576 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLI. No. 1059 



omy to conduct instruction and research about 

 soils and crops than it was originally necessary 

 to organize agricultural colleges to educate 

 farmers. The organization of agronomy is 

 arbitrary, just as the entire matter of organiz- 

 ing agricultural colleges was arbitrary. The 

 essential reason why agricultural colleges were 

 organized was that the American people 

 through their Congress conceived the idea that 

 such colleges, if organized, would more defi- 

 nitely solve the problems of farm people and 

 other industrial people than the old forms of 

 colleges already organized. In short, colleges 

 of agriculture and mechanic arts were to be 

 and are logically organized, upon the basis of 

 industrial needs, or else there was not and is 

 not any call for any such separate organiza- 

 tions whatsoever. 



It is matter of fact that colleges of agricul- 

 ture and mechanic arts were and are organized, 

 at least after a fashion, in the several states. 

 Some of them appreciated fully that older in- 

 stitutions were concerning themselves with 

 pure science and had been doing so for a 

 long time and, further, they themselves were 

 not brought into existence to be so many more 

 of the same kind, but rather to make a very 

 direct attack upon the problems of the farm 

 and other industrial life. Those that saw that 

 problem most clearly, it is safe to say, made 

 the best progress. 



In such institutions grew and are growing 

 such forms of departments as agronomy, ani- 

 mal husbandry, horticulture, home economics, 

 and dairy husbandry. The unit of every one 

 is an industry, not a science. The organiza- 

 tion of every one was necessary to solve the 

 problems of an industry, not essentially the 

 problems of pure science. The people and the 

 departments, for example, who will solve the 

 problems of soils and crops are agronomists 

 and departments of agronomy. They will at- 

 tack the problems from the standpoint of the 

 business of farming and not from the stand- 

 point of making application of some partic- 

 ular kind of science. It is true that they will 

 need all the accurate information they can 

 acquire from all fundamental sources. Their 

 future departments will embody men whose 

 equipment of knowledge consists in facts neces- 



sary to the solving of their peculiar problems. 

 Such equipment of knowledge as they will have, 

 may not make them able to compete with 

 specialists in any given pure science within the 

 field of that science, nor will they expect to. 

 They will have a business of their own. 

 Agronomy can not and does not disregard 

 pure science, but it has not and does not 

 waste much time discussing whether pure 

 scientists need more training. If they do, it 

 is supposed that they will know that much for 

 themselves, and in due time get it. The dev- 

 otees of pure science will be busy enough 

 withal, looking after their ovm proper fields 

 of information and research, whether they be 

 botany, chemistry or mathematics. 



It is the function of pure science or of the 

 several pure sciences to increase the sum of 

 knowledge. Pure science departments in agri- 

 cultural colleges are not properly different in 

 that respect from pure science departments 

 anywhere else. If they teach as they must, 

 they should mainly supply that common basis 

 for scientific thought which must needs be the 

 common equipment of all who may engage in 

 any kind of scientific work. If they engage in 

 research, they should continue to develop and 

 enlarge the world's knowledge, with primary 

 regard for knowledge, not its application. In 

 the agricultural colleges, the departments spe- 

 cially organized for the purpose will under- 

 take to make application. Specifically the 

 agronomists of the country are as well pre- 

 pared to look after this their business of appli- 

 cation, as botanists generally are prepared to 

 supply new knowledge. 



As Professor Piper has correctly intimated, 

 the business of raising crops has made much 

 progress upon the basis of knowledge secured, 

 by agronomists. Strangely enough, some of 

 this knowledge has been " empirical." The 

 process will continue. The way for botanists 

 and botany departments in agricultural col- 

 leges to help will be to devote themselves to 

 botany, not agronomy. Perhaps if they do 

 that they will occupy the most enviable posi- 

 tions in the pure science of botany, and bring 

 corresponding honor to their institutions. This 

 will not be possible for them if they fuss 

 around with the business of agronomy. 



