Januaky 17, 1908] 



SCIENCE 



89 



poration of Harvard is entirely satisfied 

 with the experiment that it has made. It 

 is, in fact, so well satisfied that within a 

 few weeks it has definitely committed the 

 university to the policy of placing the tech- 

 nical work in the university on a graduate 

 basis, and it has closed the Lawrence Scien- 

 tific School to the further admission of new 

 students. 



It is evident, therefore, that Harvard 

 University has made a very great step in 

 advance along the lines which I have sug- 

 gested for the preparation of the individual 

 for professional studies and fitting him to 

 become a chemical engineer. It seems to 

 me that it will acquire the same reputation 

 from its move in this direction as it has in 

 its law and medical schools. 



At Columbia a similar course can be pur- 

 sued, taking the B.A. in the college or the 

 B.S. in the scientific school after four 

 years' study and then proceeding in two 

 years to the degree of chemical engineer. 



Johns Hopkins has a graduate school of 

 applied science, largely devoted to research, 

 while in 1903 the Massachusetts Institute 

 of Technology issued a prospectus for a 

 graduate school of engineering, leading to 

 the degree of doctor of engineering, which 

 has not, as yet, materialized to any great 

 extent, but which we may hope to see en- 

 couraged under the direction of the present 

 acting president of the institute, our col- 

 league, Dr. A. A. Noyes. 



There are, no doubt, equally satisfactory 

 opportunities in other schools for such a 

 training as I have demanded, if the desire 

 for it is expressed, and I would by no means 

 suggest that continuous study in any one 

 locality is necessary or even desirable. 



The instruction in some of our schools is 

 intensive, in others, broad. In one, the 

 student meets an environment which is 

 purely local, in so far as all, or the ma- 

 jority, of the instructors are graduates of 

 the school in which they teach. In another. 



they have been assembled from a wider 

 field, have brought to the school a broader 

 conception of the science, and a more liberal 

 point of view. The latter is surely the more 

 desirable. It is quite possible, therefore, 

 that it may be as well to move from place 

 to place for the change of atmosphere which 

 may be obtained. 



The main thing to be accomplished is the 

 making of the liberal-minded man of broad 

 intelligence who shall possess those quali- 

 ties which I have cited as being necessary 

 in the chemical engineer and which, in my 

 opinion, are not found in the graduates of 

 our technical schools as they are now 

 thrown on the world. 



If time and my confidence in your pa- 

 tience permitted, I might go at length into 

 some other defects in our system of educa- 

 ting the chemical engineer, more especially 

 as to the evils of examinations and of 

 making undue exertions to obtain degrees. 

 But these subjects must be reserved for 

 another time and place. The views of 

 many prominent persons in regard to them 

 are well known to you, and I may add that 

 I am in sympathy with the idea that they 

 are both evils which need very careful con- 

 sideration. 



It is to be hoped that the suggestions 

 which have been made, although in no way 

 novel, may, by reiteration, arouse some at- 

 tention in so far as they may point out a 

 way of making the chemical engineer of 

 the future a larger, broader and more in- 

 fluential man than he is to-day, and one 

 who will occupy a position ia the com- 

 munity of as great importance as the lead- 

 ers of the other great professions. 



Clifford Richardson 



THE MECHANISM OF HEREDITY '^ 



Heredity is to-day the central problem 



of biology. This problem may be ap- 



'Address of the vice-president and chairman of 



Section F, Zoology, American Association for the 



Advancement of Science, Chicago meeting, 1907-8. 



