. The October num- 

 ber of Science Progress contains one such 

 program, which I hope will receive the atten- 

 tion of men of science. Whether all the items 

 are accepted or not remains to be seen; but 

 until the discussion is earnestly undertaken, 

 we can scarcely hope that the state will give 

 more help than it has done hitherto. Dr. 

 Woodward puts his finger upon a weak point 

 in men of science as a body. " We are," he 

 says, " as a class of too recent monastic descent 

 to fit comfortably in our present social envi- 

 ronment." That is just it. We are not strong 

 enough in making our demands heard; and, 

 in my opinion, this is not a virtue, but a 

 neglect of duty. — Sir Ronald Ross in Nature. 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS 

 Fauna Iberica. Mamiferos. By Akgel Ca- 

 brera. Published by the Museo Nacional de 

 Ciencias Naturales, Madrid, September 25, 

 1914. 8vo. Pp. xviii -|- 446 ; 143 figures in 

 the text and 22 colored plates. 



