impact

of science on society
Vol. X X I , N o . 2, April-June 1971

Tensions in the world

of science
The editor comments 101

Alan L . Bean The value of mannedflightsto the m o o n 105

John Ziman Social responsibility (I) : T h e impact of social
responsibility o n science 113
Milton Leitenberg Social responsibility (II) : The classical scientific
ethic and strategic-weapons development 123
Steven Rose and Social responsibility (III): T h e myth of the neutrality
Hilary Rose of science 137

Robert K . Merton The competitive pressures (I) : T h e race for

and Richard Lewis priority 151
Pierre Piganiol The competitive pressures (II) : T h e effects of
'publish or perish' 163
Paul Couderc A n antidote for anti-science 173
Joseph A . Cade Aspects of secrecy in science 181

AN INVITATION TO READERS

Reasoned letters which comment, pro or con, on any of the articles

printed in Impact or which present the writer's views o n any subject
discussed in Impact are welcomed. They should be addressed to the
Editor, Impact of Science on Society, Unesco, Place de Fontenoy,
75 Paris-7e (France).
Requests for permission to reproduce articles published in Impact
should be addressed to the Editor.
The editor comments

Idealistic nonsense and a fable

The pursuit of science, once regarded as an academic
occupation endowed with the detachment and tranquillity
of the cloister, n o w most definitely shares in the h u m a n
condition. It is an activity where occupational tensions
shiver the nerves in the same manner and degree as in
all other occupational worlds. Science has fully rejoined
life.
A n d this is precisely what those w h o today so sharply
criticize science and technology have been clamouring
for—though the rejoining is not quite of the form they
demand.
In this epoch of contestation—everything is being
challenged—probably the greatest generator of paranoia,
hypochondria and schizophrenia a m o n g scientists jiggling
their data and tickling their desk-top calculators is the
matter of social responsibility in science, or, if you like,
of the social responsibility of scientists. M u c h has been
said and written about this question; this number presents
three articles devoted to various aspects of it.
M a y this editor n o w say that in his weary opinion
a great deal that has been written in criticism of the social
effects of science and technology and about the social
responsibilities of scientists is irrational, illogical, b u m -
bling, romantic and/or hysteric. O n e of the soundest
discussions of this subject that he has ever read is the
article written by Professor John Ziman—and this editor
offers his parched gratitude to Professor Ziman for
the sanity and balance of his observations.

101
The editor comments

This editor will not offer an analysis of w h y so m u c h

that is said about social responsibility in science, parti-
cularly by ardent young socially conscious scientists,
is worse than nonsense, because it is idealistic nonsense
and thus carries the deluding merit of good intent.
Instead, m y gentles, he will offer here for your edification
a fable.

M E T A M O R P H O S E S : A FABLE

Once upon a time there ruled on this sad planet a mighty,

flighty King, given to riding off in all directions, and he
was hight King H o m o s a p Socialis.
M a n y were this King's problems : those of war and
of peace, those of famine and of plenty, of wealth and
poverty, of m e n and of w o m e n , of youth and of age,
of love and of lust, and of history and future. The King
had wrestled with these problems over the aeons of time,
yet had never solved them nor had ever gained on them
even one jot or tittle.
N o w King H o m o s a p Socialis had, like all m e n ,
several ways of winning respite from his concerns:
sighing, w o m e n , war, drink. But perhaps what diverted
him most of all was the Court Fool.
This creature's real n a m e was Insignificus Scienti-
ficus, though the King preferred to call him simply Fool :
a scrawny, starved specimen in a frayed, stained white
robe, w h o peered absently though thick-lensed glasses.
Each morning he bumbled through the Throne R o o m ,
leaving a shoe behind or perhaps with the lower buttons
of his robe unclosed and thus exposed to the merriment
of the ladies, and passed onward to his Ivory Tower.
A n d the King would burst into roars of laughter.
'Head in the rarefied atmosphere, h o w comically out of
touch with the world of reality he is,' the King declared.
'It brings m e surcease for a m o m e n t from m y woes.'
But one day the King m a d e it his pleasure to pene-
trate into the Ivory Tower. A n d there he found it easeful
of mind to describe some of his weighty concerns to the
Fool, though obviously this latter could have no concep-
tion or grasp of them. O n e of these, for example, was

102
 The editor comments

that the spears of his warriors were not sufficiently

efficient in battle.
'But, Majesty,' said the Fool, 'if you char the tips
in fire they will be hardened and the spears will pierce
more deeply into thefleshof enemies and friends.'
The King was amazed. W h a t a simple yet effective
idea!
A n d the King asked the Fool if he had solutions to
some of the other problems. A n d it appeared that indeed
he did.
Then with hoop-la and hurrah the King had the Fool
brought in state to the Throne R o o m . Announced the
King to the courtiers: ' W e have never known that w e
had so rare a wonder in our midst. Y o u , sirrah, are no
longer Fool. Y o u are made into the Court Magician and
your n a m e henceforth will be Magnificus Scientificus.'
With these words there was a puff of smoke; the
scrawny Fool vanished and where he had stood appeared
a sturdy, full-fleshed, beaming, smug individual in robes
brightly patterned with alembics and electron microscopes,
and with piercing eyes which appeared to penetrate into
all eternal truths.
' N o w perform!' said King H o m o s a p Socialis.
A n d the Magician did. H e flung golden ball after
golden ball into the air and each exploded into flaring
colours, to release amazing devices of all kinds, which
floated d o w n to the earth to be seized by the joyous
populace : new textiles, new foods, superb weapons of war,
easers of work and of pain, remarkable new wheels and
enhancers of the word which annihilated time and distance.
'Behold', proudly proclaimed the King, 'that all
our problems, which have bedevilled us these long cen-
turies, will soon be resolved.'
But, alas, it w a s not so. For each marvel that the
Magician produced did not come without a price. For
each benefit, as it turned out, there was a detriment.
A n d the King, w h o had showered honours and gold
upon the Magician, became m u c h disenchanted. A n d
finally cried, ' H o w deceived I have been! M y problems
are worse than ever. But the scales have dropped from
m y eyes and I see you but too clearly n o w . Y o u are not
the vanquisher of m y problems, but the real, true cause

103
The editor comments

of them. Not Magician but Devil. A n d your n a m e hence-

forth will be Satanicus Scientificus.'
Another puff of smoke!—and the plump, smug
Magician w a s replaced b y a red lobster-skinned,
fire-snorting being with two ivory horns, a long twitching
tail, black curving claws and cloven hooves, dressed only
in a velvet loin-cloth.
'Chain him up, the villain!' the King cried.
A n d it was done.
' A n d n o w shall w e master our problems', affirmed
the King, ' n o w that we have discovered and bound up
their instigator.'
But, alas, this was not true, either. T h e problems
remained and the King wrestled with them as futilely as ever.
The King came again to the shackled Devil and
said, ' Y o u cannot live in sloth. M y problems are so
enormous that every hand must help. Y o u will hence-
forth be m y Slave, thou Servus Scientificus.'
A n d the cloven-hooved Devil was at once incarnated
into a submissive, eager, and taut-muscled giant. Under
the instructions of King H o m o s a p Socialis m a n y were
the wonders he performed, carrying out each instruction
with good will and to the fullest.
Seeing this, the King w a s pleased and declared,
' N o w that I k n o w h o w best to use and control you, n o w ,
for sure, must all m y problems soon be overcome.'
But once again, alas, it was not true.
Finally, discouraged and bemused, the King called
the Slave to him. T do not understand, I do not understand.
Your powers are formidable, virtually inexhaustible. Yet
whatever form you take on, the trials and tribulations of
m y world remain unchanged. C a n you please explain this?'
Whereat the Slave replied, T can change m e , mighty
Majesty, King H o m o s a p Socialis, into anything you
wish m e to be. I can change anything in this universe
into any form you wish it to have. There is nothing that
I cannot metamorphose, Majesty, save one thing, and
this you yourself must d o . '
' A n d that is?' asked the King.
' ' (Fill in the answer, gentle reader.)

Bruno FRIEDMAN

104
The value of
mannedflightsto the m o o n

by Alan L . B e a n 1

Is the entire programme of sending men to the moon,

of sending men out as space explorers, an immense waste
of resources urgently needed on earth ?
T o this question, vehemently argued today, astronaut
Bean of the moon-landing Apollo 12, answers: the returns
fully justify the effort. T h e m o o n landings have provided
both major tangible benefits to American technology,
education and medicine, and equally important intangible
benefits to Americans and to all m e n : restored American
pride a n d prestige; helped promote a c o m m o n sense of
identity in the world's peoples; and, in meeting this
great challenge of space, have m a d e life o n earth itself
m o r e meaningful.

The United States space programme,
one of the great success stories of
all time, has been from its beginning
subject to a division of opinion. O n one
side are the supporters, including m y -
self, w h o consider it the best bargain
1. Captain Alan L. Bean, airman in the United
States Navy, joined the man-in-space
programme in 1963 and was the pilot of
the Apollo 12's lunar landing module,
which descended to the moon on 18 Novem-
ber 1969. Address: Manned Spacecraft
Center, National Aeronautics and Space
Administration, Houston, Texas 77058
(United States).
the nation ever made (can you think of
another programme that has had so many
positive results in only ten short years?);
on the other, the detractors, w h o see little
benefit from the effort so far and are
unable to visualize any rewarding develop-
ments in the future.
But critics to the contrary, the pro-
gramme already has shown, in effect,
that like the fabled goose it is laying
golden eggs. T h e various benefits, by-
products of the programme, number in
the thousands. The world has changed
much in the last few years, and many of

Impact of Science on Society, Vol. XXI, No. 2, 1971 105

Alan L . Bean
Captain Alan L . Bean
the best changes have been as a direct
result of the space efforts.
In 1958, the National Aeronautics
and Space Administration ( N A S A ) came
into being through Act of Congress as a
research and development organization to
expand our knowledge of phenomena in
the atmosphere and space, and to develop
and operate vehicles capable of carrying
instruments and living organisms into
space. It also was given the responsibility of
maintaining the nation's leadership in
aeronautical and space science technology,
applying the knowledge gained to peaceful
activities within and without the earth's
atmosphere.
In the years since then, N A S A has
placed six m e n on the m o o n , mastered
m a n y of the problems of travelling in
106
space, and sent up hundreds of satellites
which have expanded international c o m -
munication, checked on weather and flood
conditions, monitored some of the earth's
resources, and supplied photographs and
information never before available to
mankind.
A n d yet there are critics w h o still
demand justification of the entire business
of sending m e n into earth orbit or on
expeditions to the m o o n , maintaining that
unmanned spacecraft could do it better
and more cheaply. They do not give up
easily.
W H Y M A N IS N E E D E D IN
SPACE EXPLORATION
The assertion that m a n can do nothing
in space and that automatic instrumentation
can always d o as well has been disproved
by some of the experiences w e have had.
It is true that some tasks can be accom-
plished best by automated vehicles and
that unmanned spacecraft are less costly
and return excellent scientific data on a
long-time basis. But to say that m a n ' s
presence is unnecessary and unduly c o m -
plicates spacecraft design is a statement
that does not entirely conform to the
record.
In those last frantic seconds of the
landing of Apollo 11 on the m o o n , it was
Neil Armstrong w h o took over the controls,
changed course, and kept the lunar module
from cracking u p on the rocks toward
which automatic instrumentation was
guiding it. O n our o w n Apollo 12 launch,
w e were able to m a k e corrections and
configuration changes that machines could
not have done w h e n lightning struck our

vehicle on take-off. Here were definite
examples of savings of large sums of money
and the rescue of missions, the failure of
which would have been heard around the
world and been an embarrassing and
costly setback.
M o r e important than the possible
need for manual action in these emergen-
cies, no instrument could have accom-
plished the reconnaissance, evaluation,
and experiments that m a n has accom-
plished in space and on the lunar surface.
U n m a n n e d spacecraft have been
found to be the best vehicles to be used
in exploring distant planets for the next
few years, and they are ideal for certain
definite experiments such as meteorology
and communications. However, in many
instances, as complexity increases and
when advance knowledge of the test or
subject to be tested is limited, m a n is
more effective and reliable. Even more
important, he exercises judgement that
has not yet been conveyed to automated
instruments.
Early in its programme, N A S A had
to decide whether it should develop the
capability for m e n to operate in space,
or leave that area to the Soviet Union. It
also had to decide between projects to
achieve simple objectives or complex
research programmes aimed at developing
general exploratory capability and broad
technological positions aimed at conquer-
ing space as the m e n of C o l u m b u s ' time
first conquered the seas. In the latter
instance, m e n would be needed.
N A S A also has pointed out that its
charter requires it to develop aeronautics
and space technology to the degree that
no nation flies farther or faster or higher
than the United States. This has become
The value of mannedflightsto the moon
a national policy and one in which a
majority of the people seem to take pride.
American missions to the m o o n have
demonstrated that the rigours of the space
environment are less than anticipated.
Moreover, it has been found that m a n is
remarkably hardy, that he is largely self-
repairing and self-correcting, and that he
is m u c h less likely to experience a complete
failure on a complex job than any equip-
ment, however sophisticated, that might
be assigned the task. Experience has shown
us that w e can no m o r e explore space
adequately without m a n at the controls
than maritime nations of the fifteenth
century could have conquered the seas
with robot ships.
In considering M a r s , some scientists
maintain that it would be foolish to plan
on sending more than one manned space-
craft to that planet because of the large
distance and the huge sums of m o n e y
involved. This appears to be true for our
present point in time, but it would be
rather short-sighted to consider this
decision to be a permanent one. M a n is
destined to venture out into the far reaches
of our solar system and, indeed, eventually
to the stars. The only question is when.
THE V A L U E OF
THE SPACE EFFORT
A s w e become more experienced in space
and our vision grows, the horizons for
h u m a n usefulness and capabilities in this
n e w environment will broaden. F r o m a
vehicle which at first demonstrated little
real utility, the aeroplane has evolved into
today's intercontinental transport systems
which m a k e it possible for millions of
107
Alan L. Bean

people to visit other lands a n d people, years average life expectancy has increased
causing an enormous impact o n their a significant amount. Through technology,
thinking, their living habits, and their the workday has been decreasing, while
economies. O n e would have had to be output has been increased. Today, w e are
exceptionally far-sighted to visualize this freer of disease and sickness than ever
beneficial result of the first short flight before in the history of m a n . Epidemics of
that the Wright brothers m a d e in their flu, diphtheria, smallpox, scarlet fever,
fragile aeroplane at Kitty H a w k in 1903. as an example, are n o longer c o m m o n .
Today, the United States cannot Polio has been licked, and tuberculosis is
afford to neglect—as w e did the aeroplane relatively rare.
in its early days—a technology with so In addition, a vast number of schools
powerful a potential as that of space. have been built, for education has been
A n y technology that can take m a n to the greatly increased and expanded. College
m o o n and back less than ten years after is a real possibility for millions of American
the first pioneering orbit of the earth is young people, not just a privileged few.
not to be abandoned or cast aside care- Technology has produced a great
lessly. Just as the sea and air did earlier deal of undesirable fall-out, but to blame
in history, space is moving forward onto all the world's problems o n technology
the stage of h u m a n affairs, adding new and urge that w e slow our technological
dimensions to our economic, cultural, advance is completely ridiculous. It is
and spiritual potential. also ridiculous to blame a ten-year-old
T o assess the value of the space effort engineering project for all the evils of the
is very m u c h like trying to count one's past several thousand years.
blessings: some appear in tangible form, A n active and forward-moving space
as sharp as a clear-cut diamond, while programme is necessary and is the best
others are more intangible and cannot be stimulus to improved technology that w e
immediately visualized, but rather are k n o w of today. A n d w e are going to need
felt as a change in the attitude and imagina- that improved technology to solve the pro-
tion of people themselves. blems that will be with us over the next
It is difficult to estimate the return years.
the American economy has received from A m o n g the most important intangible
space exploration, but it is sizable. There contributions of the space effort are s o m e
are those, of course, w h o are critical of classified as political and international.
the material progress that w e have m a d e T h e m o o n landing restored the prestige
over the last ten years, and their comments the United States had lost earlier and, in
are not without some thread of truth. general, gave the people of the world a
It is true that all of our technological m u c h more positive feeling about the
achievements have not served m a n well, results government could achieve with the
but the good far outweighs the bad, and democratic process. A s a result of our
the benefits become more evident with successful programme, w e n o w k n o w h o w
the passing of time. to operate in space and are in the forefront
For example, just in the last few of a rapidly advancing technology, and

108

the people of the world seem to understand
what w e have done and that our efforts are
for all mankind.
Another factor is the matter of national
and military security, something w e have
developed through industrial strength and
intellectual achievement.
Practically speaking, it would be
incredibly short-sighted for the United
States, one of the major powers of the
world, to ignore or play a minor role in
following u p such a massive break-
through in modern-day technology as space
science.
Spacecraft are playing an active part
in bringing the world closer together in
understanding through communications
satellites and in co-operative space enter-
prises for mutual benefit. A unique charac-
teristic of space vehicles is that they are
more efficient and useful in serving the
world than they are in serving any one
nation or group of nations. Even n o w ,
weather satellite data is freely available
to any nation which chooses to install a
ground receiving station and activate the
satellite's transmitting system.
M o r e than 500 million people watched
the Apollo 11 astronauts walk on the m o o n
and heard them as they explored its sur-
face for the first time in history. W h e n
the astronauts gave their impressions of
earth as viewed from 250,000 miles away,
all the hundreds of millions of the earth's
population watching were for a brief time,
at least, totally united in their pride in
the accomplishments of two earthmen on
the m o o n .
This space achievement gave people
everywhere, whatever their origins, a
feeling that they were not just Americans,
or Europeans, or Asians, or Africans, but
The value of mannedflightsto the m o o n
were all members of the h u m a n race and
had a c o m m o n interest and c o m m o n
humanity. Could any other conceivable
m a n - m a d e event have caused 500 million
persons in all parts of the world simulta-
neously to realize their c o m m o n identity?
Still another matter of great signi-
ficance is the manner in which the space
programme has brought about the inter-
mingling of people of all disciplines—
medicine, physics, chemistry, astronomy,
engineering, economics and public admi-
nistration. Such intermingling m a y point
the way to the solutions of m a n y problems
which specialists working in a single
discipline have not been able to solve.
It also stimulates a climate for world
peace. N A S A ' s international space acti-
vities provide clear indications of the
fellowship that develops when scientists
from m a n y nations work together and
engage in discussions concerning enter-
prises of mutual interest and benefit. T h e
tie that binds them is not the need for
security, but the thirst for knowledge which
will be the heritage of mankind.
The space programme has been a
triumph of management, technology and
engineering. It has united government,
industry and education in a c o m m o n ,
peaceful undertaking. Out of it has c o m e
a great reservoir of manpower capable of
new standards of performance and quality,
as well as of engineering competence,
craftmanship in execution, and rigour in
inspection far beyond normal industrial
standards.
The computer industry, perhaps more
than any other, has felt the impact of the
new technology. T h e first computers
appeared in the period immediately
following the Second World W a r . Since
109
Alan L . Bean
then, the industry has blossomed, for
advances based on scientific knowledge
gained and funding m a d e possible through
the space effort have brought about savings
in industrial space and in dollars. C o m -
puters have been scaled d o w n until
thousands of electrical circuits n o w can
be compressed into a case smaller than a
coin the size of a quarter-dollar. In the
United States alone, this business grosses
$20,000 million a year and provides
gainful employment for 800,000 people.
M a n y other fields benefit from the
by-products of space. Perhaps the most
widely affected is medicine. N e w methods
of treatment and m a n y spectacular and
amazing devices to aid with diagnosis and
treatment are n o w in use. A marked
advance is expected in the battle against
cancer, especially in view of the develop-
ment of a fluoroscopic camera that at
an early stage can identify tumours.
Before long, the blind m a y be able to 'see'
again by means of a miniature radar rig
and television lens 'eyes' linked with the
optic nerve—an outgrowth of space
technology.
Soaring hospital costs also are expected
to be stemmed by the spin-off from the
space effort. O n e of the principal causes
of the rise in medical fees is m a n p o w e r .
B y means of a telemetry unit similar to
those employed by astronauts, for instance,
a single nurse n o w can sit at a central
point and keep check on a hundred or
m o r e patients simultaneously, assuming
the duties of scores of nurses.
In non-medical fields, there have
been m a n y major developments from
space, some completely unexpected. A n
electromagnetic h a m m e r invented to build
the Saturn V rocket is being tested in
110
shipyards, aeroplane factories, and auto-
mobile plants. After lying dormant for
years, the fuel cell has been activated to
power spacecraft in orbit, leading to a
$27 million programme under way in
thirty public utility companies to adapt it
for h o m e power units. Highway and
airport runway surface design has been
improved to prevent rainy-day accidents,
a step that already has saved m a n y lives
and millions of dollars. N e w 'wonder
metals' and amazing n e w fuels such as
liquid hydrogen and liquid fluorine have
resulted from space. Tiny n e w electric
batteries, developed in the space pro-
g r a m m e , power wrist-watches for at least
a year without having to be replaced.
The list is long.
Another field that has greatly bene-
fited from space is agriculture. Sensors
and cameras sent aloft on spacecraft send
back information on weather, crops and
earth resources never before available to
m a n . T h e time m a y c o m e when these
sensitive instruments can tell a farmer when
to plant and when to harvest. Improved
weather forecasts alone m e a n savings of
thousands of millions of dollars annually
to the farmer, engineer, aviation and
shipping industries and other interests.
Monitoring of the earth's resources is
a promising development. Growth of
world population is causing a constant
increase in the demand for food. In order
to meet this demand, the supply of food
must be conserved and managed wisely,
which means a careful inventory must be
maintained. Space satellites can best pro-
vide that inventory by surveying all of
earth.
W h a t I feel is one of the most impor-
tant enduring contributions of the space

endeavour is evident in the field of edu-
cation at all levels from the elementary to
the post-graduate. T h e space programme
has m a d e young m e n and w o m e n aware
of the complex world they will inherit
and h o w important it is to be educated
to meet the challenges that surely will face
them. The subjects and courses in schools
today reflect our technological and scienti-
fic advances and their influence. A s a
result, those w h o graduate will be better
prepared than w e are. They will be able
to solve problems that w e are unable
to solve today.
Further, the attitudes of youth toward
the world and its people are significantly
different than those of their elders, and, I
feel, generally they are better. T h e space
programme has influenced them to consi-
der the world as a single unit, and to
emphasize the sameness of the peoples
rather than their differences. This awaken-
ing sense of supra-nationalism and
concern for m e n of all nations is perhaps
one of the truly great contributions of the
space programme to mankind.
COULD THE MONEY BE
BETTER SPENT?
M a n y critics are concerned that the money
w e spent going to the m o o n would have
been better spent to help eliminate poverty
and hunger here at h o m e . This is normal
reaction to something so drastically new
and unusual as the space programme.
However, there are two major facts
that need to be considered. First, diverting
the space dollars, roughly $3,200 million
right n o w , to the approximately $25,000
million that is being spent o n the national
The value of mannedflightsto the moon
level for health, education, manpower
training, and community development and
housing, could not have a significant
impact in the welfare field. O n the other
hand, it would drastically diminish m a n ' s
advancement in science and technology
and abandon the peaceful conquest of
space and its promise for all mankind.
Furthermore, while w e cannot ignore
our earthly needs, neither should w e fall
into the trap of concentrating only o n
programmes that do not appear to have
any immediate solution and that drain
away all significant national resources
without advancing the country technologi-
cally and philosophically. O n e should not
look only at the m u d and dirt around him,
but should cast his eyes upward to the
stars for inspiration and motivation to
greater achievement.
W h a t space holds for the distant
future must be left to the imagination.
But soon to c o m e are earth-orbiting
laboratories, which offer promise of all
sorts of useful application. T h e weight-
lessness of space should permit the mixing
of materials which cannot be merged on
earth because of the pull of gravity o n
components of differing weights. This
would m a k e possible unique new products
n o w unattainable. Perfectly round ball
bearings could be forged—all those pre-
sently produced are imperfect—eliminating
noise and friction; and gas bubbles could
be mixed into steel to produce a steel
foam of unusual lightness, yet as strong
as solid steel.
Whatever the value of space, the
investment has provided a unique satis-
faction for m a n , making more meaningful
his life here o n earth. It has given h i m a
n e w frontier, a new outlet for an insatiable
111
Alan L. Bean
desire to explore the unknown. His sights
have been raised and he has been inspired
to greater things. Eventually he m a y find
that his ultimate survival depends on his
use of space technology and the skill he
develops as a space voyager.
W h e n our Apollo 12 spacecraft was
out in deep space, in the continual sunlight
between earth and m o o n , I was struck
with the fact of just h o w small the earth
is—indeed, just h o w small m a n is—in the
vast panorama of the universe. M a n is,
in a real sense, insignificant and even
invisible when viewed on this scale.
112
At the same time, I w a s inspired to
realize that, although w e are infinitesimal
in size, to our present knowledge m a n is
the only thing in the universe that can
chart his o w n course a m o n g the stars,
can travel wherever his imagination
might challenge him to journey.
The programme of manned space
exploration is one of mankind's finest
hours. It is a time when the words, 'there
is something in m a n that surpasses m a n ' ,
are most meaningful. W e must not
sacrifice this great space-faring capability to
look only at the problems here on earth.
Social responsibility (I):
T h e impact of social
responsibility o n science
by John Ziman1

Are scientists responsible to society for the consequences

of their discoveries or developments?
Definitely, answers Professor Z i m a n . But society,
he points out, gets the scientists it deserves. A n d society
has been turning out narrow specialists w h o are learned
ignoramuses, unable to deal with the political and moral
questions associated with science.
Uniting passion of spirit with cool rationality,
scientists must form the loyal opposition against the
irresponsible use of science, with the universities the
seat of responsible dissent. Y e t to thus advocate the cause
of m a n , scientists must be protected from 'the pressures
of a n ignorant public, a shameless press, rapacious
money-makers a n d opportunist politicians'.

It is not given to us mortals to perceive THE ESCAPES FROM

the full consequences of our actions. RESPONSIBILITY
Moral responsibility is therefore an
issue that cannot be decided by scienti- 'I had no idea that this would happen,
fic procedures. W h e n an evil is traced Sir!'—thus, perhaps, Rutherford, for split-
back to a cause that w e have freely crea- ting the atom. 'It was all in a good cause,
ted, w e can almost always produce an Sir!'—the discoverers of D D T . 'If I
excuse. hadn't done it, Sir, somebody else would!'
—nuclear fission, shall w e say. 'They
1. Dr. John Ziman, F . R . S . , is Professor of
were going to d o it, so I thought I had
Physics at the University of Bristol, better do itfirst!'—thebiological weapon
H . H . Wills Physics Laboratory, Royal makers. 'They m a d e m e do it, Sir!'—a
Fort, Tyndall Avenue, Bristol BS8 1TL
(United Kingdom). general excuse for all servants of all

Impact of Science on Society, Vol. X X I , N o . 2, 1971 113

John Ziman

corporate bodies. ' W e tried it out, and it vineyard—or w e are indeed the N e w M e n
seemed to work all right!'—the thalido- come to m a k e a better world.
mide tragedy. 'I didn't actually do any- The dilemmas of personal responsi-
thing myself; w e just talked about it and bility are not n e w , and the history of
the other chaps went and did it'—a ethics tells plainly that they cannot be
compendium of justifications for all resolved. Think of the Inquisition—or of
academic research. 'Well, it does m a k e the revolutionary turned executioner—
rather a mess, doesn't it, but everybody before you put your trust in an ideology or
wanted to play with our n e w toy'—which a pledge of virtue or a Hippocratic oath.
covers m u c h of the pollution problem. Gospels, social blueprints and other formu-
A n d so on. lae acquire their legalistic interpreters,
Every such excuse is valid, however until the call for peace becomes a war-cry
essentially infantile. T h e scientist is not and the stake is an instrument of mercy.
in the front line, pulling triggers a n d I see no salvation in resolves or reso-
dumping defoliants. B y definition, he is a lutions, however aptly phrased and appa-
Back R o o m Boy, employed to discover rently benevolent. T o accept them without
principles and to design devices, not to reservation is essentially to abjure respon-
hurt other people with them, so you can't sibility; it is the abandonment of judgement
really blame him for what has happened. and a flight from rationality itself. A n
True enough ; but if he had not m a d e that innocuous pledge can do n o good until it
misused discovery, or if he had imagined is called into question, when precisely the
its consequences, or if he had not allowed issue of interpretation in particular un-
himself to be employed by that evil cor- foreseen circumstances must be faced. It
poration, then perhaps the tragedy would is then that w e must rely again upon our
not have taken place. spiritual and intellectual resources: the
In the complex of social institutions will to do good, the imagination of suf-
within which w e try to m a k e ourselves at fering, the rational calculation of the
h o m e on earth, the mind and professional consequences of action or inaction.
expertise of the individual scientist is not
a negligible force. T h e enormous size
of the technical community seems to T H E M A K I N G OF SOCIALLY
guarantee anonymity and to countenance RESPONSIBLE SCIENTISTS
irresponsibility, yet the intellectual leader
carries ten thousand of his colleagues with Social responsibility in science rests
him in a 'break-through', and sets ten therefore upon the way in which scientists
million humble labourers on a new course are m a d e . Whether or not w e have the
of manufacture, commerce and use. W e inborn talents for success in research, w e
scientists cannot take personal pride in are moulded by upbringing and education.
the 'achievements' of our science and But social responsibility is not a subject
technology and simultaneously repudiate to be learnt from a course of lectures
responsibility for its failures and abuses. (Tue. 10, Fri. 10, R o o m G . 4 4 ; D r .
W e are either humble workers in the Piravetz: Practicáis, Sun. 2-5, Trafalgar

114
 The impact of social responsibility on science

Square). It is not something one can practise O u r specialized courses of study—pure

ostentatiously, as an example to the young physics, pure chemistry, pure biochemistry,
('I think I shall go out and do some social even pure medicine and pure engineering—
responsibility in science this afternoon. are absurd and nonsensical as a training
Anyone coming with m e ? W e could count for active life, whether in research itself or
it as part of your optional field work'). It in technical development. T h e assumption
is an attitude of mind, a sensibility of the is quite false that the clever schoolboy,
spirit implicit in an educational system, in drawn through the successive dies of
personal relations, in institutional policies. primary school, 11-plus years of secondary
W h a t is missing from the education school, O-level, A-level, university, B.Sc.
of present generations of scientists? First, P h . D . , etc., like a billet of steel drawn
they lack general education. They go out d o w n into a mile of piano wire, can acquire
into their corporate laboratories as learned incidentally all the detailed information he
ignoramuses knowing all about nuclear needs outside of such a speciality. T h e
magnetic resonance, or the physiological interdisciplinary, technological, historical
function of adenosine triphosphate, but and economic aspects of our academic
without any grasp of history, of philosophy, disciplines must be taught, positively,
of political thought or of economics—or of wisely, expensively and at length.
otherfieldsof science. The microbiologists W e must also deal with the political
scorn ecology, the nuclear physicists k n o w and moral questions associated with
nothing of warfare, the mechanical engi- science. A course in civics in grade 5B is
neers are totally ignorant of the physiology not enough, nor is any amount of doctri-
of respiration, and so on. naire Marxism. The Industrial Revolution
In the m a d rush to produce comple- was a politicalevent, with deep moral conse-
tely trained specialists on the cheap, w e quences, not merely a triumph of technique.
assume that they will s o m e h o w pick up H o w w a s it possible, w e must ask,
the rest of the knowledge they need. H o w ? for the rivers and winds of our beautiful
F r o m newspapers, from bar-room gossip, land to b e so bemired? W h a t forces of
from television programmes? greed or ambition drove o n the mill
W e instil into our technologists the owners a n d railway builders—and by
highest professional standards, so that they what other forces were their monstrous
are rightly suspicious of the claims of pretensions curbed? H o w do political and
anyone but an expert in their o w n field— economic forces exert their leverage, and
and then w e entrust them with tasks that to what extent is science harnessed to
d e m a n d expert judgement over m a n y anti-human juggernauts? W h a t should be
fields. H o w can the aircraft engine designer the goals of research? W h y should science
take responsible decisions about noise? be regarded as a generally beneficial
That is not hisfield.There are 'acousti- activity? Should scientists be responsible
cians', aren't there, to deal with that? W e for their discoveries? Is it feasible to plan
need science generalists, not just to run research? B y what criteria could one begin
big business or to go into politics, but to to judge whether it is better to feed a multi-
do science itself. tude than to ride like a witch to the m o o n ?

115
John Ziman
T h e questions are countless, the
moral a n d political considerations con-
flicting, tangled and subtle. W e need
immense drafts of discussion and argument
on all such topics, in the seminar room,
round the coffee table, in debates, study
groups, and tutorials, as strengthening
medicines for the grown-up world in
which these issues will assume reality.
T h e student protest movement can
certainly not settle, by brick-bats and
obscene invective, the dilemma of the
county council in choosing between a
new hospital, a better bus service, or an
improved sewage works. T h e problems of
social responsibility always arise in highly
technical contexts, where expert opinion is
pitted against expert opinion in the lan-
guage of cost effectiveness, budget defi-
cits, m a n p o w e r projections, ton-miles per
litre, perceived decibels and other jargon.
But w e must s o m e h o w sensitize these
earnest owlish experts early to think of
people, of pain, of freedom, and of beauty.
W h e n they are middle-aged and grey-
haired, and with the power at last to m a k e
such decisions, it will be too late. Soph-
istry and calculation will then have taken
over : the spiritual lobes in their ponderous
noddles will have died for sheer lack of
exercise.
A CERTAIN HYPOCRISY
N o t school or university, but the experience
of childhood m a y decide another important
issue—corruptibility. O f all the despicable
traits of the modern academic, nothing is
worse than the hypocrisy with which he
will receive m o n e y for research from orga-
nizations whose prime ends he inwardly
116
detests. The biochemist w h o works o n a
project paid for by a military agency,
knowing that it is s o m e h o w connected
with biological warfare but pretending to
himself and others that it is all good,
clean, pure science, has sold himself to the
Devil: it is really a pleasure to see such
characters n o w getting hurt.
I don't m e a n that scientific w o r k for
military ends is itself immoral. Pacificism
is an admirable doctrine for life and can
only be respected, but so also can the
principles and practice of self-defence
against crime and violence. In civilized
countries w e support our armed forces,
though w e m a y deplore their need and
regret their expense. T o be a soldier m a y
not be everybody's choice, in peace or
even in war, but it is not a dishonourable
profession.
W h a t must surely be said, however,
is that the scientist w h o has contracted to
do research o n behalf of a ministry of
defence has become a technical soldier.
If his country goes to war, then he, too,
is pulling the trigger and dropping the
b o m b . H e m a y , as a good patriot, feel
that he is doing right: that is a question
worth quiet debate in each instance. But
he cannot take the m o n e y and still claim
the privileges of a civilian. In civil wars,
people get shot for m u c h less than that.
Hypocrisy and opportunism are learnt
at the mother's knee. The best w e can do
is to shame those w h o practise them.
CONFLICTS OF L O Y A L T Y
W e must learn, in fact, to clarify the
essential conflicts of loyalty in the practice
of science. For the old-fashioned academic

it w a s easy: his loyalty was givenfirstto
his subject, then, in principle, to humanity
—although a good rousing war-cry would
quickly awaken his patriotism. T h e only
really important thing to do in life was to
add another few papers to the literature of
'microteleonomy' or 'macroscopology',
which was itself, of course, of profound
cultural significance because it w a s 'there'.
It w a s not quite such a noble calling as it
was sometimes represented, but once one
had got oneself established one certainly
k n e w w h o , what, and where one was.
N o w a d a y s w e have to think of our
employers—who need to m a k e profits or
war, of our country—which ought to m a k e
peace, of our professional association—
which ought to m a k e up its mind, of our
students—who need to m a k e good, and
even of our families—who ought to be
m a d e to shut u p . I don't pretend to k n o w
m y w a y through these thickets of obliga-
tions; one just tries to balance them up
as best one can. But part of our moral
education in responsibility must be an
attempt to analyse these loyalties, lining
them u p in order of priority.
This is important, because mistaken
assumptions of primacy of allegiance can
completely spoil a good argument about
social responsibility. The Society for Social
Responsibility in Science (SRS) people,
for example, have been telling the chemical
and biological warfare ( C B W ) boys that
they are all monsters because they are
using scientific knowledge—'which is for
the good of mankind'—in an evil cause,
i.e. war. N o w there is n o clause in the
Social Contract, the Talmud, the Koran, or
the Analects of Confucius stating that
scientific knowledge is for the good of
mankind, or even that scientists must be
The impact of social responsibility on science
cosmopolitan pacifist internationalists. T o
this the C B W gang have every right to reply
that they love their country, that they
don't propose to see their sisters die
horribly of enemy anthrax, and they will
go right on with their patriotic (if unpleas-
ant) duty.
T h e real loyalty, of both parties,
should be both to rationality and to general
humanity—as far as one can m a k e out,
biological warfare is the most idiotic form
of w e a p o n that could possibly be imagined,
suited only to the mutual extermination of
suicidal maniacs.
PASSION OF SPIRIT,
RATIONALITY OF INTELLECT
Y e s , in the end, it comes d o w n to a passion
of spirit but a very cool rationality of
intellect. Teaching responsibility in science
is also teaching science: the correct
appraisal of situations and forces, the
use of every bit of knowledge available,
readiness to observe, interpret, experiment
and theorize. Provided that w e give
m a x i m u m weight to genuine social needs
and aspirations—i.e. w e treat people as
people, not as abstract mouths, repro-
ductory organs, sources of exertion or
transportable packages—then w e must use
our heads to the full.
Nothing will more quickly discredit
the S R S movement than the impatient
resort to the impatient slogan or doctri-
naire catch-cry. Scientists w h o thus discard
their intellectual powers, their real claim
to skill and authority, betray their pro-
fession and reduce themselves to the level
of John D o e and Richard R o e . Responsi-
bility in science is the use of one's scientific
117
John Ziman
talents, not the pompous authority of
one's n a m e o n a petition or a vulgar
display of naive political prejudices.
INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITY
AND COURAGE
Individual responsibility m a y demand
personal sacrifice. It m a y m e a n a willingness
to stand up and be counted, to earn public
abuse, even the loss of office and employ-
ment. ' T h e blood of the martyrs is the
seed of the Church', they used to say.
The great c o m m u n i o n of science is
not unlike a religion, or a Church, in our
modern society. The doctrines of observa-
tional accuracy, rational theory and experi-
mental verification shall be our Trinity,
with the President of the Royal Society as
our Pope and the Nobel laureates as our
patron saints. With the Science Research
Council as a College of Cardinals, with
laboratory directors as abbots, with the
great accelerators and radio telescopes as
our cathedrals, the model is complete.
But alas, w e have n o martyrs. Since
that equivocal episode of poor old Galileo,
it has been a wonderful success story, a
primitive sect waxing mighty until m a d e
one with the State. Without conflict,
without blood, without the opposition of
the temporal to the spiritual power, w e
have been incorporated in the Establish-
ment.
The issues of 'science policy' are mere
manceuvrings by our bishops amongst the
other great lords of the power élite. They
are not allowed to touch on fundamentals
—intellectual independence, academic free-
d o m , the right to speak out and the duty
to be silent—for these have been sold for
118
m o n e y , m e n and machines at every point
of potential conflict.
I do not say that the State is an
abomination, nor that science is being
used exclusively for wicked ends by power-
m a d tycoons and politicians. In our
democratic societies, there are means of
resolving conflicts of goals that do not call
for violence and ultimate martyrdom. Yet
one must note that such conflicts are latent
in the confrontations of transcendental
knowledge by earthly economic and
political forces. Science under Nazism
and Stalinism is the example: h o w few
were those w h o stood against them in
the n a m e of science and truth.
Solzhenitsyn's Nobel Prize is for
literature, but his picture of the imprisoned
science of The First Circle is a masterpiece,
not only of the imagination but of sober
sociology. T h e scientific achievements of
the prisoners are hampered by folly,
suspicion and incompetent management,
not primarily by a refusal to w o r k for
the system that employed them. T h e
myths by which these clever intellectuals
lived did not c o m m a n d them to invite
martyrdom in place of co-operation: the
few w h o accept this sacrifice do so almost
out of a spirit of self-destruction and soli-
darity with the oppressed rather than
heroically in the service of a greater cause.
The full story of this episode has not
yet been written—indeed, the events
themselves have not rolled on to a signi-
ficant conclusion—so that w e do not k n o w
to what extent new myths have taken root
and grown strong amongst those w h o
suffer and have suffered. Perhaps w e shall
witness, at last, a community of scientists
w h o k n o w that their genuine responsibility
is to stand against lies, hypocrisy, cruelty

and folly, not just to acquiesce prudently
to the improper demands of State power.
T h e problems of individual responsi-
bility in science are not trivial. They are
not solved by wild movements of protest
by passionate students. T h e responsibility
has to be exercised by scientists themselves
—that is, by persons of sufficient maturity
and experience to speak and act as experts
in extremely complicated technical situa-
tions. This very maturity and experience
can be acquired only by long years of
purely professional activity as assistants
and subordinates in large-scale enterprises,
where the passions are sapped, the moral
insights are dulled. All that w e can do, I
believe, is to sensitize and arm their con-
sciences, sharpen their understanding of
the world and its ways and exercise their
moral faculties, in youth, so that they m a y
comprehend the issues and have the
courage to face opposition w h e n the real
battles have to be fought.
SCIENTIFIC 'ANTIBODIES'
But let us not despair. The historical answer
to the tyranny and irresponsibility of
individuals and institutions is not merely
personal martyrdom, cunning a c c o m m o -
dation, or the preaching of unheeded
sermons. T h e wisdom of society creates
the countervailing corporate power: Par-
liament to curb the King, the courts to
curb banditry, trade unions to curb the
exploitation of labour, and so on. T h e
'balance of power' model, the adversary
principle, the peculiar institution of
'Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition', are
examples of a technique that could well
be copied. If w e have bodies of scientists
The impact of social responsibility on science
dedicated to essentially irresponsible and
selfish ends, of profit or power, then w e
must invent 'antibodies' to neutralize them.
This is the theory of the F o o d and
Drugs Administration and other regulative
agencies of the United States Government.
Despite m a n y short-comings, they do, in
fact, perform their allotted functions. In
principle, if imperfectly in practice, they
oppose the collective powers of teams of
scientists to the teams in the manufacturing
corporations, thus acting as deliberately
conscientious elements on behalf of
society.
Within the framework of scientific
methodology, this is the correct procedure.
The task of the scientific innovator is to
persuade the other members of the scholarly
community that he has m a d e a valid
contribution. T h e task of the others is to
oppose, not out of mere conservatism and
prejudice, but as informed critics unwilling
to be convinced by mere assertions. T h e
progress of knowledge is dependent upon
such debates—not elevated into personal
controversies, and always tempered by
tolerance and scepticism on both sides. The
apparently certain tone of each particular
scientific paper belies the underlying
uncertainty of the issues; it is the duty of
each participant to use his persuasive
powers to the full, just as the duty of the
advocate is to m a k e the best of his case
before the court.
Scientific responsibility in social issues
therefore demands such debate, whether in
the comparative privacy of the learned
journals or in the form of the press or
Parliament. In most cases, there is no
absolute truth to be determined: D D T is
both a blessing and a scourge; motor
vehicles are convenient, but noisy and dirty.
119
John Ziman
A balanced report by a single expert
commission, however well intentioned, can-
not judge between conflicting opinions and
priorities until each party has expressed,
to the utmost, its o w n special viewpoint or
interest.
W h a t is important is that there
should be adequate representation, of a
skilful, professional kind, of the interests
of the general public, of conservationists, of
bird-watchers, of the lovers of peace and
quiet, of preventive medicine, of anglers,
of the League against Cruel Sports, of the
preservers of churches and windmills,
besides the immediate economic contes-
tants, such as industrial corporations,
local authorities, public utilities, transport
undertakings and so on. It is as m u c h the
duty of the State to ensure that this type
of expert evidence and advocacy is available
as it is in a criminal trial to have proper
lawyers for the defence.
T H E UNIVERSITY: SEAT O F
RESPONSIBLE DISSENT
But where will such experts c o m e from?
W h o will normally employ them? Industrial
corporations and the various organs of the
State k n o w h o w to provide themselves
with scientific consultants; what about the
numerous other interested parties, espe-
cially the ordinary citizen w h o is to be
assaulted, battered, deafened, poisoned,
driven from his h o m e , or just insulted? In
theory, he, too, is the ward of a benevolent
State, that will develop further agencies
for consumer protection, planning, noise
abatement, etc.
But the conservatism that breeds in
such agencies is all too familiar. They
120
continue to plod solemnly back and forth
on ancient sentinel duties, and are blind
to n e w dangers. Being in the political
domain, they are the target of political
forces, such as those of corporate indus-
try.
A n d w h o will guard the guardians?
Where are the professional experts to
countervail the military power, the powers
of State monopoly, of national health
services, etc? The American debate about
anti-ballistic missiles ( A B M ) is a case in
point. Although this is not at all a matter of
pure science, the public case against the
A B M system had to c o m e from a small
volunteer group of academic scientists
(who are not, indeed, ignorant on the
subject) rather than from an engineering
organization charged specifically with
these interests.
W h e r e can institutionalized, licensed
dissent and criticism survive, except in
our universities? T h e great issues of aca-
demic freedom and independence are more
desperate than ever, n o w that the learned
m e n have real fire to play with. Having
demolished the ivory tower in the n a m e of
social relevance, w e must rebuild it as a
watch-tower over all matters of technique
and social action. W e need ABM-watchers,
and CBW-watchers, and pollution-watch-
ers, armed not with slogans but with
searchlights and telescopes of specialist
knowledge.
This is not an easy exercise in social
engineering. Your natural A B M - w a t c h e r
is a cinch for a fat contract for secret work
on radar systems for the Pentagon; a
really good pollution-watcher is the ideal
consultant on the payroll of an oil c o m -
pany ; nobody knows anything about C B W
except those w h o have already been sworn

in under the Official Secrets Act. Yet I
think it must be attempted.
The advantage of the university
environment is that it provides a safe
professional base for expert criticism.
T h e academic is paid primarily to be a
teacher and a scholar, not to provide
specific research results for specific cor-
porate bodies. A tenured professor does
not have to be personally brave to say
what he likes about the government, the
local big wigs, and the policies of Genera-
lized Manufacturers Unlimited. True, he
m a y not get his next research contract
renewed, but w h y should he care: it will
give him more time to write a book instead
offilinginnumerable reports and question-
naires.
The academic economists, in their
splendid running battles with Treasury
policy, set us a good example. Chaps like
John Kenneth Galbraith and Nicholas
Kaldor m o v e in and out of government
circles—and when they are out of favour
they don't hesitate to cock devastating
snooks at their lords and masters in
Washington and Whitehall, respectively.
H o w m a n y aeronautical engineers or
biological soldiers are doing just that?
This is not a matter of unusual individual
'responsibility'; it is just the institutiona-
lization of loyal opposition in the academic
watch-towers.
The real problem is h o w to switch
the so-called research interests of m a n y
university teachers into such channels, and
h o w to fund them so that they have
adequate assistance and equipment without
coming under the sway of precisely the
corporations and agencies they are meant
to watch. This is a field for m u c h m o r e
experiment by bodies like the Ford
The impact of social responsibility on science
Foundation and the National Science
Foundation in the United States and their
equivalents in other nations.
A SOCIETY GETS T H E SCIENTISTS
IT DESERVES
In the end, a country gets the scientists
it deserves. A responsible society breeds,
trains and fosters responsible scientists.
A n open market in ideas and political
criticism is also open for technical attack
and counter-attack. A free press, for
example, ready to publish informed articles
on scientific matters, m a y be the essential
atmosphere in which kites m a y be flown
as first signals of a storm of controversy.
R e m e m b e r that the single most important
act of scientific responsibility in our time
was the publication of Rachel Carson's
book, The Silent Spring—surely impossible
in a totalitarian society where all scientific
questions are automatically solved by
appropriately planned groups under the
benevolent eyes of the all-wise Party and
an omnicompetent Council of Ministers.
The problems of technological pro-
gress are not, in the end, capable of
decision by 'scientific' methods. They are
problems of social priority, of aesthetic
judgement, of taste, of preference, of
material and spiritual standards. The final
arbiters must be the c o m m o n people, as
users and abusers of our pretty toys.
Let's not fool ourselves, though.
M o s t 'political' and 'economic' decisions
about technology are taken at first hand
by politicians, businessmen, generals, and
other socially powerful people. Until quite
recently, these proud, self-confident and
supposedly responsible chaps scarcely
121
John Ziman
deigned to listen to scientific arguments at
all ; technical change was occurring at m u c h
lower levels in society than in their elevated
world of political parties and personal
profits. N o w they have learnt something of
the need for expert advisers, and of at
least s o m e sort of statistical evidence to
support their intuitive wisdom.
Despite one's suspicions of the closed
worlds that some such advisory groups can
build about themselves, especially w h e n
protected by secrecy, one must encourage
this development: for the m o m e n t w e
cannot have too m u c h decent science in
the government and in other organs of
social action. T h e Luddite anti-science
m o o d of m a n y intellectuals would be
disastrous if it communicated itself to the
power élite, for it would hamper good,
responsible science without putting any
obstacles in the way of selfish technocracy.
O u r civilization has gone too far along the
path of bureaucratic and technological
sophistication to survive such a repudia-
tion of rationality.
SCIENTIFIC RESPONSIBILITY
FOR T O M O R R O W
It m a y be, indeed, that the pendulum of
prejudice has swung too far. The public
adoration of the scientist, as the sage and
saviour, is a thing of the past; n o w w e
122
seem to hear nothing but scorn for his
pretensions and hatred of his arrogance.
T h e movement to harness every technical
expert to environmental studies or systems
engineering, to m a k e him useful and safe
—your friendly neighbourhood boffin—
could be as damaging as the older snob-
bery of pure science for its o w n sake.
Scientific knowledge and social action
are not the same thing. The neo-Marxist
argument that all science is 'really'
determined by social ends is either a
vacuous truism or it is dangerous non-
sense. Natural philosophy is not entirely
for useful ends, despite the technological
spin-off. If you try, too short-sightedly, to
press it into service for immediate ends,
then you will rob later generations of its
products. Countercyclically, I feel the
need to preserve the collective skills, the
expert knowledge, and the delicate social
organization of the scientific community
from the pressures of an ignorant public, a
shameless press, rapacious money-makers
and opportunist politicians. A certain
aloofness, a slight distance from everyday
affairs m a y be the only w a y of preserving
these islands of sanity in a crazy world,
not as refuges but as watch-towers and
safeguards against far greater evils.
That is the paradox: social responsi-
bility in science must not be too concern-
ed about today, for tomorrow also will
come.
Social responsibility (II):
T h e classical scientific ethic and
strategic-weapons development
by Milton Leitenberg1

In modern war technology based on science plays a bigger

factor than ever before in the history of mankind. Capable
scientists are, therefore, the most precious asset which a
nation possesses to give it superiority over its enemies
and victory or defeat is in their hands. . . . Thefirstrespon-
sibility of the scientist is to the nation of which he is a
member. . . . He has no choice but to assist his nation
by developing the most effective defense techniques and
also the most effective and, therefore, most destructive
aggressive war weapons. Ernst Chain.

Misuse of scientific and technical knowledge presents a

major threat to the existence of mankind. Through its
actions . . . our government has shaken our confidence in
its ability to make wise and humane decisions. There is
also disquieting evidence of an intention to enlarge further
our immense destructive capability. Scientists and engi-
neers statement, Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
4 M a r c h 1969.

This world can be motivated and structured in such a way

as to achieve a world without war—a world to end the
madness which continues to condemn children everywhere
to hatred, starvation, disease. N o r m a n T h o m a s .

1 Milton Leitenberg, an American biochemist, is a staff member of

the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, where he
works on the annual S1PR1 Yearbook of World Armaments and
Disarmament and on a major study of chemical and biological
warfare. Address: SIPRI, Sveavägen 166, S-113 46 Stockholm
(Sweden).

Impact of Science on Society, Vol. X X I , N o . 2, 1971 123

Milton Leitenberg
W e have been living with the threat of
nuclear war for twenty-five years. This is a
long time in which to tolerate a situation
that has only been aggravated by all
concerned year after year. T h e leaders of
no nation or group of nations have been
capable of reversing or halting the extra-
ordinary increase in stocks of nuclear
weapons and their delivery systems:
competent estimates place combined A m -
erican and Soviet nuclear strength at the
present time at perhaps 50,000 to 60,000
megatons and at around 100,000 individual
nuclear weapons.
In past years interested non-nuclear
nations have found their efforts to contain
this process of growth inadequate and
their counsels divided; often they were
diverted in international forums from their
concern by pressures applied by the major
powers or by their o w n preoccupation
with local or petty problems. S o m e natio-
nal leaders have had no interest at all in
reversing the process, some have worked
continually to maintain and to accelerate
it, and others have either been disinterested
or else sycophants.
In this paper, I wish to show h o w
the classical ethic of science, the pride of
scientists, has been in fact a major factor
in permitting the nuclear problem to attain
its present dimensions.
I shall start by pointing out one major
reason w h y negotiations between the two
great nuclear powers to control the
strategic-weapons race have failed.
W H Y ARMS-CONTROL
NEGOTIATIONS H A V E FAILED
If there has been any progress at all in
124
the area of arms control and disarmament
it has only been to reduce the rate of
increase of strategic-weapons develop-
ment by some small amount for some short
time. The direction of the curve has never
been altered. But even these words are
optimistic to the point of being untrue.
T h e partial test-ban treaty has functioned
as a non-proliferation measure, as well as
a pollution-control measure, but it has
had no effect on slowing strategic-weapons
development of the United States or the
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. In
fact, the rate of nuclear testing has been
higher in the years since the partial test-
ban treaty was signed than it had been
before, and test yields of nuclear devices
have increased by an order of magnitude.
Without the hindrance of the issue of fall-
out which had mobilized public opinion, the
testing programme and attendant nuclear-
weapons development have been able to
proceed without any restraints whatsoever.
In the mid-1950s H a n s Bethe wrote:
'Obviously in any negotiation each side
must be willing to m a k e concessions and
to consider primarily proposals to mutual
advantage rather than superiority over the
other.' Yet numerous arms-control and
disarmament proposals m a d e by the United
States and the Soviet Union have been
patently designed to maintain and even to
enhance an existing superiority of each or
to reduce the opposite side's overwhelming
superiority in other areas. Such proposals
have been more closely calculated to fit
and complement national strategic-force
levels than to accomplish the objectives
customarily attributed to efforts in arms
control and disarmament by public speak-
ers. The history of the test-ban treaty nego-
tiations supports this thesis, and the

conventional sort of commentary o n such
proposals written by interested academics
has been superficial and inadequate.
Furthermore, President Kennedy sta-
ted a position emphasizing the need for
weapons research and weapons testing to
maintain the viability of the laboratories.
In the M a r c h 1962 national address in
which he explained his authorization for
the resumption of atmospheric tests fol-
lowing the Soviet Union's resumption of
testing the previous September, he decla-
red: ' . . . in actual practice, particularly
in a society of free choice, w e cannot keep
top-flight scientists concentrating o n the
preparation of an experiment which m a y
or m a y not take place o n an uncertain date
in the undefined future. N o r can large
technical laboratories be kept fully alert
on a stand-by basis waiting for s o m e other
nation to break an agreement. This is not
merely difficult or inconvenient—we have
explored this alternative thoroughly, and
found it impossible of execution.'
W h e n the U . S . S . R . resumed testing in
September 1961, it had obviously m a d e
preparations to d o so well in advance. T h e
United States w a s close to initiating its
o w n test programme w h e n the Soviet
Union resumed testing. Subsequently, as
part of his effort to win Senate approval
for the 1963 treaty banning atmospheric
nuclear tests, President Kennedy accepted
the Four Safeguards recommended by the
Joint Chiefs of Staff and pledged that the
government would continue a vigorous
underground testing programme.
The series of retractions m a d e by the
United States in the late 1950s of its o w n
disarmament proposals before various
United Nations agencies w h e n it appeared
that the Soviet Union might be willing to
The classical scientific ethic
and strategic-weapons development
accept s o m e of the initiatives were parti-
cularly disconcerting. There have been
few serious explorations of the institu-
tional alterations and requirements that
would be needed if the arms control or
disarmament initiatives could at all be
considered seriously or stand the possi-
bility of achievement. T h e test ban is an
excellent case in point.
THE P Y R A M I D I N G OF
S T R A T E G I C - W E A P O N S SYSTEMS
The problems of controlling strategic
weapons are multiplied by the tendency of
such weapons to pyramid. It takes diplo-
m a c y perhapsfiveyears to struggle through
to a solution on any one issue which it m a y
happen to solve. T h e serious efforts are
usually efforts after the fact, efforts to
undo already-installed operative systems.
In that interval perhaps ten other major
strategic-weapons system decisions m a y
have been m a d e by one of the major nuclear
powers. With all the vaunted contemporary
prowess in systems analysis n o one has
ever set forth what the effects of this
process will be as they continue to accrue
over twenty-five, fifty or a hundred years.
B y n o w the dynamics of the process
should be clear to all:
Each n e w development sets the stage for
the next: the arguments in support of
the very next weapons system and
decision that is under consideration
are facilitated and m a d e more salient.
The cumulative effects of the systems pro-
cured over the entire post-Second World
W a r period work towards the same
facilitation.
Sectors of the nation and economy
125
Milton Leitenberg
favouring further weapons development
and procurement are institutionalized,
strengthened, extend their staffs and
constituencies wider and wider through
the political process and become part
and parcel of accepted government
practice and 'tradition'.
U p till n o w the publics of both the Western
democracies and of the socialist nations
have followed along in this process
like sheep to the horn call of 'national
security'. If anything, Western publics
are more culpable, as they consistently
claim to be better informed and to
enjoy freer discussion.
The long-term effects of this process are
never considered.
N e w generations of strategic weapons are
developed and deployed every five to ten
years. There seems to be n o capability
within any country to prevent their accu-
mulation. There is even less ability in the
international community to impede their
continuing development. N o strategic-
weapon system has even been reduced,
dismantled or withdrawn except to be
replaced by an improved succeeding sys-
tem. T h e more strategic-weapons systems
there are, the greater the threat that
realistically can be perceived and the
greater the likelihood that the next
development will be instituted.
These points m a k e it evident that too
little attention is paid and analysis m a d e
of the interrelationship between scientific
research and development ( R & D ) , the
weapons-acquisition process, and the sub-
sequent arms-control problems.
126
THE CLASSICAL ETHIC A N D
SCIENCE IN M O D E R N SOCIETY
Writing in 1937 and generalizing from the
G e r m a n experience, the historian H a n s
K o h n offered an assessment that was to
become far more meaningful after the war
than it was even in the contexts of the
First World W a r and the Second World
W a r : 'Even science does not unite any
more—the old Republic of Letters is
gone. Science tends to become in some
countries as Ernst Kriek called it " W e h r ,
Waffe und Werkzeug z u m völkischpoli-
tischen Aufbau" (arms and tools for the
nationalist political upbuilding). . . . It is
an instrument for national purposes. . . .
Science has become, as m u c h as economics,
a potentiel de guerre.'
In October 1957 a conference on
N e w Knowledge in H u m a n Values took
place at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology. O f thefifteenaddresses given,
one was remarkable and in fact has become
historic. It was m a d e by D r . Jacob
Bronowski, a person of undoubted bril-
liance, and subsequently appeared as the
book, Science and Human Values. It has
since become required reading in college
courses throughout the United States. It
is an impassioned expression of the classic
scientific ethic, which has remained un-
changed since Galileo. Its tenets are these:
The sole duty of the scientist is to follow
the lead of his data and to interpret it
as faithfully and truthfully as possible.
Because each m e m b e r of the community
of scientists applies this principle, a
system results which has its o w n inter-
nal corrective, holding the entire m e m -
bership of the community to the same
standards of truth and accuracy.

The social utility of this scientific metho-
dology would be manifested if it were
equally utilized by other sectors of
h u m a n endeavour.
N o one has yet offered any further improve-
ments to this d o g m a .
This address is particularly memorable
because the ethic it reiterates is inadequate
and obsolete, in regard to the major
scientific problem of our time. It was
obsolete in 1957, and it gets m o r e so with
every passing day. It is even misleading.
It does not begin to take into account the
elements which it must in order to under-
stand the interaction between scientific
research and the weapons-acquisition
process, and it is the misdirection of scien-
tific knowledge which these elements bring
about which has become the paramount
problem of science in our time.
For these elements have c o m e from
outside the scientific process, have super-
imposed themselves on it, and have used
the scientific process for purposes of
national politics. These elements which
have adapted the outputs of the scientific
method are systems for managing science,
applying it, organizing it, funding it, and
directing it to serve particular goals.
T o aggravate matters, a faith in the
classic d o g m a facilitates the utilization of
the scientific process by the imposed ele-
ments, at the same time as it makes the
scientific community extremely reluctant,
in the face of its marvellous ideal, to realize
what is actually taking place.
O n e can suggest a very crude three-
stage model describing the social utiliza-
tion of science and the interactions of
science with society: (a) in the earliest
phase of its evolution, science subordi-
nates itself to politics, claiming to be
The classical scientific ethic
and strategic-weapons development
value-free and neutral; (b) with time,
scientific research and development results
influence the society but do not yet cause
any disruption in its framework—the
influence m a y be significant but the esta-
blished institutions have not yet given w a y
to the selection of one applied social
utility to be benefited at the expense of
all others; (c) eventually the consequences
of science and technology m a y be so great
so as to change the very institutions of
society, perhaps even developing mecha-
nisms whereby scientific and technological
development becomes the purpose of other
social and political activities.
T h e trouble with the classical scienti-
fic d o g m a is that itfitsonly a world which
is still in the earliest of the above three
stages, whereas m a n y societies today have
long passed into being some amalgam of
the latter two. There exists no theoretical
or conceptual framework which deals with
the n e w situation and the n e w context.
Louis M u m f o r d , w h o attempted to deal
with the reality, however inadequately, in
two papers in 1954 and 1961, is considered
an atavism by the scientific community.
Never in any nation since the Indus-
trial Revolution has any group of working
scientists tried to determine or condition
society's reception or understanding of
their n e w invention or theory.
T h e only exception to this statement
m a y be the group of atomic scientists in
Chicago that produced the Franck Report
opposing the use of the atom b o m b in
1945, and that subsequently founded the
journal, The Bulletin of the Atomic Scien-
tists. They stand as m o d e r n Prometheans.
Nevertheless their attempt was too weak,
too late, too minimal. After 1945 they
could play only a very minor role, and the
127
Milton Leitenberg

function of the Bulletin has since been an offered the opinion that even in the face of
educational one. a 'potentially dangerous and inevitable
situation' the scientist could not consider
'a type of action' outlined above, that
BRINGING T H E SCIENTIFIC ETHIC m u c h as one might be unhappy with the
U P TO D A T E eventual and forseeable outcome, one w a s
faced with 'inaction'. This response by
It is only in the early generative stages of Wiener is all the more disappointing because
scientific discovery, long before application, in perhaps the only case of its sort on
that a relatively limited n u m b e r of m e n , record Wiener had, in a public letter,
perhaps just a few hundred individual renounced his contract support from the
researchers, can exert any leverage on United States Department of Defense in
policy by saying that they, at any rate, the late 1940s because, as he stated, he n o
shall not proceed with work in a certain longer felt that his service under such
direction. Far less a number of policy- contracts suited the national interest.
makers have clearly been capable of moving The scientific community is at present
research in the opposite direction, towards incapable of dealing with the points listed
a particular application. above precisely because its method and
T o the objection some scientists m a k e ethic does not concern applications, end-
that all scientific research, whatever the products, utilizations. Concerning the
objectives for which undertaken, m a y have utilization that the real world will m a k e of
eventual beneficial utility, w e must reply its products, science has only the hands-
that it is time that the scientists and the off hopefulness of the classical ethic or
scientific community became capable of rosy nostrums and absent-minded visions
enough maturity to attempt to incorporate used for public addresses on civic occasions.
into its methodology and practice a pro- This is, of course, not true of those few
cess of foresight. This process would prominent scientists w h o have direct
specify, as best as possible: (a) what advisory roles in defence establishments,
benefits might derive from the work one though they are even more expert in
is so anxious to pursue and which is seen expounding on the rosy visions at civic
through the optimistic filter of scientific occasions.
curiosity; (b) what negative aspects might There is nothing institutionalized in
result; and (c) what other means, if they the role, method and function of science
were only initiated and applied, m a y already concerning the problem of consequences.
exist and be available to achieve the same W h a t is institutionalized are the patriotism,
potential benefits as are argued for the encouragements, career arrangements and
particular n e w piece of research. rewards for making a better torpedo, a
All suggestions to this effect have better phased-array radar, and a thermo-
heretofore been dismissed out of hand or nuclear warhead with lower weight-to-
have been looked on as aberrations. In yield ratio, though n o such products have
speaking to the student body of Brandeis a place in D r . Bronowski's classical for-
University in 1958, D r . Norbert Wiener mulation.

128

T h e classical ethic completely crum-
bles before the following description
written by Edward Teller in 1962:
'In the s u m m e r of 1948 at Los A l a m o s
w e had a detailed discussion with the Air
Force about the next explosive to be
designed. T h e Air Force people said that
what w e had w a s fine; it justfittedtheir
biggest b o m b e r ; it had sufficient yield;
and it could not be improved. This seemed
strange to m e because I k n e w that our
b o m b had been designed to fit the bomber
which existed during the war. I k n e w
bombers would change and it did not
m a k e sense that the decision m a d e appro-
priately during the w a r should n o w
determine the shape of our arms for the
indefinite future. This provides a lesson.
Generally, it is m u c h better not to ask
for military requirements but to push
scientific developments. . . .
'There is a general lesson to be learned
from this experience. W e were afraid of
our o w n scientific progress. I have heard
scientists say quite frequently: " O u r main
problem is n o longer one of technological
advance but rather is to m a k e the best
h u m a n use of the advances already
achieved". This is an extremely grave
symptom. T h e whole dynamic civilization
of the West, for which America is the
spearhead, is based u p o n scientific and
technological advancements. W e must
trust our social processes to use these ad-
vancements in the right manner. W e must
not be deterred by arguments involving
consequences or costs.'
T h e American scientific community
has n o w thoroughly and capably educated
the military community o n h o w to acquire
the things it needs from science—and this
is probably true, to a greater or lesser
The classical scientific ethic
and strategic-weapons development
degree, of the scientific communities of
other countries. D r . Teller is c o m m e n d -
ably clear about things; he just has
different goals. For a m o m e n t science and
the world were mature enough to be
afraid of scientific 'progress'. This might
have resulted in control, which D r . Teller
with mortal fear recognizes as an 'extre-
mely grave s y m p t o m ' .
Almost as a reply to Teller's 'trust
[of] our social processes to use these
advancements in the right manner' was
the ' M a r c h 4 1969 statement' of s o m e of
the senior faculty members of the Massa-
chusetts Institute of Technology, several of
w h o m were, with D r . Teller, alumni of
the Manhattan Project, which developed
thefirstA - b o m b . The quotation o n the first
page of this article is continued with this
declaration : ' T h e response of the scientific
community to these developments has been
hopelessly fragmented. There is a small
group that helps to conceive these policies,
and a handful of eminent m e n w h o have
tried but largely failed to stem the tide
from within the government. T h e con-
cerned majority has been on the sidelines
and ineffective. W e feel that it is n o longer
possible to remain uninvolved.'
With entire unanimity scientific states-
m e n — w h o as often as not are scientific
statesmen because of their prior service on
defence science advisory boards—speak of
science as an end in itself which should
under n o conditions be tampered with.
This d o g m a only obscures the fact that
science is nearly always being guided. T h e
questions are only: B y w h o m ? For what?
Science is not an end in itself. All of
the intelligent scientific statesmen of the
older generation w h o pay h o m a g e to the
'irreversible scientific revolution' and
129
Milton Leitenberg
deplore the negative anti-scientific ten-
dencies of some of today's university
students have found themselves totally and
completely incapable of controlling the
overwhelming channelling of scientific
progress towards weapons development.
THE INTERACTIONS BETWEEN
SCIENCE AND WEAPONS
DEVELOPMENT
There is no longer any distinction whatever
between basic scientific research which m a y
have military relevance or weapon appli-
cations and that which does not. This is
not because science has changed but
because the military 'requirements' have.
W e a p o n s are n o w universally dispersed in
all environments—space, sea depths, jungle
—and n e w weapons, communications
systems, sensors, and support equipment
involve so m a n y n e w energy forms and
materials that there probably is n o area of
scientific research that is not n o w of interest
to the military.
Research in organic chemistry is of
interest, for example, because of the need
for a lubricant that will operate from
— 80° C to + 3,500° C . Micro-organisms
are studied in near-vacuum environments
since they apparently have some effect on
missile inertial-guidance systems and on
lubricants in aircraft and missile electronic-
control and guidance systems. Studies on
the requirements and the fixation of
barnacle larvae are relevant to whether or
not the barnacles will fix and grow on
surfaces: if they happen to fix o n the
acquisition sonar of a nuclear-attack
submarine it seriously reduces the ability of
this costly and critical weapon to function.
130
T h e oceans are in fact an excellent
example of what has happened to science.
Twenty-five years ago it w a s safe to say
that any ongoing piece of océanographie
research had very little chance of being
applied to a weapon system, that it might
answer n o more than the direct scientific
questions which had been asked in the
research programme, and that there was
a chance that it might improve the food
harvest from the sea. A n y ongoing ana-
logous piece of océanographie research
today is likely to have at least a large
military component, or military interest
m a y even be the sole reason w h y the
research is being done. This is simply
because military weapon systems have
moved into the oceans, and there are n o w
deep-diving submarines, bottom instal-
lations, bottom submarine barrier and
detection systems, buoys, etc., all affected
by pressure, temperature, salinity, living
creatures (including micro-organisms), cur-
rents, ocean-floor geology, geomagnetism,
wave action, etc.
Nuclear science, aeronautics, electro-
nics, materials research, data processing,
solid-state physics, oceanography have all
combined to form the very basis of exis-
tence of the arms race. Without such
research all the system definitions in the
world would not bring about a n e w
weapon.
N o one today realizes this better than
the military services. A publication of the
United States Air Force Office of Scientific
Research lists some sixty areas of scientific
research in which it has performed a
'colonizing' role; these are areas in which
it has an interest and in which it subsidizes
research, both in the United States and
abroad. T h e United States A r m y Research

Task S u m m a r y lists thousands of projects
in eighty-nine scientific disciplines, grouped
into s o m e twelve categories. A paper by
Harvey Brooks states: ' A mere catalogue
of areas in which Office of Naval Research-
sponsored scientists have pioneered shows
h o w frequently O N R has been there with
the right science at the right time even
though few foresaw the usefulness and
relevance w h e n O N R first began to
sponsor it.' T h e Department of Defence
described in Congressional testimony a
list of 'programs to establish a technolo-
gical base to meet identified needs'.
Clearly, the military has long passed
the stage of utilizing knowledge and
technology discovered years past in various
fields of science. N o t only has the military
outgrown its role as a harvester, it fully
understands the discovery process and
very often n o w defines the requirements for
a material, operation, or capability before
the basic research or even theory is worked
out—in bionics, in materials physics, or
in some otherfield.Funding of American
science since the Second World W a r has
primarily followed the perceived require-
ments of the nation's future defence
needs: oceanography for anti-submarine
warfare ( A S W ) , materials to withstand
new aerodynamic stresses, electronics and
physics required for the support and deve-
lopment of n e w generations of missiles,
and so on.
A n y o n e conversant with the history of
American missile development can easily
document the process by which gradual
improvements in several areas simul-
taneously—guidance, materials, thrust,
miniaturization—have m a d e previously
impossible w e a p o n systems possible. If you
have these capabilities y o u can m a k e the
The classical scientific ethic
and strategic-weapons development
missile, if you d o not have them y o u
cannot m a k e the missile. All of the above
holds equally for the U . S . S . R . or any other
nation.
In the ten years that the Polaris
submarine ballistic missile has been
deployed, from 1960 to 1970, n o less than
5,000 improvements have been m a d e in
the weapon. All of these changes g o
together to increase its range, its accuracy,
its reliability, its invulnerability. All of
those changes depend o n science, o n
'basic research'.
Computers, solid-state physics, the
atmospheric, materials and space sciences,
all first burgeoned under the military
impetus, with the emphasis n o w on oceano-
graphy. Thus the distinctions between
'basic science' and 'applied technology',
between 'research' and 'engineering devel-
opment', are abitrary and grossly exag-
gerated in discussions of the relationship of
scientific research to weapons develop-
ment. The problems of military technology
are largely answered b y basic science:
basic research in thefinestructure of metals
finds its application in aircraft landing
gear; research into atomic emissions
produces the absolute chronometer used
in conjunction with Polaris ballistic-
missile guidance systems; geodetic research
provides input to I C B M inertial guidance
systems and geomagnetic anomalies are
charted for effects o n submarine inertial
guidance devices; basic research in math-
ematical theory produces computer pro-
g r a m m e s ; hydrodynamics research is ap-
plied in rocket fuel-pumps and in submarine
design to reduce sonar-detectable noise
produced by movement. T h e examples are
infinite; there are as m a n y as there are
fields of scientific research.
131
Milton Leitenberg

The sole criterion for whether a field This situation has been succinctly
of science or topic of research is 'military' expressed by former Presidential Science
is the interest of the military. Adviser Jerome B . Wiesner: 'Since there are
very long lead times in most of the activities
we're engaged in, w e invent a weapon,
T H E SELF-STIMULATING N A T U R E then w e invent the counter-weapon and
OF W E A P O N S D E V E L O P M E N T w e assume the Russians are doing both
these things. A n d w e do both of them and
Once weapons development became driven then w e talk about them and sure enough,
substantially by scientific knowledge of they d o them. T h e M I R V [multiple indi-
materials, environments, energy modes, it vidually targetable re-entry vehicle], I
underwent an important transformation: think, is a very good example of this?
new weapons development has become T h e exact same process has been
self-accelerating and the motives for described just as succinctly by D r . John
weapons development have grown more Foster Jr., Director, Defense Research
and more divorced from the actual needs and Engineering, Department of Defense,
of defence. and by D r . D . J. Fink, then a high-
Let us suppose that the vast research ranking Department of Defense official,
establishments discover some n e w weapon in a 1968 article o n strategic warfare.
or technique of warfare, which m a y well Scientists have been the major figures
take six or seven years to develop. It is on the defence advisory committees that
then automatically assumed that 'the foresaw as feasible and advised the initia-
enemy' is likely to discover the new tion of such major strategic projects as
weapon or technique as well, so that the solid-fuel missiles, the Polaris submarine
only safe thing is to push even further ballistic-missile system, satellite recon-
ahead. W e a p o n s research and develop- naissance and surveillance, A S W systems,
ment thus become more and more an etc. In each case it was possible to ration-
ungovernable and—in the presence of a alize the recommended and subsequent
government unwilling to apply constraints development as a contribution to 'stabil-
—a self-propagating process ; it takes on a ity' in the strategic-arms race, and there-
Frankenstein aspect. It needs n o increase in fore advantageous for national security.
tension to keep it going; it hardly even Often, also, scientists were the major
needs a real enemy. As regards the United figures on the special panels and commit-
States and the Soviet Union it certainly tees that urged the strategic-arms race on
has not needed the evidence of R & D on a to n e w heights.
particular weapon system by the other side.
The assumption is one of an under-
lying 'threat', and that whatever ' w e ' can DECEPTION A N D SELF-DECEPTION
do, 'they' will in time be able to, and will
do as well. T o these presumptions is added T h e essential and necessary dependence
the fear that an advantage will accrue to of weapons development on scientific
the 'other side' if it deploys the item first. research has been the subject of a great

132
 The classical scientific ethic
and strategic-weapons development

deception, practised on both the general k n o w , what will happen to the results
public and—even m o r e so—the scientific of our work after it leaves our laboratory.
community, within which this role has If w e do k n o w , it is not the social role
been obscured. There is little rational reason of the scientist to decide what shall be
w h y public knowledge of the relations the application of his w o r k ; that is the
between scientific research and weapons function of the society as a whole, or
development should be in so poor a state particularly of another special group,
and w h y these relations should be so the managers of the activities and
touchy a subject in the scientific c o m m u - priorities of society, the 'politicians'.
nity. The situation seems best describable Today, if not historically, the last of these
as an amalgam of ignorance, self-decep- rationalizations undoubtedly bears a strong
tion, and deliberate deception in order to relationship to the source of funding for
minimize public reactions and possible m u c h scientific research, and recognizes
consequent obstacles to programmes deem- the costs to the individual of placing
ed in the interest of national defence. personal against managerial decisions in
These three elements are present in dif- any institution in any nation.
ferent degrees for different sectors of the A declaration on this issue of doing
scientific community. military-sponsored research written by
F e w scientists anywhere are overtly D r . Ernst Chain is typical of m a n y , m a n y
coerced into particular scientific disciplines others: ' W h a t is wrong with accepting
or into work on particular scientific research grants from the Ministry of
projects. Rather, it is institutional pres- Defence? A s is well k n o w n , thousands of
sures, social rewards, the availability of scientists have, for m a n y years, accepted
funds and positions, student training and such grants from the U . S . N a v y , the U . S .
fellowship programmes which are every- Air Force, N A T O , and similar national
where in the world the guiding mechanisms. and international organizations for funda-
There is no reason w h y a scientist mental research in m a n y branches of the
cannot choose any kind of w o r k he physical and biological sciences; this does
pleases, in full awareness of its aims, not m e a n that such w o r k involved them
implications and applications. T o all in research on military technology. O n e
appearances, however, scientists seldom can only be grateful for the mission and
achieve free choice and unnecessary foresight shown by those responsible for
rationalizations and defensiveness about formulating and deciding the policies of
the work chosen, under one form of these organizations in allowing their
persuasion or another, are the rule. T h e funds to be m a d e available for sponsoring
arguments presented for doing weapons- fundamental university research which
related research have consistently been the bears n o immediate, and usually not even
following simple rephrasing of the tra- a remote, relation to problems of warfare
ditional ethic: technology.'
W e scientists are doing only what interests N o w compare this with the official
us. guide-lines set by the United States
W e do not k n o w , and there is no w a y to Department of Defense ( D o D ) : 'All

133
Milton Leitenberg
ongoing or future research and exploratory
development by foreign performers shall
be supported by D o D only when it has
been determined that (a) it is clearly signi-
ficant in meeting urgent defence needs of
the U . S . ; (b) it cannot be deferred for later
action; (c) the proposed foreign investi-
gator certifies that he is unable to obtain
support from any other source for the
proposed project; and (d) at least one of
the following special conditions is inherent
in the proposed work: (1) the research or
development involves geographical, envi-
ronmental, or cultural conditions, fauna,
or flora not found and not feasible to
duplicate or simulate within the United
States and its territories; (2) the work
involves diseases, epidemiological situa-
tions, or availability or clinical material
which are not present within the United
States; (3) the work involves a unique
research idea highly relevant to DoD
needs'" [my italics].
It is quite c o m m o n to find the most
extreme efforts to prove irrelevance to
military purposes. For example, studies o n
the isolation, purification, and structure of
ricin, a plant toxin as deadly as some nerve
agents, and on enzymes involved in nerve
transmission, are claimed to 'have no, or
only the most tenuous, relation' to chem-
ical- or biological-warfare matters. This
is, in fact, the exact opposite of the truth.
The rationalizations about doing
military-sponsored research are typified by
the contradictory ones attributed in two
scientific journals to a n administrator
(Galler) and a scientist (Humphrey)
discussing a particular research project at
the Smithsonian Institution:
'The Smithsonian's Galler says there
is no question that the Defense Depart-
134
ment has some biological warfare interest
in at least one of the two projects headed
by an ornithologist loosely attached to the
Institution's M u s e u m of Natural History.
Support for the bird study of the Pacific
Ocean Biological Survey Program has,
in fact, c o m e directly from Fort Detrick.'
{Scientific Research, 9 D e c . 1968, p. 27.)
' " W h a t they [the D o D agencies] d o
with the data I don't have any idea,"
H u m p h r e y said. " W e just send them copies
of our results." ' (ibid., p. 31.)
'Galler, too, says he doesn't care
what the military does with the research re-
sults from Belem, but he seriously doubts
that any of the data could be used for
offensive biological warfare.' (ibid., p. 31.)
'In fact, H u m p h r e y , the project's
director, says he learned "fairly early" in
the survey " w h y the military is interested
in this in a general sense". H e says he is
"sure" the A r m y wants to test C B W in
the Pacific and is looking at thefindingsof
the ecological survey to be certain that any
potential site is "safe". But he says the
Smithsonian itself is not trying to pick
such a site ; it is simply trying to learn m o r e
about the animal and bird population of
the area.' (Science, 21 Feb. 1969, p. 792.)
The issue of military-sponsored re-
search has c o m e to a head in the United
States in the last two years, albeit still with
no great clarity in the public mind. This
was due in part to a Senate appropriations
amendment (the Mansfield A m e n d m e n t ) ,
n o w revoked, which had set the require-
ment that basic research funded by
military agencies must have direct military
relevance. Interestingly enough, the Depart-
ment of Defense reported some six months
after this amendment came into force that
only 2 or 2 % per cent of its basic science

research funding might fail to meet the
criterion.
Over the years the Office of Naval
Research and the Air Force Office of
Scientific Research have released a series
of studies and reports concerning defence
research priorities and funding practices
m a d e to take advantage of past experience
and improve the purchase of research. They
certainly d o not claim to be funding
science in which they see n o relevance for
their operational requirements, and in fact
they see their role as quite the opposite
and clearly say so. It is only in scientific
journals that the opposite case is m a d e ,
in the United States often in such publica-
tions as Scientific Monthly and Science.
It is the scientific community that has had
to be convinced and reconvinced of its
pure allegiance to the tradition of scientific
curiosity while accepting military support
for research.
W H A T THE SCIENTIFIC
COMMUNITY MUST DO
T h e dangers in science heretofore have not
been in the research exercise but in the
utilization of the research results. If the
military becomes interested in research in
every corner and discipline of science, and
if it becomes impossible to control the
utilization process, then it becomes incum-
bent o n the scientific community to
attempt some degree of control of the
research exercise itself. T o put it baldly:
either society redirects the political use of
science or scientists must attempt to
control the work science does.
In either case, however, the objectives
The classical scientific ethic
and strategic-weapons development
for achieving control must be explicit. If,
for example, the objective is to bring about
the conversion of national weapons
laboratories to agricultural research it
would be useful to say so plainly. It makes
clear exactly what one is trying to d o and
what difficulties stand in the w a y , politi-
cally o n the one hand, and within the
scientific community on the other, in
terms of training and personnel.
It is clearly easier to w o r k within
government to change programme plan-
ning than to w o r k from the outside against
existing programmes which governments
are doing their best to maintain: there are
too m a n y scientists available to w o r k on
existing programmes and there always
will b e ; few scientists work at anything
other than w h a t they are hired to w o r k at,
or get research grants to work at.
T h e scientific community has far
m o r e political leverage to initiate change
in governmental scientific priorities and
programmes than the general public has.
It should turn to a direct examination of
governmental structures and to a consi-
deration of the constitutional changes that
could be m a d e by governments to establish
a n e w , m o r e responsible relationship
between science and society.
Suggestions that have been so far
m a d e for controlling the research exercise
itself by the working scientific community
have been merely symbolic. Symbolic
gestures and inadequate efforts which
offer n o real hope of altering the situation
they purport to confront are to be avoided.
Anything less than concrete proposals with
s o m e potential of solving or forcing a
solution of the problems are useless.
T h e first responses uniformly m a d e
by m e n overwhelmed by the realities of
135
Milton Leitenberg

a task implying a major change in the
status quo are always : (a) that the process
is irreversible, or (b) that the suggested
alternative is unworkable, or (c) that to
achieve the change is impossible. Nothing
that m e n — o r m e n ' s governments—seri-
ously care to reverse is irreversible.
Moreover, the predictable response that
'it will not w o r k ' cannot only usually be
translated into 'it has never been tried',
but carries the implication that the proposal
is in fact opposed.
The entire problem of science serving
military objectives is imbued with an
over-abundance of unreality, of the unwil-
lingness of those in high position a n d of
their intelligent advisers to realize u n -
pleasant truths, and of continuously mal-
adaptive reactions. Perhaps the general
public can be excused of the same faults
on the basis of ignorance—but perhaps
not. H o w e v e r , it is impossible for the
scientific community to claim that i m m u -
nity. Our entire training a n d existence is
based o n a n analytic, conscious a n d
reality-based methodology, yet w e have
been blundering for twenty-five years. W e
can blame n o one but ourselves for our
gullibility, and if we live in a n insensate
state it can only be self-induced.
It is time that deceptions were cast
aside. T h e longer the present situation
continues, the less likely that anything will
be revoked or changed.

SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING

B A X T E R , J. P., 3rd. Scientists against time. Cambridge, Mass., M I T Press, 1946.

H O U S E O F C O M M O N S . Defence research, Second report from the Select Committee on Science and
Technology. London, H M S O , 27 March 1969.
K Ä S T , F.; R O S E N Z W E I G , J. Science, technology and management. N e w York, McGraw-Hill, 1963.
K O R O L , A . Sonet research and development, its organization, personnel and funds. Cambridge,
Mass., M I T Press, 1965.
N I E B U R G , H . L. In the name of science, Chicago, 111., Quadrangle Books, 1946.
SIPRI (Stockholm). Yearbook of world armaments and disarmament. In 1968-69 edition, chapters
on the technological arms race, submarine-launched ballistic missiles, chemical and biolo-
gical warfare; in 1969-70 edition, chapters on the militarization of the deep ocean, Soviet
expenditure on military research.
U N I T E D STATES C O N G R E S S . Annual Hearings on Department of Defense appropriations. Parti-
cularly the Volume on Research, Development, Test and Evaluation, prepared by the Sub-
committee on Department of Defense of the Committee on Appropriations of the House
of Representatives ; and Hearings of the Committee on A r m e d Services, United States Senate.
. Hearings and reports of the Subcommittee on Science, Research and Development of
the Committee on Science and Astronautics of the House of Representatives ; of the C o m -
mittee on Government Operations, House of Representatives; and of the Committee on
Government Operations of the United States Senate.

136
Social responsibility (III):
T h e m y t h of the neutrality
of science
b y Steven R o s e a n d Hilary R o s e 1

Is science—even pure research—ever neutral, as many

scientists hold, with its non-neutrality, in terms of positive
or negative social consequences, determined by its appli-
cations?
N o , insist the authors ; this is a m y t h , whose relatively
recent flowering has contributed to m a n y of the world's
major problems. E v e n pure research can never be neutral
since its nature a n d its directions are always framed b y
the social and scientific context of its time. T h e fact
that science is not neutral m a k e s scientists profoundly
responsible to society in the performance of their w o r k .
H u m a n relevance m u s t be built into the conduct of science ;
a p r o g r a m m e of action for scientists is offered to achieve
this.

O n e of the key items of intellectual programmes have more than a passing

baggage which most practising scientists
carry over from their training—there are
not m a n y such, for few scientific training
1. D r . Steven Rose, brain researcher and
Professor of Biology at the O p e n University,
and M r s . Hilary Rose, lecturer in sociology
at the L o n d o n School of Economics, are
founder-members of the British Society
for Social Responsibility in Science and
co-authors of Science and Society. Address
(S. R . ) : Department of Biology, The
O p e n University, Walton Hall, Bletchley,
Buckinghamshire (United K i n g d o m ) .
reference to theory—is one labelled 'the
neutrality of science'. Briefly stated the
phrase m a y be expanded thus: 'The acti-
vities of science are morally and socially
value-free. Science is the pursuit of natural
laws, laws which are valid irrespective of
the nation, race, politics, religion or class
position of their discoverer. Although
science proceeds by a series of approxima-
tions to a never-attained objective truth,
the laws and facts of science have an
immutable quality. T h e velocity of light

Impact of Science on Society, Vol. X X I , N o . 2, 1971 137

Steven Rose and Hilary Rose
is the same whoever makes the experiment
which measures it. Because this is the case,
although the uses to which society m a y
put science m a y be good or evil, the scientist
carries no special responsibility for those
uses, save as a normal citizen. T h e two-
edged sword of science is fashioned for
whomsoever will pick it u p and wield it.'
Thus, a recent analysis of the social
responsibility of the scientist by a Nobel
laureate, E . B . Chain, italicized the state-
ment that 'science, as long as it limits
itself to the descriptive study of the laws
of nature, has n o moral or ethical quality
and this applies to the physical as well as
the biological sciences' [l].1
It is this set of beliefs and ideas
concerning the neutrality of science which
has began to wear the aspect of a myth,
which while at present ubiquitous in
socialist and capitalist, industrialized and
non-industrialized societies, none the less is
of relatively recent origin. O u r purpose
here is to challenge this myth, to reveal
it for what it is, for it is our feeling that
the unthinking, unquestioning acceptance
of it as gospel has been to a large degree
responsible for the anti-social applications
•—the n o n - h u m a n or inhuman uses—of
science, which have strongly contributed
to m a n y of the world's major problems.
If w e treat the neutrality of science
as a myth, w e are then committed to
attempting to discuss a series of questions :
H o w has the m y t h emerged? W h a t role
has it played? H o w has the m y t h been
challenged? H o w far does the future of
science and of h u m a n survival itself depend
on our ability to transcend and refashion
such myths of science? These are dauntingly
large questions, yet it is inescapably clear
that they form the agenda of increasing
138
numbers of socially aware scientists, a n d
that they reflect the intellectual and moral
crisis of contemporary science.
THE EMERGENCE OF THE MYTH
OF PURE SCIENCE
It is widely accepted that the m o d e r n
activity of science emerged and began to
find its social and philosophical articula-
tion in post-Renaissance Europe, a n d
rather specifically in seventeenth-century
Britain. That science w a s seen as a pro-
gressive force, closely linked to the
enhancement of h u m a n welfare, is clear
from the writings of Francis Bacon and the
founders of the Royal Society. For B a c o n ,
knowledge for knowledge's sake, or for
power's sake, w a s subordinate to k n o w -
ledge for charity's sake, for 'of charity
there can be n o excess'. A n d for the
chemist, Sir Robert Boyle, science w a s
for 'the greater glory of G o d and for the
good of mankind'.
But this clarity of purpose did not
survive into the eighteenth century in
Britain, where science became an activity
for a cultured, moneyed and leisured class.
It is n o accident that the term 'scientist' did
not exist in Britain until the mid-nineteenth
century; the phrase actually used w a s 'a
cultivator of science'. In France, too, rigid
social stratification m a d e the Académie
des Sciences a cultured gentleman inven-
tor's club until its degeneration a n d
transformation following the 1789 R e v o -
lution. A n d the discrepancy between
'aristocratic' and 'citizen's' science even
1. T h efiguresin brackets refer to the references
at the end of this article.

then contributed to the death of Lavoisier.
T h e Industrial Revolution in the
nineteenth century saw the continuation
and hardening of this gulf. T h e rigid
amateurism of the Royal Society preci-
pitated the formation of alternative insti-
tutions more clearly integrated with the
needs of burgeoning capitalism, such as
the Midland industrialists' Lunar Society,
which embraced W e d g w o o d , Boulton,
Watt and Dalton, and later Babbage's
British Association for the Advancement
of Science. Yet such was the forward
thrust of the scientific temper that Lunar
Society members were attacked for their
radical political views and sympathy to
the French Revolution, while the debates
at the early British Association raised such
fundamental questions as to convince a
magistrate that 'science and learning, if
universally diffused, would speedily over-
turn the best-constituted government on
earth'. The movement in Britain towards
working-class scientific education in the
mid-nineteenth century reflected a constant
tension between Establishment fears of
the revolutionary potential of scientific
thought and recognition of the needs of
capitalist society for a more skilled worker.
T h e conflicts were equally in evidence
in the rest of Europe. France saw the
emergence of the strange scientific religion
of St. Simonism, whilst in G e r m a n y the
naturphilosophen, with their speculative
attempts to synthesize science and natural
knowledge into an all-embracing scheme of
the world, conflicted with the m o r e arid
traditions of the university scholar. Even-
tually, the universities digested this dev-
elopment; 'pure' science emerged as a
university discipline uncontaminated with
relevance to anything, and the Technische
The myth of the neutrality of science
Hochschulen concentrated on the practical
side of science and industry's needs,
contributing to the success of the G e r m a n
science-based industries, which served the
nation so well right into the First World
War.
The development of socialist materia-
list ideas in the later nineteenth century,
and particularly those of Marxism, set
these tensions into a new frame. Marxism
claimed to be a scientific socialism. It
applied the techniques and dialectical
methods of the natural sciences to the
disordered world of h u m a n affairs. Socia-
lism was seen to be on the side of history,
and science was on the side of socialism.
Major theoretical scientific advances con-
tributed to the interpretation of society;
M a r x , like the conservative Herbert
Spencer, saw the value of a biological
metaphor for h u m a n activities. It is well
k n o w n that M a r x wished to dedicate one
of the volumes of Das Kapital to Darwin,
w h o declined the honour. A t the same
time Darwinism found itself recruited to
service the needs of racists and eugenicists.
N o r w a s it just biology which was
seen as both deriving impetus from,
and contributing to, social analysis. T h e
inmost heart of science itself—fundamental
physics—could be interpreted in terms of
dialectical materialism and in the Dia-
lectics of Nature Engels attempts precisely
this major task: a theoretical re-interpre-
tation of the whole of science, as then
perceived, as exemplifying the workings of
the dialectic—a degree of grand theorizing
which has daunted most later Marxists.
Engels' attempt to interpret the acti-
vities of science as conforming to the
workings of the dialectic was extended by
later Marxists, but could only expect to
139
Steven Rose and Hilary Rose
achieve recognition in practical policies
subsequent to the Soviet revolution of
1917. But even in the Soviet Union, it was
not until ten years after the revolution,
w h e n the at times uneasy truce of experts
and professionals with the Party which
typified the period of the N e w Economic
Policy was coming to an end, that a
specific attempt w a s m a d e to break with
the ideology of pure science which still
dominated the A c a d e m y of Sciences. T h e
period of Five-Year Plans and the march
towards socialism w a s also typified, as
Joravsky has documented [2], by a fresh
attempt to define a 'socialist physics',
'socialist biology', and so forth.
The form of such a socialist science
was uncertain and open to debate. W h a t
was clear was that it ought to be different
from 'capitalist' science, and that in this
scheme of things, there was no such thing
as 'pure' science.
"Pure' science w a s simultaneously
under ideological attack not only from
the left, but the right, for the emergent
Nazism of G e r m a n y w a s beginning to
talk of 'Aryan' and 'non-Aryan' (i.e.
Jewish) science. S o m e branches of physics,
notably Einsteinian relativity and quantum
theory, were under attack for their non-
Aryan quality, and there were cases w h e n
the same type of physics was attacked both
for its non-Aryanism and for its n o n -
socialist, 'idealist' nature.
T h e reaction to these attacks upon its
self-perceived integrity by the majority of
the scientific community was predictable.
In G e r m a n y and the Soviet Union, the
response was one which Haberer has
characterized as the politics of 'prudential
acquiescence' [3], This acquiescence led
in G e r m a n y to the dismissal of Jewish
140
university scientists and the official accep-
tance of an openly racialist biology,
justifying the organized and monstrous
slaughter of the concentration camps. In
the Soviet Union, it took the milder form
of prudential acquiescence in the syste-
matic destruction of a particular field of
science, genetics, and the exile or silencing
of its protagonists.
In pre-war Britain, the debate took
a different turn. Traditional empiricism
reduced a discussion of whether the inter-
nal logic of science itself was ideologically
determined to one concerning the harnes-
sing of science to h u m a n welfare. Radical
and Marxist scientists generated a wave
of optimism about the prospects and signi-
ficance of science as a factor in the libera-
tion of mankind. This opinion is typified
by Bernai, writing just before the Second
World W a r .
'Science [he wrote] puts into our hands
the means of satisfying our material needs.
It gives us also the ideas which will enable
us to understand, to co-ordinate and to
satisfy our needs in the social sphere.
Beyond this, science has something im-
portant to offer: a reasonable hope in the
unexplored possibilities of the future, an
inspiration which is slowly but surely
becoming the dominant driving force of
modern thought and action' [4].
T o achieve this effect science must
be rationally planned and organized. In
an appropriate social structure, science
would inevitably proceed so as to enhance
h u m a n welfare. Even this proposition,
however, resulted in m u c h of the academic
community closing ranks against the on-
slaught, proclaiming its self-interested
purity with virginal fastidiousness. Polanyi
provided the philosophical rationale and

Baker the organizational steam for a
Society for Freedom in Science, whose
exponents demanded independence for
the Republic of Science. This claim found
voice in the complaint that the Bernalians
proposed to direct science to such an
extent that a microscopist would not even
be allowed to choose what colour to stain
his preparations.
W a r , and the mobilization of the
scientific community in the prosecution
of war, m a d e the debate meaningless.
Even the most prudential of the G e r m a n
scientists found themselves involved in
the war effort—some Jewish scientists
even managed to survive the war in their
laboratories. In Britain, the purest of
academics were registered and drafted
into war research. A n d in the United
States, the biggest scientific mobilization
the world had even seen, the Manhattan
Project, took place. The Republic of
Science became a dream of peace which
science, even w h e n the peace at length
came, was never really to recover.
By the end of the war, the era of Big
Science had arrived, ushered in by the
explosions at Hiroshima and Nagasaki,
and the debates of the 1930s seemed
strangely irrelevant. Science w a s paid for
by the government; the largest part of
this payment was for war (defence)
science, but governmental and industrial
research contracts permeated the univer-
sities, too. At first opposed, at least in
Britain, by the end of the 1950s such a
permeation was being actively welcomed.
In the United States, of course, it always
had been, for there the concept of academic
freedom was one of freedom for the
scientific entrepreneur, typified by the
archetypal Dr. Grant Swinger, the mythical
The myth of the neutrality of science
money-hunting scientist created by D a n
Greenberg, of Science magazine. The key
to American economic and scientific
success was seen in precisely this articu-
lation of university, industry and govern-
ment. Its devotees urged the creation, in
Britain and elsewhere in Europe, of local
versions of the impressive 'Route 128',
the highway which is lined with science-
based industries which have sprung out of
research at the mighty Massachusetts
Institute of Technology.
The acceptance and rationalization of
this n e w conventional wisdom m a y be
plotted as a function of the emergence in
m a n y nations, over the late 1950s and
through the 1960s, of science policy-
making committees and Ministers of
Science—an inconceivable prospect in
the 1930s except amongst the Bernalians,
though advocated by some prescient
individuals as far back as the 1850s. B y
1970, indeed, something like an academic
discipline (or meta-discipline) of 'science
policy' has emerged. For such policy-
makers, the suggestion that science should
not be locked into the national economy,
making its appropriate contribution to
national goals, is risible. National goals
m a y even be specifically technological,
such as the commitment of Kennedy to
put an American on the m o o n by 1970.
A n d in a technologically based society,
the preservation of the scientocracy and
technocracy's neutrality and indepen-
dence from governmental processes has
become impossible.
Meanwhile science and technology
are judged by their economic and political
pay-off for the nation. British participa-
tion in the proposed 300 G e V particle
accelerator at C E R N was ruled out by
141
Steven Rose and Hilary Rose

the Labour Government in 1968 precisely had taken part, m a n y with the noblest of
on the grounds that no economic pay-off intentions, in the Manhattan Project.
in the short or middle term could be per- Believing that Hitler w a s developing the
ceived from it; a cheaper version was B o m b and that Hitler must be stopped
ruled in again by the Conservative Govern- and Fascism destroyed, what choice w a s
ment in 1970 on the grounds of the national there but to attempt to provide a B o m b
advantage to be gained politically by for the Allies?
close scientific links with Europe. The fact that Hitler was not on the
way to getting an atomic b o m b , and that
the ones that the physicists had m a d e were
THE PRESENT STATUS used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, pro-
OF THE M Y T H voked a crisis of conscience. If their
profession was to be saved, and their
W h a t then of the present status of the consciences salved, they needed to discri-
myth of the neutrality of science? Sur- minate between the effects of this use of
prisingly it has not withered pari passu their physics, and the physics itself: the
with the emergence of Big Science. T h e physics had to be neutral; only the use to
reasons for this seem to relate back in which it is put need be condemned. A n d
part to the debate of the 1930s and 1940s as more and more it became apparent that,
on neutrality. For m a n y scientists the in the West, science was being applied to
debate effectively ended during a confron- evil ends, the need to maintain the distinc-
tation in M o s c o w between the agronomist tion between the subject and its use became
Lysenko and his critics. Lysenko, defend- sharper. For precisely those w h o in the
ing his o w n 'Michurinist' (or modified past had argued that the link between
Lamarckian) biology, against the 'idealist' science and h u m a n progress was inevitable,
and 'quasi-facist' genetics attributed to the retreat back to the laboratory and its
Mendel, M o r g a n and Weissman, and neutrality became a necessity if they were
against the r u m p of Soviet geneticists, not to stop doing science altogether.
finally clinched his argument by revealing A n interesting parallel evolution seems
that his views had the approval of Stalin to have taken place in the Soviet Union.
himself. T h e revelation of the distortions Again, it m a y b e related both to the
introduced by the imposition of Lysen- failure of Lysenkoism and to the success
koism in Soviet biology threw Marxist of the B o m b . It is exemplified by the
Western scientists into a state of intellectual changing Soviet view on nuclear weapons.
disarray. S o m e left the Party, like Haldane. In the early 1950s the official view still
Most retreated from an outspoken defence reflected a belief that technology could be
of the prospects of a socialist science into m a d e to serve m a n ' s ends. T h e B o m b
a more neutralist position. was seen as an adjunct to, but not a
A second, and perhaps still more transformation of, the class war which by
important factor in strengthening the definition must be victorious. The language
neutrality of science idea arose from the of nuclear holocaust, the D o o m s d a y
dilemma faced by m a n y physicists w h o machine, and the jargon of the United

142

States arms control experts was repugnant.
But by 1970, this view was n o longer held
in the Soviet Union. The B o m b is n o w seen
as transforming war [5].
The jargon of the two super-powers is
a mutual one, the language of the strategic
arms limitation talks ( S A L T ) . Technology
is seen to be just as sweetly inevitable to
the Soviets as it was to Oppenheimer,
w h e n asked his views on the American
H - b o m b . A n d the corollary of technologi-
cal inevitability is neutrality. 'Science', a
distinguished Soviet physicist assured one
of us recently, 'is neutral; it is h o w one
uses it which determines its good or evil
potential.'
THE REACTION AGAINST SCIENCE
It is only in the last few years that this
ubiquitous acceptance of a science simul-
taneously closely articulated into the
bureaucratic, military and industrial m a -
chine of contemporary society, and yet
freed from responsibility, of the ethos of
the god-given right of the scientist to ask
for the m o n e y he wants from the govern-
ment, and to research o n what the govern-
ment and he like when he gets it, has been
effectively challenged. Partly, the challenge
has taken the form of a wave of anti-
science and the deliberate advocacy of
non-rational forms of truth, of a refusal by
m a n y young people to d o science—a
phenomenon anxiously analysed as the
'swing from science' by governmental
committees in several nations. Partly, it
has been a rediscovery of the ideological
issues by science and engineering students,
w h o have become increasingly politicized
by the general ferment in the universities
The myth of the neutrality of science
which is occurring as practically a world-
wide phenomenon.
A n d partly, it has undoubtedly been
catalysed by the repercussions of events
following the Cultural Revolution in
China in the late 1960s. For the Maoists
in China resuscitated old arguments about
the relationship of science and scientists
to the people. With their insistence on
egalitarianism, the down-grading of the
expert, and the demand that his work
should 'serve the people', they m a d e a
d e m a n d whose echoes were those of the
populist scientist artisans of the French
Revolution, w h o closed the Académie
des Sciences and helped send Lavoisier to
the guillotine.
For Western Maoists, science is
valid—and correct—only in so far as it is
ideologically sound; its internal logic is
totally subordinated to the ideological
demands m a d e upon it. It is scarcely
surprising that virtually the only overt
defenders of Lysenko to be found today, in
or out of the Soviet Union, are the Maoist
students.
For the less ideologically coherent,
the rejection of neutral science has been
enlarged to embrace a rejection of all
science as irrevocably linked with the
instruments of State oppression. T h e
relationship perceived by Marcuse between
the products of contemporary physics
and the needs of I B M and the United
States Atomic Energy Commission, has,
w e have argued elsewhere [6] resulted in
a specific rejection, not only of the sciences
of the Establishment, but of the whole
methodological apparatus and rationality
of science itself.
It is against this background, the
re-opened questions of the continuance of
143
Steven Rose and Hilary Rose
science itself, and of its ideological inputs,
that the 1960s and 1970s have seen the
emergence in several countries of Societies
for Social Responsibility in Science. These
groups have disparate views, but they are
all linked in a c o m m o n attempt to re-state
the values and the methods of science and
the possibilities of harnessing it for
constructive purposes, to recognize the
ideological inputs inherent in science which
the consensus politics of West and East
of the last fifteen years have obscured,
and to recreate a critical science. T h e
objectives of such groups must be to use
the critical methods of science to analyse
and where necessary combat the social
implications of particular kinds of science.
This means taking issue with certain bits
of science itself.
T H E PHILOSOPHICAL ISSUES
This compressed discussion of m o r e than
three centuries of philosophical, methodo-
logical and ideological debate has of
necessity had to m a k e a number of sweep-
ing generalizations. Having both chroni-
cled and asserted the validity of a particular
point of view in this debate, w e n o w attempt
to state more clearly what w e m e a n w h e n
w e question the validity of the claim that
science is neutral.
O n e way of doing this is to document
the nature of the constraints that operate
on the activity of science within the present
system. But, if w e recognize that Big
Science is State financed, and that there
is always more possible science than actual
science, more ideas about what to d o than
m e n or money to d o them, the debate is,
in a sense, short-circuited. Science policy
144
means making choices about what science
to d o . Whoever makes these choices, by
definition they cannot be ideology- or
value-free; they imply an acceptance of
certain directions for science and not
others; opening certain routes means
closing others. Putting a m a n on the m o o n
means not doing other sorts of things.
Such choices are inherent in any system.
A n d as they are clearly not neutral
choices the science they generate cannot be
neutral.
This is easiest to see, of course, in such
obviously appliedfieldsas space techno-
logy. But it can be seen in otherfieldsas
well. In biology, for example, when an
American w o m a n scientist w a s awarded
the United States A r m y ' s highest civilian
award for the development of a more
effective form of rice-blast fungus, specifi-
cally suited to South-East Asian condi-
tions, this award was clearly not given
for neutral science.
But what about the basic science that
led u p to this work, which m a y not have
been done under military contract or in a
defence establishment? Take the develop-
ment of the tear-gas C S , n o w extensively
used in Viet-Nam, for example. This gas
was developed in the mid-1950s by Bri-
tain's chemical defence establishment at
Portón D o w n , as a result of a recognition
of the inadequacies of the then-used
tear gas, C N , on a number of technical
criteria. Researchers at Portón began their
search for a new agent as a result of a
specific directive from the British Ministry
of Defence. In the course of screening a
number of possible agents they came across
C S . Bulk production followed. Thus the
work w a s done for a specific objective;
it was clearly not value-free, by definition

not neutral. Portón work w a s plainly
mission-oriented. A s a mission cannot be
neutral, the science done in achieving it
cannot either.
But what about the work from which
the Portón studies were derived? Are w e
to indict Corson and Stoughton, back in
the 1920s, for the initial observation that
ortho-chlorobenzylidene-malonitrile was a
lachrymator, just because thirty years
later Portón picked it up and used it for
a n e w purpose?
If this is the case, w e should indict
not only Corson and Stoughton but also
all the other hundreds or thousands of
academic researchers doing their 'pure'
research in the laboratories of the 1920s,
churning out their three papers a year on
the properties of o d d chemicals and the
behaviour of model systems, simply
because they were working in the ambience
of a society whose structure imposes a
consequence not in harmony with h u m a n
welfare. W e would have to indict not
merely Rutherford and Einstein for the
atomic b o m b , but practically all the che-
mists, physicists, mathematicians and
biologists w h o have published research
in the present century. Plainly, this is a
reductio ad absurdum.
It might then be argued that there is
a cut-off point in the neutrality debate:
non-mission-oriented basic research, whose
immediate application is not apparent,
might seem excluded from it. A t a prag-
matic level, such a common-sense idea
might seem acceptable, provided the
research was not sponsored by a fund-
giving agency or organization with a
mission other than the support of basic
science for its o w n sake, such as a Depart-
ment of Defence or industry. Particle
The myth of the neutrality of science
physics and molecular biology might seem
to c o m e into this category.
Whilst such a view might appear
sound enough as a rule of t h u m b for
everyday practical purposes, it avoids
recognition of the possible interconnexions
between science as a cognitive system and
the social system. That is, it assumes that,
whatever the goal choices m a d e by
funding agencies, within those financial
constraints the actual content of the
science which is done depends only on
the objective accretion of data, facts and
theories. It thus implies a purely 'internalist'
view of the nature of scientific knowledge,
as a set of ever-advancing and self-consis-
tent absolute approaches to a statement of
'truth' about the universe.
This view of science, though, is one
that has c o m e under serious challenge
recently from the philosophers of science.
Thus, the activity of scientists can be
divided, according to the illuminating
insight of K u h n , into 'normal' science
and 'revolutionary' science [7]. Normal
science is what most scientists do all of
the time, and all scientists do most of the
time; it is solving a set of puzzles about
the natural world. The puzzles are designed
and solved in terms of a paradigm, a
gestalt view of the world, which provides
a framework for normal science. At
certain periods in science, and for a variety
of only partially understood reasons,
K u h n argues, there occurs a paradigm
switch, a change in the gestalt view of
the world amongst working scientists,
which alters the puzzles they set themselves.
This paradigm-switching is what K u h n
calls revolutionary science: problem-solv-
ing instead of puzzle-solving.
Kuhn's concept of revolutionary
145
Steven Rose and Hilary Rose

science m a y be suspect; what is sure is Let us take some perhaps obvious

that his view of normal puzzle-solving examples of the non-neutrality of some
science strikes an answering chord from biological paradigms. T h e framework of
m a n y working scientists w h o recognize evolutionary biology set by the Darwinian
it as an accurate description of their revolution of the 1850s was one in which
activity, so different from the p o m p o u s the central metaphors, drawn from society,
proposals of verification, falsification and and in their turn interacting with society,
hypothesis-making which they were always were of the competition of species, the
supposed to be doing by philosophers in struggle for existence, the ecological niche,
the past. and the survival of thefittest—aset of
Corson and Stoughton's work, like metaphors which closely reflected the
that of the great majority of scientists, is norms of the society in which they arose,
essentially of the puzzle-solving kind. W h a t and contributed to the subsequent develop-
w e wish to propose here is that, while it ment of its ideology by giving it a seem-
is not possible to ascribe a 'value', a ingly 'inevitable' biological base. These
measurement of non-neutrality, to all metaphors replaced earlier ones which
single pieces of puzzle-solving basic located biology firmly into an explanation
science of this type, it is possible to ascribe of a god-designed universe. Using these
a value to the paradigm within which they metaphors, a vast amount of puzzle-
are conducted. Puzzle-solving basic science solving research has been conducted.
of itself, unlike mission-oriented science Today's central biological metaphors
or development, cannot have either neutra- are framed in a different language system ;
lity or non-neutrality ascribed to it; the they refer to control, community and
concepts are irrelevant. They are relevant communication, feedback and interaction,
only to the paradigm within which the metaphors certainly more appropriate to
puzzle-solving activity is being conducted. the managed society in which w e m o v e
But a paradigm is never value-free. A today—and indeed, by virtue of a group
paradigm is never neutral. Hence while w e of determined ethological extrapolators
do not have to search for non-neutrality, such as Morris and Lorentz, going some
or its moral congener, responsibility, in way to provide it with a biological rationale
the w o r k of a particular puzzle-solving as well. A n d once again, today's puzzle-
scientist, w e find it without difficulty in solving science is conducted within the
the paradigm within which he is working. framework provided by the metaphors.
T o put it in other terms, and to answer The paradigm—the metaphor—sets
the question which w e raised earlier, while the questions w e ask of our subject, and
w e cannot indict Carson and Stoughton hence the answers w e seek from our mat-
and other puzzle-solving basic scientists erials. If a behaviour geneticist asks the
for their 'pure' research because of the question, ' H o w m u c h does heredity
uses to which their results are put inde- determine intelligence?' he has limited the
pendently of them, w e assert that their answers to his question before he has
work is non-neutral because the paradigm begun his empirical research—that is, he
within which it is done is non-neutral. has located his answer within a particular

146

paradigm. It is the question and its
framework, not so m u c h the answer,
which are non-neutral, their historical
antecedents belonging in the line of
eugenics stretching back to Galton and
beyond. A n d w e should not be surprised
to find this type of research providing
certain types of answers, which are then
clearly related to certain social and poli-
tical purposes.
It is not that the question should
not be asked, but that w e need to be very
clear about the nature of the paradigm
which sponsors it and which, within the
limits of the data, specifies the answer,
as it must for all puzzle-solving research.
For m u c h of science, the analysis of
possible non-neutral components in specific
paradigms is very difficult. It m a y well be
that it is only in periods of social and
intellectual crisis that w e can glimpse the
interconnexions between science and the
social system.
T o suggest the non-neutrality of
science is, w e realize, not merely to recog-
nize the passing of a myth—a myth which
has nurtured academic science, and its
considerable achievements, for m o r e than
a hundred years. T o reject the myth also
comes close to taking away another leg
from the already wobbling basic tenet of
scientific philosophy—that of the objec-
tivity of the natural sciences. Admittedly
this is a tenet that the philosopher-
physicists of the Copenhagen School have
in their time taken a healthy crack at,
and been attacked as idealists in conse-
quence. It is a tenet, too, which has been
under attack in contemporary biology,
for the seeming success of the reductionist,
objective techniques in such fields as
molecular biology has begun to generate
The myth of the neutrality of science
a counter-attack, an anti-reductionism
which again poses the central problems of
the relationship, in biology, between obser-
ver and observed (see, for example, [8]).
N o n e the less, this is not to deny the
validity of science's inner logic: that the
advance of science, despite the shifting
perspective of its paradigms, presents
successively more accurate approximations
to comprehensive statements about the
nature of the universe. T h e way in which
m e n see the world m a y vary with their
viewpoint, but the variation will be
confined within the crucial limitation that,
for all of us, our viewpoint is h u m a n ; there
is afinitespecification to the w a y in which
our brains function, and to the relationship
of this functioning to the environment.
Hence, in so far as objectivity speci-
fies a public viewpoint that is more or less
c o m m o n to all m e n , there is an objective
internal logic to science, which n e w
techniques, experimentations and para-
digms help refine. T h e universe m a y be
(can be?) solved in this sense, granted
time—and a paradigm which does not
precipitate disaster. But the language in
which the solution will be framed will
depend upon the paradigm : of the infinity
of questions w e can ask about the universe,
w e will choose some of them and not
others from within the ideological frame-
w o r k set by the paradigm.
W h e n , as they n o w are, issues of
h u m a n survival are on the agenda, it
m e a n s that the time has c o m e when it is
right to assert, as a necessary counter-
m y t h , that it is possible to use the
techniques and methods of science for
mancentred and not man-destroying pur-
poses; that w e must build h u m a n rele-
vance into the paradigms of science itself.
147
Steven Rose and Hilary Rose
F R O M ABSTRACTION T O ACTION
H o w do w e even begin to translate those
abstractions into a concrete programme for
action? There are four distinct areas of
activity possible.
First, scientists themselves have to
become aware of the social, political and
economic pressures effecting the develop-
ment of science. They must learn the
significance of the old saying, 'he w h o pays
the piper calls the tune', for all science in
general and for their o w n science in parti-
cular. They have to find out h o w decisions
are m a d e , in and for science, and, where
these decisions are concealed and unde-
mocratic, expose them, working with the
community at large to open the decision-
making processes and m a k e them d e m o -
cratically accountable.
At the same time, scientists will be
wise to recognize that their criticisms will
not necessarily endear them to those w h o
pay for their research. They cannot afford
to be as naive as those mathematicians in
the United States w h o publicly deplored
the massive abuse of science and techno-
logy in Viet-Nam and were then surprised
when the Department of Defense threat-
ened to cut off their research funds.
Second, scientists must learn to
communicate not only with the community
at large but also with their fellow scientists.
They must be willing—and able—to explain
what work they are doing, and w h y , and
to speak out plainly if they feel that the
social implications of their work are
ambiguous or dangerous. They cannot
afford to leave this communication task to
the professional communicators alone;
communication is not merely a matter of
professional expertise but of moral res-
148
ponsibility. It is n o longer adequate for
the scientists to retire to their ivory-
towered laboratories, emerging only to
share the mutually congratulatory bland-
nesses of the scientific establishment. T h e y
have to learn to speak out.
But speaking out does not m e a n
cheap sensationalism or wild prophesy
of d o o m . T o preach a sort of technolo-
gical fatalism, of the inevitability of
scientific and technological advance in
this or that direction, is not merely irres-
ponsible, it is to misunderstand the nature
of science and its links with the social
order. It is to subscribe to the myth of the
scientific and technological imperative.
N o r does speaking out imply the
carrying of apparently bulky but in reality
lightweight burdens of specious moral
responsibility about potential future abuses,
the sort of attitudinizing morality of
several biologists w h o have b e c o m e
concerned at prospects of 'genetic engineer-
ing' for example. It is not the scientists'
responsibility to carry this burden—if
indeed it is a real one—and it distracts
attention from the real issues of survival
that are on today's agenda.
Third, the problem of science educa-
tion and course content must be tackled.
W e cannot continue to educate as scientists
individuals w h o are not taught to be aware
of the pressures on, and real value of, the
activity by which they will subsequently
earn their living. Science must cease to be
taught, as it is in almost all countries of
the world, in a sort of moral and social
vacuum, as if there were no relations
between the activities of the laboratory
and the 'real world' outside. Present
experiments in which ways of introducing
social relevance into science education
 The myth of the neutrality of science

are being attempted, need to be evaluated, and disease both throughout the world at
improved and extended. large, and even in rich societies?'
Finally, and most important, even W e are not facing a single once-and-
having done all this, the scientists cannot for-all crisis in science but rather a chronic
merely sigh with relief, return to their condition where the world, m a d e one by
laboratories with a 'business as usual' massive science and technology, lurches
sign u p and get back to their favoured either towards barbarism or progress.
research topics. They must instead ask Survival itself demands revolutionary
themselves the question, ' H o w can m y changes in society, and a precondition of
scientific skills best be used to serve the this in a scientific society is the mobiliza-
people: to expose and correct the role of tion of the scientific community.
science and technology in wreaking geno- Where once revolutionary activity
cide in wars, in oppressing individuals was argued for as a guarantor of progress,
and minorities by acting as an agency of we n o w have to argue for its necessity as
civil power, and in permitting malnutrition a guarantor against barbarism.

SELECTED REFERENCES

1. C H A I N , E . B . The social responsibility of the scientist. New scientist, 22 October 1970.

2. J O R A V S K Y , D . Soviet Marxism and national science. London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1961.
3. H A B E R E R , J. Politics and the community of science. N e w York, Van Nostrand-Reinhold, 1969.
4. B E R N A L , J. D . The social function of science. London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1939.
5. Moss, N . Men who play god. Harmondsworth, Middx., Penguin, 1970.
6. R O S E , H . ; R O S E , S. Science and society. London, The Penguin Press, 1969.
7. K U H N , T . S. The structure of scientific revolutions. Chicago, 111., University of Chicago Press,
1970.
8. M C K A Y , D . The bankruptcy of determinism. New scientist, 2 July 1970.

149
The next number of Impact of Science on Society (1971, N o . 3)
considers the interactions between...

Science, technology and the law

The vast changes which science a n d technology are bringing into every
aspect of life are producing n e w situations, n e w conditions, n e w social con-
cepts, n e w interrelationships in society with which existing laws were never
designed to cope. W h a t are the legal complexities, the problems which m u s t
be considered in formulating new laws or in adapting existing ones?
Articles in this n u m b e r of Impact of Science on Society discuss this
question in connexion with:

abortions liability of manufacturers

exploitation of space organ transplantation
exploitation of the authors' rights
ocean floor

Plus a n interview o n science, technology a n d the law with

Helga Pedersen, Justice of the S u p r e m e Court of D e n m a r k

O
^^ Subsequent numbers of Impact of Science on Society will have the themes:

O n h u m a n intelligence
c Science, scientists and governments
o
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T h e competitive pressures (I):
T h e race for priority
by Robert K . Merton and
Richard L e w i s 1

Is the intense competition to establish priority of scientific

discovery purely a modern manifestation, a disease of
our highly competitive age?
T h e authors deny it, leafing through the pages of
the history of science to s h o w that priority conflicts
always have existed and were often far m o r e unruly—see
N e w t o n , Leibniz, Descartes—than they are today.
But the social structure of science today is vastly
different—with sharp specialization, the flowering a n d
fading of 'hotfields'of research, and research by teams—
and this has h a d major effects, here examined, o n scien-
tific competition.

Largely activated by James Watson's found in contemporary science. T h e

book, The Double Helix, scientists and
humanists alike have lately assessed what
they take to be the intense competition
Dr. Robert K . Merton is Giddings Profes-
sor of Sociology and Richard Lewis is
studying for his doctorate in sociology at
Columbia University. Address: Department
of Sociology, Fayerweather Hall, Columbia
University, N e w Y o r k , N e w Y o r k 10027
(United States). (At the suggestion of the
editor, this article is largely based o n
previous papers by the senior author
reporting studies supported by a grant from
the National Science Foundation to the
Columbia University Program in the
Sociology of Science.)
patterns of rivalrous motives and behaviour
described by Watson are held to be peculiar
to 'a new kind of scientist, and one that
could hardly have been thought of before
science became a new occupation, subject
to, and forming part of, all the vulgarities
of the communications media'. Only in
our highly competitive age, it is said,
are appreciable numbers of scientists con-
cerned to 'scoop' others—to establish
priority—in order to gain recognition for
their o w n work.
A s another scientist, Jerome Lettvin,
sees it, Watson expresses ' n o more than

Impact of Science on Society, Vol. X X I , N o . 2, 1971 151

Robert K . Merton and Richard Lewis

the general opportunism that is the hall- into every apple within reach and then
m a r k of modern competitive science'—a often drop it just as quickly. It was consid-
statement in which the governing term ered very bad manners, but they were
for us is 'modern competitive science'. A n d the m e n of the future. . . .
a humanist responds to The Double Helix 'The phenomenal increase in the
with the suggestion that 'a keenness for number of people whose work brings them
early recognition m a y even be, these days, in contact with scientific investigations has
as essential to discovery as intelligence. changed not only the image of the average
Science, like all other activities now1— scientist but also his motives and rela-
again w e accentuate the temporal modi- tionship with his colleagues. The latter are
fiers—'is crowded and accelerated. There not fellows working in neighboring fields—
is n o sitting alone any more and letting theirfields—butall too often are direct
apples fall down'. competitors engaged in simultaneous,
absolutely identical, experiments. N o t only
has the ruthlessness of accomplished
COMPETITION IN SCIENCE T O D A Y business techniques invaded the areas
where industrial exploitation overlaps
All apart from Watson's provocative research, but this kind of behavior is no
book, some scientists have contrasted longer considered alien to science.'
what they remember as the comparatively That the rush to achieve priority of
quiet times of science before the Second discovery is c o m m o n in our time hardly
World W a r or thereabouts with the needs documentation. T h e evidence is
intensely competitive situation today. H a n s there on every side. A few years before
Gaffron, in one nostalgic and admirably Watson reached his m u c h wider audience,
succint example, writes: Arthur Schawlow, co-developer of the
'The student n o w , in 1970, finds it laser, casually noted in the public prints
difficult to believe that, at least with m a n y that Charles Townes and he had been 'in
of us in the 1920s, there was never the a hurry, of course. W e feared that it
thought of having to hurry, or of having might only be a matter of time before
to publish results prematurely and m o r e others would c o m e up with the same idea.
than once lest they be overlooked or taken So we decided to publish before building a
over in their entirety by somebody else. working model'. Townes had ample auto-
Even important discoveries were left for biographical reason to be in a hurry. After
a year or two in the hands of a m a n with all, in the early 1950s, he had been involved
w h o m they originated so that he could in that fivefold independent discovery of
develop them according to his means and the maser, along with Willis L a m b , Joseph
abilities. W e used to say: " A n apple Weber, Nikolai Basov and Aleksandr
already bitten into is not very attractive." Prokhorov.
The m a n w h o had thefirstbite was expect- The contemporary annals of science
ed to keep and eat his apple. But then are peppered with cases of scientists
more and more people appeared on the spurred on to more intense effort by
scene w h o felt n o compunction to bite the knowledge that others were on m u c h

152

the same track. Harriet Zuckerman's
interviews with Nobel laureates find m a n y
of them testifying, in the words of one of
them, that 'it was bound to happen soon.
H a d I not done it... it was there, waiting
for somebody . . . [probably] at the Rocke-
feller Institute'.
Or to turn from the moving frontiers
of science to its interior regions, Warren
Hagstrom found that two-thirds of a
sample of some 1,400 scientists had been
anticipated by others in their o w n contri-
butions, a good number of these o n more
than one occasion. A n d , if there were need
of any further sign that contemporary
scientists are often engaged in the race for
priority, w e need only turn to the periodic
editorials by Samuel Goudsmit in the
Physical Review Letters, where he notes
the drive for quick publication to ensure
priority, sometimes at the expense of
physicists 'working along the s a m e lines
w h o want to d o a more complete job
before publishing their findings'.
S o m e of his editorials are touched
with anguish as he reviews expedients
adopted by physicists seeking publication
in the Letters in order to '"scoop" a
competitor w h o has already submitted a
full article' or by some w h o use the news-
papers for thefirstannouncement of their
findings or ideas.
O n every side, then, there is evidence
that some u n k n o w n proportion of contem-
porary scientists is actively engaged in
trying to get there first. The fact is a com-
monplace. But does the fact warrant the
inference, drawn in an emerging mythology,
that intense competition for discovery is
in a significant sense distinctive of our
o w n time, with its enlarged population of
scientists, its grants, prizes and profes-
The race for priority
sional rewards? W e think not, that this
view results from parochial perception. It
emerges from the simple expedient of not
looking at what there is to see throughout
the centuries of science.
COMPETITION IN T H E PAST
The race for priority has been frequent
throughout the entire era of modern
science. Almost all those firmly placed in
the pantheon of science—Newton, Leib-
niz, Descartes, Huyghens, Faraday, Gauss,
Laplace or Darwin—were caught up in
passionate efforts to achieve priority and
to have it publicly registered.
Since w e have been told that the
aggressive, prize-seeking and competitive
behaviour of Watson is something n e w
unleashed in the present world of science,
it m a y be in point to consider the behaviour
of the seventeenth-century nonpareil, N e w -
ton. Long after he had m a d e his incom-
parable contributions to mathematics and
physical science, N e w t o n was still engaged
in ensuring the lustre and fame owing
him. H e was not merely concerned with
establishing his priority but was periodi-
cally obsessed by it. H e developed a corps
of young mathematicians and astronomers,
such as Roger Cotes, David Gregory,
William Whiston, John Keill and, above
all, E d m o n d Halley, 'for the energetic
building of his fame' (as the historian
Frank Manuel put it in his Portrait of
Isaac Newton).
Newton's voluminous manuscripts
contain at least twelve versions of a defence
of his priority, as against Leibniz, in the
invention of the calculus. Toward the end,
Newton, the president of the Royal
153
Robert K . Merton and Richard Lewis
Society, appointed a committee to adjudi-
cate the rival claims of Leibniz and
himself, packed the committee with his
adherents, anonymously wrote the preface
for the second published report on the
controversy—the draft is in his hand-
writing—and included in that preface a
disarming allusion to the legal adage that
'no one is a proper witness for himself
and [that] he would be an iniquitous
Judge, and would crush underfoot the
laws of all the people, w h o would admit
anyone as a witness in his o w n cause'. W e
can gauge the pressures for establishing
his unique priority that must have operat-
ed in order for Newton to go to such
lengths in defence of his claims.
At times, the rivalrous concern with
establishing one's priority of discovery
went so far as to set brother against
brother, as in the case of the great eigh-
teenth-century mathematicians, Jacob and
Johannes Bernoulli, w h o often and bitterly
attacked one another's claims to priority.
Johannes improved on this by throwing
his o w n son out of the house for having
w o n a prize awarded by the Académie
Française on which he himself had had his
eye.
O r to turn to the h u m a n sciences,
C o m t e , tormented by the suggestion that his
law of three stages had actually been origin-
ated by St. Simon, denounces his one-time
master and describes him as a 'superficial
and depraved charlatan'. Again, Janet
claimed—to take Freud's o w n paraphrase
—that 'everything good in psychoanalysis
repeats, with slight modifications, the
views of Janet—everything else in psycho-
analysis being bad'. Freud refused to
lock horns with Janet in what he described
as 'gladiator fights in front of the noble
154
m o b ' , but s o m e years later, his disciple,
Ernest Jones, reports that he had 'put an
end to' Janet's pretensions at a London
congress and Freud applauds him in a
letter that urges h i m 'to strike while the
iron is hot', in the interests of 'fair play'.
The concern of scientists with compet-
itive claims to priority thus transcends
differences of time and national culture.
Peter Kapitza puts it all in the of-course
m o o d as he says of the behaviour of the
father of Russian science, L o m o n o s o v :
' N o less importance was assigned to
priority in scientific work at that time
than n o w . ' O f this, L o m o n o s o v and his
colleagues provide dramatic evidence.
W h e n the physicist Richman was killed
by lightning in 1763, the Russian A c a d e m y
of Sciences cancelled its general meeting,
only to have L o m o n o s o v ask that he
nevertheless be granted the opportunity
to present his paper on electricity, 'lest', in
his words, 'it lose novelty'. T h e president
of the academy saw his point and arranged
for a special meeting in order 'that gos-
podin L o m o n o s o v should not be late with
his o w n new productions a m o n g scientific
people in Europe, and his paper thereby
be lost in electrical experiments m a d e
meanwhile'.
In a world m a d e up of national
States, each with its o w n share of ethno-
centrism, priority redounds to the credit
of the discoverer not only as an individual
but also as a national. F r o m at least the
seventeenth century, Englishmen, French-
m e n , Germans, D u t c h m e n and Italians
have urged their respective country's
claims to priority; somewhat later, Ameri-
cans entered the lists to m a k e it clear that
they, 'of course', had primacy.
The pattern of national claims to
 The race for priority

priority is both old and n e w , as can be less often likely than in earlier times to
seen from this vigorous formulation of assume that duplicate discoveries must be
its rationale which appeared in 1948 in borrowed or stolen ones.
the Soviet journal, Voprosy Filosofii: A m o n g the multitude of multiple
'Marxism-Leninism shatters into bits discoveries in the history of science,
the cosmopolitanfictionconcerning supra- Elinor Barber and the senior author have
class, non-national, "universal" science, examined a sample of 264 in detail. They
and definitely proves that science, like found a secular decline in the frequency
all culture in modern society, is national with which multiple discoveries became
in form and class in content . . . T h e an occasion for intense priority conflicts.
slightest inattention to questions of priority O f the 36 multiples before 1700 in the
in science, the slightest neglect of them, sample, 92 per cent were strenuously
must therefore be condemned, for it contested; the figure drops to 72 per cent
plays in the hands of our enemies, w h o in the eighteenth century, remains at about
cover their ideological aggression with cos- the same level in the first half of the
mopolitan talk about the supposed non- nineteenth century and declines to 59 per
existence of questions of priority in science, cent in the second half, reaching the
i.e., the questions concerning which lowest level of 33 per cent in thefirsthalf
peoples m a d e what contributions to the of this century.
general store of world culture.' That the culture of science today
Thus, Soviets and Americans alike m a y not be as pathogenic as it once w a s
join other nations, past and present, to in the matter of intense conflict (as
claim priorities as a collective expression distinct from competition) is suggested
of accomplishment in science. by the response to Watson's The Double
Helix. Contrary to what has been widely
assumed, that brash memoir does not
T H E M O R E S OF COMPETITION testify to a breakdown of once-prevailing
IN SCIENCE norms that called for discreet and soft-
spoken c o m m e n t on scientific contem-
This sketchy sampling of historical cases poraries. A m e m o i r such as this would
in point is perhaps enough to put in have been regarded as a model of benign,
question the emerging belief that the disciplined restraint by the turbulent
rough-and-tumble of contest and competi- scientific community of the seventeenth
tion in science is peculiar to our o w n century.
deteriorating times. This aspect of the That it should have created the stir
ethos of science and the behaviour of it did testifies that, with the institutionaliza-
scientists seems indeed to have changed tion of science, the austere mores govern-
but in quite another w a y . Scientists are ing the public demeanour of scientists and
n o w apparently more aware than ever the public evaluation of contemporaries
that growing numbers at work in a field have in this context become more rather
m e a n that their o w n discoveries are likely than less exacting. A s a result, Watson's
to be m a d e by others as well and so are little book, so restrained in substance and

155
Robert K . Merton and Richard Lewis
so mild in tone by comparison with the
caustic and sometimes venomous language
of, say, Galileo or Newton, violates the
sentiments of the m a n y scientists oriented
to these m o r e exacting mores.
Turbulence in the public behaviour
of scientists today derives far m o r e from
the intrusion conflict over political values
and interests into the domain of science
than from conflict over priority.
C H A N G I N G SOCIAL S T R U C T U R E
OF SCIENCE
If neither competition nor conflict over
priority are n e w to the world of science,
their character and distribution have
nevertheless probably changed in the
fairly recent past. For, plainly, all the basic
demographic, social, economic, political
and organizational parameters of
science have acquired dramatically n e w
values.
The size of the population of working
scientists has increased exponentially from
the scattered hundreds three centuries
ago to the hundred or more myriads
today.
The time of the amateur is long since
past; scientists are n o w professionals all,
their work providing them with a live-
lihood and, for some, a not altogether
impoverished one.
The social organization of scientific
inquiry has greatly changed, with collab-
oration and research teams the order of
the day. A s just one pale reflection of this
changed organization of scientific inquiry,
each decade registers more and more
multi-authored articles, in decided contrats
to the almost unchanging character of
156
single-authored papers in the humani-
ties.
The monumental budgets assigned to
science—although never large enough, as
all of us carefully insist—are orders of
magnitude greater than the straitened
budgets of only a few generations ago, to
say nothing of the immense contrast with
those of the more remote past. T h e vast
increase in the number of scientists and in
funds for science practically guarantees
the exponential increase in the quantity of
published research, a change which creates
problems of its o w n .
A s science has b e c o m e more institu-
tionalized, it has also become more inti-
mately interrelated with the other institu-
tions of society. Science-based technologies
and the partial diffusion of a scientific
outlook have become great social forces
that m o v e our history, greatly affect the
relations obtaining between the nations of
the world and, to a degree, subvert the
values attached to science as a h u m a n
activity.
Yet little enough is k n o w n about
changes in the extent, intensity, forms and
consequences of competition in response to
these changing parameters of contem-
porary science. For one thing, the econo-
mics of science is an even more under-
developed field than the sociology of
science. T h e direct and indirect competi-
tion betweenfieldsof science for resources
(including m a n p o w e r and the equipments
of research) has not been systematically
investigated by a micro-economics of
science. T h e sociology of science in turn
has its limitations, dealing primarily with
the form of competition for recognition
of scientific accomplishment along the
lines w e have just sketched.
 The race for priority

Population density in branches viours that evade—if they d o not actually

of science violate—the norms of science. Thus, w e
find editorials in the Physical Review
Changes in the social structure of science Letters like one asserting that 'the Letters
appear to have counteracting effects o n on experimental high-energy physics are
this form of competition, some serving to getting out of hand. T h e competition in
intensify it, others to d a m p e n it. T h e this branch of physics is so fierce that
exponential increase in the number of speedy publication is requested even for
scientists has been accompanied by m o r e unimportant contributions and unfinished
and m o r e specialization in research, quite work'.
along the lines of both Spencerian and
Durkheimian theories of role differentia- Hot fields and cold fields
tion. Although the process of differentia-
tion has reduced the numbers of those In the workshop vernacular of m a n y
engaged in direct competition for discov- scientists, these highly competitive fields
ery in a given narrowfield,it has probably are 'hot fields' and deal with 'hot subjects'.
intensified rivalry by increasing awareness T h e decisive characteristic of a hot field
of the work going forward elsewhere o n seems to be its high rate of significant
the same problem. (The young Watson's discoveries (and possibly, a lower ratio of
candid account of his abiding sense that routine to highly consequential ideas and
the great Pauling might get there first findings). Thus, as an interested observer,
exemplifies this to the full.) Alvin Weinberg could write of one such
Various differences in the intellectual hot field that: 'Hardly a m o n t h goes by
and social structure of scientific specialties without a stunning success in molecular
probably affect the extent and intensity biology being reported in the Proceedings
of competition for discovery within them. of the National A c a d e m y of Sciences.'
T h e various fields can be thought of as H o t fields are not only m o r e active
differing in their 'population density' of than 'cold' ones, but their results are taken
scientists. This refers not to the obvious to have implications that reach well
differences in the absolute numbers of beyond the borders of the specialty. They
scientists at w o r k in this or that discipline tend, at least for a time, to attract larger
or specialty. Population density refers proportions of talented m e n w h o have an
rather to the numbers at work in relation eye for the jugular, concerned to work o n
to the significant problematics of the field, highly consequential problems rather than
so that s o m e fields are m o r e 'crowded' ones of less import. H o tfieldsalso have a
than others in the sense that m a n y workers high rate of immigration and a low rate
are focusing o n the same problems. of emigration, again until they show signs
In such specialties, competition tends of cooling off.
to be particularly intense and the tensions Levels of interaction between workers
generated by the race for priority greater. in the hotfield,particularly at the leading
A n d , as always with intense direct c o m p e - edge, are unusually high. Access to infor-
tition, this m a y elicit competitive beha- mal channels of communication m a y

157
Robert K . Merton and Richard Lewis
intensify rivalry but reduce anxiety, since
workers in the field need not speculate
about h o w rivals are faring or what n e w
developments are under w a y .
Competition on different strata
Kinds and degrees of competition differ
not only a m o n g specialties but probably,
also, a m o n g the various prestige strata
of scientists within all fields.
Races for priority in finding solutions
to deep and consequential problems
amongst the frontiersmen of science tend
to differ from the kind of competition
occurring in the m u c h larger middle and
journeyman ranks. Working at the leading
edge of afield,even one which happens not
to be advancing at a rapid rate, usually
means having readier access to what is
going o n in it. It thus enables leading
scientists to k n o w their chief competitors
as rivals.
A m o n g the middle and lower ranks,
this shades off toward m o r e impersonal
competition. These scientists often do not
k n o w w h o else is engaged in similar work
and this lack of information generates its
o w n brand of pressures and anxieties.
Competition is less often experienced as a
sportive, though often intense, personal
rivalry; it tends to become a diffuse
pressure to publish quickly in order
not to be pre-empted by u n k n o w n
others.
This is not to suggest that the tensions
of competition are uniformly greater at
the frontiers of a science than in its interior
regions. T h e concern with being pre-
empted is relative and not necessarily
correlated to the intellectual significance
of the work in hand. So, too, anxiety is
158
relative to levels of aspiration and attain-
ment, and can be just as intense, or even
more so, for seemingly small stakes as
large ones. In one aspect, this was unforget-
tably expressed by Benjamin Franklin
after he had suffered from claims by others
that they had first worked out the experi-
ment of the lightning kite :
'The smaller your invention is, the
more mortification you receive in having
the credit of it disputed with you by a rival,
w h o m the jealousy and envy of others are
ready to support against you, at least so
far as to m a k e the point doubtful. It is
not in itself of importance enough for a
dispute; n o one would think your proofs
and reasons worth their attention: and
yet if you do not dispute the point, and
demonstrate your right, you not only lose
the credit of being in that instance inge-
nious, but you suffer the disgrace of not
being ingenuous; not only of being a
plagiary but of being a plagiary for trifles.
H a d the invention been greater it would
have disgraced you less: for m e n have not
so contemptible an idea of him that robs
for gold on the highway, as of h i m that
can pick pockets for half-pence and far-
things.'
Individual identity and team research
T h e rapid growth of scientific research on
the large scale has affected the m o d e of
competition in yet another way. Zucker-
m a n (1968) notes that 'as the social orga-
nization of scientific work becomes m o r e
complex—more often collaborative and
sometimes intricately organized—the visi-
bility of individual role-performance is
reduced'. This creates its o w n variety of
tensions in science.

The institution of science has long
worked in such a way as to reward scien-
tists by having knowledgeable peers grant
them recognition for their distinctive con-
tributions. Scientists have correspondingly
developed a passion for eponymity rather
than anonymity.
But a side-effect of large-scale re-
search, with its often sizable teams of
workers, is a kind of anonymity for its
members. Thus, the editor of Physical
Review Letters reports 'the difficulty of
assigning credit to individual scientists for
their contributions' and refers, as a limiting
case in point, to 'a Letter with, as byline,
the names of three institutes; the partici-
pating physicists are not mentioned, not
even in a footnote... In this same issue...
w e publish another Letter on the identical
subject but this Letter gives the names of
seventeen authors from two institutions . . .
F r o m these and from previous multiple-
author papers it becomes clear that in
such cases the role of individual researcher
is almost impossible to evaluate'.
The growth of team work not only
makes problematic the recognition of
individual contributions by others; it also
makes problematic the evaluation of contri-
butions by themselves. T o this extent, the
changing organization of research m a y
m a k e for estrangement of scientific workers
from the scientific inquiry in which they
have taken part, after the fashion observed
for complex division of labour by A d a m
Smith, Hegel and M a r x .
T h e problem of establishing a public
identity in science becomes further c o m -
plicated by exponential growth in the
volume of publication. For a published
work to become a genuine contribution
to science, it must of course be visible
The race for priority
enough to be utilized by others. Contri-
butions of thefirstclass m a y be just as
visible today as in times of less voluminous
publication, since the system of having
papers submitted to journals judged and
screened by referees, with all its imper-
fections, generally operates to identify
them. But less consequential though useful
contributions m a y n o w be more often lost
to view and w h o is to assess the effects of
this o n the advancement of science?
Under these circumstances, the con-
cern with establishing priority of concep-
tion m a y become deepened for large
numbers of research scientists. The threat-
ened absence of a public identity in science
m a y also heighten the competition to
publish in journals of high prestige where
visibility is greater than in the less-
regarded and less widely read journals.
P E R S O N A L STYLES OF RESPONSE
TO SCIENTIFIC COMPETITION
T h e public response to the Watson personal
m e m o i r seldom considered that scientists
vary greatly in their attitudes toward
competition. S o m e revel in it; others shun
it. For some, it is stimulus; for others,
annoyance or threat. S o m e enjoy the
tension of the race; others prefer the
tranquillity of virtually n o competition
at all. Freud, for example, wrote nostal-
gically about the early days of psycho-
analysis when, thoroughly neglected, he
could enjoy a 'splendid isolation' in which
'there was nothing to hustle m e . . . M y
publications, which I w a s able to place
with a little trouble, could always lag far
behind m y knowledge and could be
postponed as long as I pleased, since there
159
Robert K . Merton and Richard Lewis

was n o doubtful "priority" to be defended'. And, as a final instance, M a x Planck

In the s a m e vein, Jacques H a d a m a r d
reported that he was primarily attracted
by problems in mathematics that had been
largely overlooked. A n d , h e noted, that
'after having started a certain set of
questions a n d seeing that several other
authors h a d begun to follow that same
line, I . . . [would] drop it and investigate
something else'.
So, too, Norbert Wiener, although he
described himself as competitive, neverthe-
less maintained that he 'did not like to
watch the literature day by day in order
to be sure that neither Banach nor one of
his Polish followers had published s o m e
important result before m e ' .
described the initial lack of interest a m o n g
his colleagues in his w o r k as an 'outright
b o o n ' , observing that 'as the significance
of the concept of entropy had not yet
come to be fully appreciated, nobody
paid any attention to the method adopted
by m e , and I could w o r k out m y calcula-
tions completely at leisure, with absolute
thoroughness, without fear of interference
or competition'.
It m a y be these occasional domains
of temporarily unpopular and unpopulated
fields of inquiry that have given rise to the
nostalgic and overly generalized impression
that competition in science is altogether
peculiar to our time.

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ship. Am. sociol. Rev., June 1967, p . 391-403.

160
 The race for priority

. Pattern of n a m e ordering a m o n g authors of scientific papers: a study of social symbolism

and its ambiguity. A m . J. Sociol., November 1968, p. 276-91.
. Stratification in American science. Sociol. inquiry, spring 1970, p. 235-57.
Z U C K E R M A N , H . ; M E R T O N , R . K . Patterns of evaluation in science: institutionalisation, structure
and functions of the referee system. Minerva, January 1971.

161
T h e competitive pressures (II):
T h e effects of 'publish or perish'

by Pierre Piganiol1

Does today's imperative need to appear as often as possible

in the learned journals have repercussions on the scientist
and his work ?
In universities, yes: professors focus o n their research
at the expense of teaching. O n the choice of research
projects, no: current vogues in science have m u c h m o r e
influence. O n the conduct of research, yes: h u m a n rela-
tions in laboratories deteriorate as time passes without
publishable results; moreover, it can throw sand in the
gears of research teams. O n the quantitative output of
scientific papers, yes—but this is m o r e beneficial than not.
In s u m , the effects of 'publish or perish' are both
benign a n d malign.

Publish or perish—this bald phrase sums
u p a highly simplified proposition which is
often thought to represent reality: that
the requirement to publish the substantial
results of a completed research project is
being replaced by the imperious necessity
of publishing at any price, this because of
the nature of mechanisms whereby the
career of the researcher and the means that
1. Dr. Pierre Piganiol, a chemist w h o presently
concerns himself with problems in the
methodology of research and development,
is adviser on scientific matters at the C o m - suspected offirstpublishing a debatable
pagnie de Saint-Gobain-Pont-à-Mousson,
Boîte Postale 124, 92 Neuilly (France).
are to be put at his disposal are judged
and decided. It is argued that this situation
is prejudicial to the advancement of k n o w -
ledge, since the choice of research subjects
and the actual conduct of the work are
subject to constraints liable to cause serious
deviations from an ideal strategy.
Moreover, those 'unwarranted' papers
are supposed to be largely responsible for
the glut of scientific literature and the
crisis in scientific documentation. T o
caricature the situation, the researcher is
result or hypothesis, then of refuting his

Impact of Science on Society. Vol. X X I , N o . 2, 1971 163

Pierre Piganiol
w o r k in a second paper, and lastly of
presenting the sound results in a final
document; in other words three publica-
tions instead of one.
T h e reality is quite different and
highly complex. It is the aim of this article
to capture it as objectively as possible.
W H Y DO RESEARCHERS PUBLISH?
Apart from reasons bound up with the
researcher's life, which w e shall study later,
the essential and obvious motive for
publishing is to convey the results of a
piece of work to the scientific community.
This obvious aspect often conceals m o r e
subtle and equally essential phenomena.
For the image of a structure of knowledge
growing through the accumulation of
bricks contributed by individual research-
ers, w e must substitute that of an inter-
action between an always provisional
structure and the form of the brick which
is being fashioned. O f course, there are
fields in which the primary need is to
accumulate data, and seeking or collecting
them is relatively independent of the rest
of science. Yet it is undeniable that the
research effort is actually impelled by the
speculations or the possibilities indicated
by the current state of science.
Thus, there emerges a n e w role for
scientific papers: they are not merely
an expression of results obtained but the
agency of a twofold interaction: firstly
between the growing structure of k n o w -
ledge and the elements which give it
substance, and secondly between the
researcher and the community of scientists.
T h e researcher's direct contacts, often at
symposia, seminars and congresses, are
164
likewise occasions for interaction, but it is
rare for the discussions not to be based on
written documents, documents which are
often tentative but are nevertheless pub-
lished, at least in s u m m a r y form.
Exposés of discovered facts and the
basis for a dialogue, research papers are
thus not merely the static components of
the corpus of knowledge, but indeed express
the dynamics of its growth.
However, the researcher is a m a n w h o
sometimes needs sops to his self-esteem,
w h o will hardly consent to losing the credit
for his contribution, w h o often lives by
his scientific work, w h o has a legitimate
wish to see his standard of living improve
as his worth does, and w h o is deeply
conscious of the fact that his advancement,
and even his employment, depend on the
frequency and quality of his publications.
A n d even if it chanced that the researcher
wholly—and inhumanly—disregarded his
o w n advantage and eschewed personal
ambition, another motivation would lead
him to the same view of the need to
publish: namely that of keeping his
laboratory and his team going, while
providing them with increased means for
making their w o r k more effective.
The problem is to measure the dis-
advantages of the pressures of seeking
success.
W H A T TO PUBLISH AND H O W ?
Before approaching this question, a quick
outline is needed of the main types of
scientific papers, with no claims to exhaus-
tiveness. These papers are subject to rules ;
anyone w h o wishes cannot just publish
whatever he likes.

Consider a scientist embarking on a
fairly large-scale project. His ultimate
success will depend on his solving a
considerable number of particular prob-
lems. T h e complete work m a y require
six years, for example, but the w o r k will
proceed by several stages, with a 'paper'
at the end of each of them published in
the journal of an appropriate learned
society. Here the researcher runs into three
obstacles.
The first is the judgement of his
research director or of the entity he serves.
Here w e get an interaction effect between
the researcher's reputation and the interests
of his employer or team. It would be
wrong, however, to think that this pheno-
m e n o n leads to one particular attitude;
instead, w efinda whole spectrum, ranging
from absolute prohibition to encourage-
ment to speedy or even over-hasty publi-
cation.
Let us analyse some of the factors
which influence these attitudes. T h e
research director has not only a scientific
role, but a formative role o n the h u m a n
plane: certain temperaments will need to
be stimulated and pushed, while others,
with a tendency to be superficial, will have
to be m a d e to deepen their approach.
Next, the director is influenced by his
o w n interests, for he has his o w n reputation
to maintain, his appropriations to secure,
and his future to consider. Lastly, he
must keep in mind all his team's research
projects, their interactions, the over-all
effect that the whole m a y produce at
particular times, and even, on occasion
the need to keep quiet about a n e w line
being followed by his laboratory.
Thus the role of the research director
is not only that of an objective judge of
The effects of 'publish or perish'
the value of a piece of research, but that
of one responsible for a total strategy and
for particularized strategies.
T h e second obstacle is the reading
committee of the journal, whose critical
severity is dictated not only by a desire
for quality, but also sometimes by simple
material problems. In point of fact, the
journal's severity does not pile o n top of
that of the researcher's boss, for it often
varies inversely with the severity of the
exigencies which apply at the researcher's
place of work ; it is operative in proportion
as the other constraints are inoperative.
Might a reading committee substitute
a subjective judgement affected by the
personal interests of s o m e of its members
for an objective value judgement? It has
happened, but so rarely that such cases
m a y be considered as isolated aberrations.
T h e third obstacle is financial. For a
long time publication w a s done at no charge
to the researcher, but latterly the situation
has changed. T h e fact is that science is
advancing at a faster pace than the increase
in the number of researchers, due to more
efficient automatic equipment which re-
places m a n y manual operations. A s a
result, even by increasing members' dues
to the m a x i m u m limit acceptable, learned
societies have found it difficult to shoulder
the cost of publishing all the papers
submitted to them. This has led to the
establishment of page charges m a d e to the
author. These charges, which represent a
portion of actual publication costs, are
often but not invariably, paid by his
laboratory. This practice does not seem
to have cut d o w n the number of papers
published, though it has undoubtedly led
to an effort to be concise.
T h e papers referred to above are
165
Pierre Piganiol

fairly detailed; they almost always w o r k example. But here the cost of printing
on the principle that the qualified reader becomes a problem.
should be able to reproduce the experi- For some years past, therefore, there
ments described and discuss their theore- has been increasing recourse to a compro-
tical bases. In m a n y countries there are mise procedure whereby the exhaustive
institutions—in France, for instance, the document is not printed but deposited in
Académie des Sciences—which have taken a documentation centre which supplies
as one of their tasks the rapid publication photocopies of it on request. This is the
of 'short notes' describing the objectives most c o m m o n w a y in which these are
and essential results of research projects. circulated in France by the Centre National
Experimental details are here reduced to a de la Recherche Scientifique ( C N R S ) .
m i n i m u m (except of course for special It m a y happen that the researcher
cases, such as the perfecting of a new or wants to expand the readership for his
particularly effective piece of equipment work beyond simply the scientists in his
or technique) but such papers are no other o w n field. H e is then constrained to
than the cartoons of the full canvases. simplify his terminology in order to m a k e
Moreover, they serve to fix dates which it assimilable by non-specialists, or more
establish priorities. accurately, by specialists in other fields.
T h e institutions doing this justi- This is a first step in popularization.
fiably take a lofty view of their task. Here Papers or articles of this type count for
the anonymous reading committee is little in the analysis of 'titles and works',
replaced by some eminent person of high upon which a scientist's reputation is
reputation, whose n a m e is m a d e k n o w n based. They are, however, indispensable
to the author. Are they i m m u n e from error, and, if they are important because of their
either through allowing themselves to be content, they create an image of the
taken in by a charlatan or by rejecting some scientist which increases his public while
idea which is too revolutionary or which at the same time exposing him to jealousy.
is not understood because it has been Finally, the researcher m a y feel that
imperfectly expressed? Obviously not, but his work sheds new light on a m u c h broader
the rarity of the doubtful cases makes it problem. In that case he sets about writing
possible to discount their effect. a book of which his o w n personal work
But let's get back to our researcher. forms a relatively small part, but which
If his perseverance is crowned with affects the whole. O n e example is the work
success, he willfinallybe able to publish a by Nobel laureate Jacques M o n o d , Le
summary paper which will be but little Hasard et la Nécessité (Chance and
longer than the short notes, but in which Necessity) on the natural philosophy of
he must s o m e h o w manage to set forth his modern biology.
conclusions in full. This means that some Other works at a lower level are the
part of the other information which he text books written by researchers. Even
wishes to pass on m a y be lost. F r o m this if the author's personal contribution to the
results the desire and the need to publish subject dealt with is very limited, such
a m u c h fuller document, a thesis for books derive their value from the fact that

166

the researcher 'lives with his science'.
This, incidentally, explains w h y higher
education, at least at the graduate level,
is not separated from research.
The purpose of the foregoing was to
provide an outline of the structure of the
publication process. Let us n o w turn to
the study of possible distortions of it.
A n d , since w e have just spoken of the
links between education and research, let
us begin with the case of the professor,
even though it is not central to our subject.
T H E PUBLISHINGS OF PROFESSORS
W h e n a professor publishes a research
paper, he does so as a researcher and not
as a teacher. O n the other hand, the publi-
cation of a lecture course or a book is
directly connected with his teaching
vocation. T h e unfortunate thing is that
until very recently a professor's career,
in most countries, depended o n his research
activities and not on his worth as a teacher.
This has led to two extreme types of
distortion.
There is first the case of the young
instructor. H e must produce some publish-
able work as quickly as possible. There-
fore, he will tend to regard his teaching
activities as an impediment or obstacle
and consequently to reduce them, even at
the sacrifice of his students' interests.
O n e consequence is that research into
teaching is neglected or left solely to the
specialists, whereas every teacher should
also be concerned with perfecting his
teaching forms and methods so that the
process of transferring knowledge m a y be
more effective. Things m a y even reach
the degree where others look d o w n on the
The effects of 'publish or perish'
m a n w h o takes the trouble to devise n e w
laboratory experiments or class demonstra-
tions—which are becoming rarer and rarer
in our lecture halls.
A b o v e all, the students end by
complaining about the weakness of the
instruction, despite the fact that the staff
is there. T h e deficiency is compensated
by the growth in the number of monitors
and graduate assistants. Despite this, the
fact remains that m a n y young teachers feel
a conflict between the demands of their
work and the demands of their careers.
T h e second type of distortion is
exemplified by the case of the professor
of some seniority. His standing depends
almost exclusively on scientific criteria
and particularly o n the number of his
publications. T h e pace of his career, his
reputation and his advancement in the
university depend almost solely on what
he does in his laboratory. This absorbs most
of his time, sometimes to the detrimen of
his lectures, often to that of the bulk of
his students, and almost always to that
of his output of general treatises which
would be of immense benefit to all; this
problem is particularly prevalent in France
where there are no corrective arrangements,
such as the institution of sabbatical leave,
and where publishers k n o w h o w difficult
it is to get works written on even the most
important subjects.
Obviously, these difficulties fade out
at the graduate level of education. Here
there is no longer any conflict but rather
a close symbiosis between teaching and
research. But this applies only at the
superior segment of higher education,
which in any case, is not open to beginners :
they still have the problem of getting there.
W e have just juxtaposed the terms
167
Pierre Piganiol
'conflict' and 'symbiosis'. Let there be n o
mistake about the writer's ideas : symbiosis
is necessary and conflict is to be avoided.
The ineluctable connexions between
teaching and research will have to be
established o n n e w bases. T h e expansion
of mass higher education will not long
permit having a laboratory assigned to
every professor—something which is al-
ready disappearing—nor even to every
group of professors. There is a limit to
the amount that a country can allocate for
research (say 3 per cent of its national
income?) and it is far lower than is
demanded by education.
W e therefore need not only to
restructure the teaching-research relation-
ship, but invent n e w measures of university
careers—but this could well be the subject
of another article. For the present let us
simply agree that it is a matter of urgency
to re-establish the balance lost because of
a rapid university expansion, disorganized
though desirable.
But the future is not attained simply
by extrapolating the present. O n e must
visualize the future structure a n d then
deduce the successive stages of a rational
evolution towards it. In other words,
progress will c o m e through seeking for a
'contrasting scenario' establishing a desir-
able future, and not through plotting a
'trend scenario' which would adapt the
present situation to the future simply
by extending it on a larger scale.
T H E CHOICE OF R E S E A R C H
SUBJECTS
Does the compulsion to publish influence
the choice of research projects? Is the
168
o p t i m u m strategy for the expansion of
knowledge perverted to the point of losing
effectiveness?
It is difficult to give an answer, if
only because of the sparseness of our
knowledge about the real mechanisms
whereby research programmes are chosen.
Such choices m a y be the outcome of a
rational analysis of the state of a particular
field of science, of the impact of the results
secured in otherfields,and of the d e m a n d
for scientific answers created by needs
arising outside science (of industry, natio-
nal defence, etc.), or m a y simply result
from the fact that certain problems are in
vogue. Here w e have a clash between the
mostly unformulated though partly for-
mulable internal logic of scientific progress
and the pressure of external factors.
In a document devoted to that subject,
the National A c a d e m y of Sciences of the
United States introduced an interesting
criterion for evaluating the state of che-
mical research, namely, the number of
questions which chemists suggested they
wished to see resolved. Is this objective
measure of the degree of interest in different
domains of chemistry the reflection of the
internal logic of the development of those
branches? M a y it not m o r e likely be
simply an indication of the problems which
the present state of the science makes it
possible to tackle with sufficient chances
of success to reward the researchers with
the possibility of publishing a large number
of papers? It is probable that these two
questions are pretty m u c h equivalent, in
which case there is n o conflict between a
p r o g r a m m e dictated by a sound apprecia-
tion of what is important and one egoisti-
cally conceived to spotlight the researcher's
virtuosity.

While I believe that this is indeed the
case in general, I think that there are
problems which are less attractive because
of the length of the preliminary research
necessary for tackling them: the m o u n -
taineer, discouraged by the tedious ap-
proaches to one peak, turns his attention
to others.
But there is a corrective: the less-
accessible peaks are the m o r e unknown,
and as soon as the researcher becomes the
head of a group, he will be able to commit
a part of its efforts to the chancier but
m o r e rewarding venture. This, however,
raises the problem of team strategy, to
which w e shall return.
In point of fact, I a m convinced that
the need to publish plays a very little part
in the choice of research programmes.
Passing fads are m u c h m o r e influential,
but even they count for m u c h less than
has been thought a m o n g all the external
and internal factors which shape the course
of science.
T H E C O N D U C T OF R E S E A R C H
Does the compulsion to publish have any
influence on the conduct of research?
Assuredly it does, if only by intensifying
that work effort and strain familiar to
m a n y researchers as the end of the year
approaches without their having been
able to accumulate any publishable results.
Is this effect sometimes harmful?
I have myself observed, in university
research laboratories, a certain loss of
equanimity as deadlines for publication
approach, going so far as to destroy
co-operativeness and even put friends at
loggerheads. These, however, were excep-
The effects of 'publish or perish'
tional cases which simply proved that s o m e
of those involved did not have the neces-
sary qualities to be real researchers.
In practice, as a result of the advances
in research methods, the great majority
of research projects can be broken d o w n
into sub-units, s o m e of which require only
the mere collection of data. Most research
subjects include sub-units which offer n o
risk of failure to the researcher; at the
s a m e time, the judicious planning of the
w o r k makes it possible to establish a
reasonable schedule of publications.
But above all, modern research
imposes its logic upon the researchers.
T h e course of a programme of experi-
ments depends upon m a n y factors and
marrying their consequences is a matter of
delicate adjustment. It therefore strikes m e
as doubtful that the publication considera-
tion can be considered as anything but a
very secondary factor. This does not m e a n
that it is not sometimes the dominant
consideration. I wish only to stress that
o n the whole its over-all effect o n the
process of increasing knowledge is pro-
bably negligible.
T H E SPATE OF PAPERS
O n e of the m o r e serious criticisms m a d e of
the present system of publications relates
to the excessive quantity of papers produced
by the compulsion to publish (Fig. 1). For
all the reasons discussed above, I d o not
consider that this spate reflects unwarrant-
able duplications and I should even be
inclined to believe that the multiplication
of papers conduces to the health of the
documentation mechanisms.
The objective of such systems is the
169
Pierre Piganiol
F I G . 1. The scientific-paper producer.
exhaustive retrieval of all pertinent papers
on a particular question. In general,
documentation systems classify and retrieve
papers by using key words which are m o r e
or less arranged in a hierarchic order
ranging from the m o r e general to the
m o r e particular. All the present systems
are at fault in that their key-word labels
describing the content of papers are
inadequate. The fact that the same subject
is covered with a certain minimal redun-
dancy in several related papers, forming
a coherent whole but under different
170
specific titles, definitely improves the
filing in computer m e m o r y banks of the
real content of these researches.
Moreover, it must be remembered
that researchers d o not content themselves
with simply the computer's descriptive
lists, but m a k e extensive use of the highly
specialized, and therefore very selective,
bibliographies given at the end of each
paper. T h e partition of a subject into
several separate papers goes far towards
guaranteeing the exhaustiveness of the
retrieval of related papers.

W e k n o w that information losses
invariably occur in the diffusion of infor-
mation. In order to combat this pheno-
m e n o n , a palliative is needed; one such is
the multiplicity of papers. Admittedly this
entails greater information-handling costs,
but the alternative would be a loss of
information, so in the final count, the
true economies are not where they are
generally thought to be. In this particular,
therefore, and contrary to the widely held
view, I calculate that w e must assign a
positive value to that social necessity, the
multiplication of papers.
EFFECT O N SCIENTIFIC TEAMS
O n the other hand, w e n o w c o m e to
various phenomena to be reckoned to the
discredit of the pressure to publish. T h e
fact is that m u c h research is carried through
not by one scientist, but a team in which
each m e m b e r has his o w n particular
place. O n e might think that each m e m b e r
would be able to produce a valid individual
paper o n his part of the over-all research
task, but the most cursory analysis of the
situation shows that this is not so. A s
a consequence, the need to publish can
often hinder the team system from func-
tioning smoothly, a grave handicap in
terms of both efficiency and mental atti-
tudes.
T h e p h e n o m e n o n is sufficiently i m -
portant for counteracting measures to have
been devised. I k n o w cases of teams w h o s e
The effects of 'publish or perish'
leaders forbid the members to contemplate
any personal publication. O n the other
hand, as each set of results comes to hand,
the team agrees to assign that paper in the
series to one particular m e m b e r , even
when—in the extreme case—he has not
taken any part in that section of the pro-
g r a m m e ; this is obviously overdoing
things.
Another possible solution for this
problem is that the researcher-assessment
machinery give fairer weight to research
papers signed by several authors. T h e
indications are that very often our psycho-
logical traditions oppose this multiple-
author system, which, incidentally, is not
very easy to operate in a strictly objective
manner.
In the need to publish, w e encounter
a form of the eternal dilemma of conflict
between the individual and the group of
which he is a part.
T h e foregoing study, based on the begin-
nings of a survey, obviously needs the
backing of a m u c h fuller analysis. But it
shows that the pressure to publish is far
from having only negative effects; there
are s o m e very positive considerations in its
favour, if only in spurring on work.
N o n e the less, two major problems
remain: the evaluation of the quality of
university teachers, and of the quality of
research teams and their individual m e m -
bers. It is imperative to attack these two
problems at once in order to avoid serious
strains in the world of science.
171
A n antidote for anti-science

by Paul Couderc1

What is a major propellant of the epidemic of anti-science

current in many of the developed countries?
Ignorance: lack of knowledge o n the part of the
general populace of the concepts of science, its objectives,
its capabilities, its promise. This is one important reason
w h y a basic understanding of science m u s t be m a d e a
part of the total cultural equipment of everyone. Another
is that n o individual can h o p e to fit into, to responsibly
participate in today's scientific-technical world of change
without such a basic understanding.
This understanding m u s t be provided by a sound
and widespread popularization of science—and scientists
have a major responsibility in doing this.

F r o m all sides, from within and without, by
both the general lay public and by scientists
themselves, the validity and the social value
of science is being today put to the ques-
tion. Science is being criticized, indeed,
attacked, as if—ironically—it were solely
responsible for the grave problems that are
at loose in the world. But is it the scientist
1. Until he retired in 1969, Dr. Paul Couderc
was the head astronomer of the Paris
Observatory; he is the winner of the 1967
Kalinga Prize for the popularization of
science. Address: 5 Square Delambre,
75 Paris-14e (France).
w h o is responsible for the world's prob-
lems today?
B y definition, by etymology, science is
knowledge, knowledge of the true nature of
things. It is the product of m a n ' s curiosity
in regard to nature, of his intelligence and
of his ability to disentangle the maze of
phenomena. In this search for truth his
instrument has been the experimental
method, which has taken so m a n y centuries
to become established.
N o one can assert that science, thus
understood, is a bad thing without thereby
admitting that he or she prefers to live in

Impact of Science on Society, Vol. X X I , N o . 2, 1971 173

Paul Couderc
a state of ignorance, delusion or error. If
science engenders mixed feelings, the rea-
son is that it is confused with its applica-
tions and technological spin-off. It is these
applications which are open to appraisal:
s o m e can be considered excellent, others
injurious, while s o m e are frankly terrifying.
But this lack of understanding of what
science is and what it does is responsible
for m a n y of the attacks upon it, and pres-
ents one strong reason—among several that
I will discuss in this article—why major
efforts must be m a d e to popularize science,
to m a k e knowledge of it universally wide-
spread. For an antidote to the epidemic of
anti-science that is today sweeping through
m a n y of the countries of the developed
world is to m a k e knowledge of science part
of the cultural equipment of all people,
m e n , w o m e n and children.
The vital importance of science for the
development of mankind should be m a d e
evident to everyone: w e can expect nothing
really new, nothing that will change in
significant fashion the destiny which nature
seemed to have imposed on mankind with-
out scientific research and the discovery of
needed new knowledge.
THE INTELLECTUAL G R O W T H
OF THE RACE
It is completely true that it is to a Leonardo
da Vinci, Bach or Beethoven, Shakespeare
or Baudelaire, Chopin, Debussy or Piran-
dello that w e owe s o m e of the most power-
ful emotional experiences in life. Yet w e
cannot credit any of these geniuses with the
slightest contribution to the considerable
prolongation of h u m a n life, the shortening
of the working-day, the curing of our ill-
174
nesses or the raising of the standard of
living since the Middle Ages.
M o r e generally, it is to scientific prog-
ress and this alone that w e o w e our leisure,
the necessary condition for everything
which follows, even ideas and art. W h e n
prehistoric m a n spent all his waking hours
in seeking nourishment and a sure place to
defend himself, the space occupied in his
life by extraneous activities must have been
very restricted (even the wall-paintings in
caves had magical significance). T o science
(science in its diffident, fumbling, groping
infancy) goes the credit for everything that
distinguishes our life from that of primitive
m a n — a n d , more especially, for the free
time that has m a d e it possible to create the
great works of every kind in which w e take
such pride.
In view of this, it would be dangerous
to leave concern with science to a small
minority, the scientists, while it remained a
closed book to the rest of mankind. W e
must not forget that science, since ancient
times, has changed the basic concepts in
our thinking. If w e consider astronomy
alone, science has compelled us to accept
in turn the concept of natural law, a sphe-
rical (as opposed to aflat)earth, the dis-
carding of the vertical as the privileged
direction (thus making it possible to con-
ceive of a normal life in the Antipodes),
abandonment of the reality of darkness
(previously held to be substantial, as a
positive counterpart of light, instead of
simply the absence of light), repudiation
finally of geocentrism and those philoso-
phies which viewed the universe in anthro-
pomorphic terms.
This evolution in our basic tenets
themselves is progressing today at an
increasingly swift pace. W e all k n o w h o w

the theory of relativity has replaced the
abstract (and illusory) concepts of absolute
time and absolute space by the objective
concepts of relative time and relative space
—which alone can be measured—joined
together in a space-time continuum.
Next, the mass of bodies was shown
to vary as a function of their velocity, while
radiation and light have proved to have
mass and to be subject to gravity. Matter
and radiation, formerly conceived as
mutually exclusive and antithetic, are for
the physicist of today no more than two
interchangeable forms of but a single
entity—energy : as matter can disappear in
the form of radiation, so radiation can
condense as matter.
Lastly, in confirmation of an age-old
intuition of the Greek philosophers, science
has established irrefutably that the struc-
ture of matter (molecules, atoms, electrons,
nuclei, nucléons and so on) is discontinu-
ous. Simultaneously, quantum theory has
revealed, most unexpectedly, that radiation
itself has a discontinuous structure : energy
is emitted in small indivisible packets.
Physicist and astronomer n o w con-
sider space as a physical reality, inseparable
fromfieldsof force, and this space is not
Euclidian: in the proximity of masses of
matter, as, for example, around the sun, it
is curved—and this property is sufficient to
explain the m o v e m e n t of the planets. But
on a grand scale, space appears to possess
even more astonishing properties, such as
the quality of expansion.
These n e w concepts, which adults find
hard to accept and difficult to assimilate,
will easily find their place in the
s u m of knowledge acquired at school as
soon as an effort is m a d e to teach them,
since, according to Langevin's definition,
A n antidote for anti-science
w e consider everything that w e have learn-
ed at an early age as standing to reason.
It would be extremely serious to leave
the public long in ignorance of these
changes in thinking, to permit an increas-
ingly wide gulf to open between scientists
and laymen. O n the contrary, their out-
looks and modes of thought must, little by
little but without delay, be brought into
harmony to the greatest possible extent, by
education at all levels and also by means of
effective popularization.
THE RESERVOIR OF SCIENTISTS
There is another major reason for making
knowledge of science a c o m m o n fund of
the populace. It is the people as a whole
w h o form the natural reservoir of future
research workers or brilliant scientists. W e
cannot expect that the descendants of m e n
of genius will also be gifted (this does
happen, but not very frequently). In reality,
the qualities and gifts of the researcher or
m a n of genius are the result of felicitous
combinations of genes which are the pri-
vilege of no single class and which have
been, u p to n o w , the outcome of chance.
T h e physicists Faraday and Langevin,
the mathematicians Galois and Cartan,
benefactors of mankind such as Pasteur
and Fleming, came from modest (or even
extremely poor) families and it sometimes
required another chance occurrence, almost
as exceptional as that of their heredity, to
direct them towards a scientific career.
In order to m a k e the m a x i m u m use of
these potential h u m a n resources, there
must be wide dissemination of information
and, in all age-groups, people must be
exposed to at least some notions of science,
175
Paul Couderc
purveyed to them in a correct and easily
assimilated form, so that all w h o have the
ability can have their opportunity. Natu-
rally, this initiation is basically the respon-
sibility of the teacher,firstof all at primary
school level, and later in secondary and
technical schools. But here w e c o m e u p
against the related problems of satisfactory
training for primary and secondary school-
teachers and curriculum reform, if the
experimental method and the criteria of
scientific truth are to be firmly impressed
on all.
In addition to being familiarized with
the characteristics of true science, students
must also be given a full understanding of
those of the pseudo-sciences, the reasons
behind the pernicious revival in their popu-
larity, and their harmful effects (be it
astrology, medical radioaesthesia, quacks
and healers, spiritualism, or a general
inclination towards the occult). This revival
in popularity seems paradoxical in the
atomic era, but pseudo-science is quick to
profit from the achievements of true science.
Impressed by the 'miracles' of science, the
m a n in the street is perhaps less wary of the
charlatan's claims.
THE K N O W L E D G E NEEDS
OF T O D A Y ' S CITIZEN
A m i n i m u m of scientific knowledge and of
the scientific attitude, spread by populariza-
tion, are highly necessary for the citizen of
today, particularly in the developed coun-
tries. H o w otherwise can he understand the
far-reaching significance of today's events,
from c h r o m o s o m e analysis to the conquest
of the m o o n ? H o w otherwise can he hope
to participate fully in modern life?
176
W e are submerged in statistics, opin-
ion surveys, analyses; w e are surrounded
by electric and electronic equipment; w e
m a k e use of cars, planes and telecommu-
nications; our health, our diet, our expec-
tation of life, are the subject of increasingly
scientific medical checks. W h o can confi-
dently fulfil his responsibilities as head of
the family and as a conscientious m e m b e r
of society while disdaining such an essen-
tial factor in its functioning? C a n anyone
w h o is totally unaware of major contem-
porary discoveries really call himself cul-
tured? Should not the factors which are
going to decide the destiny of future gener-
ations (electronics, nuclear energy, nucleic
acids, etc.) form part of the stock-in-trade
of the educated m a n of today?
But w h o is it w h o needs science popu-
larization? Everyone, absolutely everyone!
A s Nobel laureate Alfred Kastler has ob-
served in an interview printed in Impact,1
science has become so vast that today
n o research worker, n o scientist, even a
Nobel prize-winner, can k n o w every sector
of it; still less is he able to keep himself up
to date in all its disciplines. Even in his o w n
discipline the specialist can only be fully
conversant—and remain so—with a tiny
section of it. For everything else he has to
rely on good popularizations, along with
the rest of us.
Naturally, several levels of populariza-
tion must be envisaged, according to the
public to which it is directed, ranging from
the rather erudite review, in which it is
presumed that the reader has the necessary
foundations, to the mass-circulation science
magazine, to the daily newspaper in which
1. Impact of Science on Society, Vol. X X ,
N o . 2, 1970.

even basic knowledge cannot be taken for
granted.
W H O SHALL BE THE
POPULARIZERS?
B y w h o m is science to be disseminated?
The book or the lecture that deals with its
subject in depth can only be done, of
course, by a specialist. However, every spe-
cialist does not necessarily have the ability
to m a k e his knowledge intelligible to the
public. W a s it not said that Einstein him-
self, through his laconic style (justly
renowned in his forceful scientific notes),
discouraged m a n y readers in his rare
attempts at popularization?
It is nevertheless true that in France,
for example, there are several outstand-
ingly successful popularization series writ-
ten by specialists. In other countries, too,
scientists of very great stature have been
noted popularizers. T o take cosmology
alone, for example, w h o can be ignorant of
the names of Sir Arthur Eddington, Sir
James Jeans, George G a m o w and Fred
Hoyle? In France itself, very great 'dis-
coverers' have also been very great writers.
Without going as far back as Descartes or
Pascal, one thinks of Claude Bernard, Louis
Pasteur, Henri Poincaré and Jean Perrin,
to cite only a few.
Scientists w h o have the necessary
gifts of eloquence and 'presence' should, of
course, m a k e a point of taking part in talks
or debates on radio and television.
H o w e v e r , I for m y part disapprove of
face-to-face encounters in public between
scientists and charlatans, say on radio or
television, as sometimes take place in
France. It is inappropriate to appear to
A n antidote for anti-science
grant equal merit to the genuine research
scientist and to the trader o n public credul-
ity and to seem to put them on an equal
footing from the outset. Moreover, it is not
always certain that the discussion will turn
in favour of the honest seeker for truth.
Impostors are crafty, are adept at chicanery
and excel at verbal trickery: these are the
skills that enable them to hoodwink their
clients. They generally accuse the 'estab-
lishment expert' of claiming to k n o w it all
(whereas in point of fact it is he, the char-
latan, whose claims rest on thin air). W h e n ,
at the conclusion of a garbled and rather
acrimonious discussion, the chairman, for
the sake of politeness, seems to imply that
the outcome is an honourable draw, what
have science and the public gained?
In the daily press and in magazines or
periodicals with a large circulation, the
dissemination of science will necessarily lie
in the hands of journalists. Schools of
journalism should provide adequate spe-
cialized training; such training, which
would begin with a basic scientific ground-
ing, should underline the need to give
prominence, along with its news value, to
the background of the discovery, the u n -
successful attempts that preceded it, the
criteria for determining its validity, the
further tests of it which m a y be expected or
the applications which m a y be anticipated.
The working journalist will naturally
keep himself up to date by reading and,
should the occasion arise, by consulting
the qualified specialist. W h a t kind of a
reception will he get? In the interview
referred to, D r . Kastler's interlocutor gives
us to understand that he has met with
rebuffs in seeking to interview scientists.
Yet I d o not think that a m o n g scientists
there is a larger proportion of difficult
177
Paul Couderc
characters than in the rest of the population
and I have always seen m y colleagues
willingly consent to interviews which have
sometimes proved very thankless (as when
the visitor was ignorant of even the basic
facts).
For m y part, I have had very frequent
contacts with journalists and, on the whole,
they have been cordial. O n t w o or three
occasions, however, I have regretted m y
obligingness. Once, for example, I spent an
hour with a stranger, at his request, in
order to provide him with the basis for an
article. Unfortunately, I remarked that
ours was not thefirstobservation of the
phenomenon reported. 'Well,' he said,
picking u p his things, 'if there's nothing
n e w about it, it's of no interest to m e . '
I can hardly hold it against him since
observing the lukewarm interest that the
second m a n n e d expedition to the m o o n
aroused. It needed the drama of the third
to reawaken interest.
W e should therefore ask the journal-
ist, not to refrain from reporting latest
developments (on the contrary, this is just
the time and that is his job), but to avoid
sensationalism and piffle at all costs. O n e
can be enthusiastic without being naïve,
without conjuring up every day the extra-
ordinary, the fantastic and the unheard-of.
Reference should be m a d e here to the
welcome—though, in m y view, still too
limited—agreement that has been arrived
at between French specialists and journal-
ists through the good offices of the Associa-
tion des Écrivains Scientifiques (Associa-
tion of Science Writers). Scientists in every
field of science have voluntarily m a d e their
telephone numbers available so that they
can answer the pressing inquiries of jour-
nalists concerning subjects of topical inter-
178
est and arrange a meeting if a longer con-
versation proves necessary. I can vouch for
the fact that this association really works,
as I have been one of the specialist volun-
teers over a period of m a n y years.
Is there any science or branch of
science which cannot be popularized? W e
should notefirstof all that certain sectors
have more attraction for the public than
others : accounts of animal life, astronomy,
prehistoric m a n , exploration of the earth
(polar expeditions, underwater exploration,
and so on) have been very popular and con-
tinue to be favourite themes. Accounts
of great discoveries and biographies of
famous scientists are printed in tens of
thousands of copies and can prove extreme-
ly profitable. Medicine also can count on a
large following, but it is not so certain that
it always provides useful and harmless
reading. O n the other hand, the abstract
sciences, such as mathematics, are m o r e
forbidding.
Yet I believe it is possible to give a
satisfactory description of even the most
difficult theories if the popularizer k n o w s
his subject intimately and takes sufficient
trouble to search for analogies, images and
striking parallels from more familiar
domains. Analogies and imagery m a y vary
in appropriateness and the purists, the
intransigent specialists, will never be
satisfied. But I believe that it is better to
compare a potential difference to the height
of a waterfall than to allow a child to be
put off, in his reading, by the expression
'potential difference'. Einstein's theory of
relativity has long been a butt for gibes:
this theory, it has been said, is understood
only by its author . . . if he does ! M a y I
point out, however, at the risk of appearing
immodest, that 100,000 copies of the small
 A n antidote for anti-science

book o n this subject which I wrote for that so m a n y French newspapers devote a
the series Que sais-je? have already been fatuous column, every day, to astrology
sold. and that almost all weeklies give it one or
two pages of coverage regularly, thereby
stultifying their readers and encouraging
T H E PLACE OF SCIENCE them to go and be hoodwinked by astrolo-
IN E D U C A T I O N A N D IN gers (either in theflesh,or computerized).
T H E PRESS This misguided behaviour on the part of a
large section of the press seems to m e to be
Most people acquire little scientific k n o w - a serious matter. Perpetual exposure to
ledge and there is an urgent need to give a pseudo-science leads to impairment of the
larger place to science in all branches of critical faculties.
education. In modern society, a m a n w h o
aspires to a post of responsibility can n o This is a world that was m a d e by science
longer limit himself to the humanities (in and technology—and it is a world of
the classical sense) and thefinearts. Science
change. However vigorous the present
correctly taught, with its historical and feelings against science and technology
h u m a n backgrounds, including study of its
m a y be, neither they nor the changes they
methods at least as m u c h as enunciation of
bring about can be eliminated from the
its results, of the gropings and failures, the
life of m a n . Ignorance of science, indiffer-
successive approximations of h o w the ence to science, on the part of the general
successful aspects of earlier theories are population can only complicate the world's
integrated into later, more general theoriesproblems, not m a k e them disappear, as
—all this forms part of a worthy and some seem to hope. T h e citizen of today
effective modern humanism. and, increasingly, the citizen of tomorrow,
I regret that newspapers do not in- cannot hope to function rationally in this
clude a science column on a more or less world without a basic understanding of
daily basis, where astronomy, for example, science, its attitudes, its concepts and its
might be discussed one day a week. Certain possibilities.
British papers used to do this some years There is the strongest argument for a
ago, but I have not checked to see if this widespread diffusion of knowledge about
excellent practice still goes on. science. A n d the scientist here has a respon-
O n the other hand, it distresses m e sible and important role to play.

179
Aspects of secrecy in science

b y Joseph A . C a d e 1

Assuming that secrecy in science is ever justified, how do

you apply it properly?
In discussing the pros a n d cons of the secrecy
question, D r . C a d e examines the biological nature of the
discovery process to s h o w w h y secrecy does not deny
knowledge to m a n k i n d but only delays it, yet is sometimes
unnecessary because rediscovery of a piece of knowledge
by another group does not necessarily follow from the
fact that needed information is available. D u e recognition
by authorities of such factors as these, together with a
correction of the abuses of secrecy, is important in order
for secrecy to be accepted by the scientists affected.

T o twentieth-century m a n , the word which is used to obtain or add to that

'science' can convey a variety of related
things : a body of knowledge about all or
part of the physical universe; or the pro-
cess of objective and reproducible observa-
tion followed by rigorous interpretation
1. Dr. Joseph A . Cade, at present a consultant
to the Organization for Economic Co-opera-
tion and Development, Paris, became
familiar with the question of secrecy as
a nuclear chemist for the United Kingdom
Atomic Energy Authority, in service with
N A T O , and as a member of the staff of
the Chief Scientific Adviser to the British
Government. H o m e address: T h e Squirrels,
Wantage Road, Streatley, Berkshire (United
Kingdom).
knowledge; or the vocation of those w h o
participate in this process ; or a culture dis-
tinct from the 'humanities'. There are few,
however, w h o would deny that one concept
central to 'science' in all of its modern
connotations is that of positively promot-
ing the free and unrestrictedflowof thought
between minds.
It is hardly surprising, therefore, that
one of the great concerns of the scientific
world during the past few decades has been
the matter of secrecy in the publication of
research results, for there is an apparent
contradiction between the very concepts of

Impact of Science on Society, Vol. X X I , N o . 2, 1971 181

Joseph A . Cade
'secrecy' and 'science'. This secrecy consists
of the restrictions often placed o n scientists
as regards disseminating their research
results—or even their thoughts o n certain
subjects—on the grounds that to do so
might provide an advantage to a potential
political enemy or a commercial competitor.
M y purpose here will be to examine
s o m e of the biological and psychological
aspects of this question which must be
taken into account in order to manage the
h u m a n problems created by secrecy—if
indeed one accepts the premise that secrecy
is ever useful or justifiable.
THE G R O U N D W O R K
OF THIS DISCUSSION
A great deal has already been written on
the problem of secrecy in science. However,
the emphasis has usually been placed on
secrecy as a moral or policy issue, whereas
in m y experience the more challenging
aspects of the problem arise from its purely
operational considerations. Analysis is all
very well, but it is always better if it leads
to improved action or attitudes.
In addition, there seems to be a well-
established mythology to the effect that
knowledge created in one mind belongs as
a matter of right to all thinking m e n . This
idea m a y be true, but it is reiterated so
often without any scientific evidence to
support it that it runs the risk of being mis-
taken for a mere opinion repeated often
enough to assume the appearance of fact.
Finally, secrecy in science has too
often been discussed in isolation from such
important areas as h u m a n creativity, the
essentially biological nature of the pheno-
m e n o n of discovery and the problem of
182
information assimilation, all of which seem
to m e to be not only relevant to the prob-
lem, but virtually inseparable from any
meaningful discussion of it.
I do not claim to be an authority o n
any of these facets of h u m a n behaviour.
I a m simply a scientist, a former nuclear
chemist, w h o has spent twenty years w o r k -
ing in atomic energy and in otherfieldsof
government science where secrecy is
applied, and w h o has learned to live with
the undeniable tensions created by the
simultaneous requirement to promote the
flow of thought between some sets of
minds yet impede it between others. A s a
result, I have discovered that the merest
acquaintance with developments in the
peripheralfieldsmentioned above can pro-
vide important lessons for the management
of secrecy. These lessons are valuable both
for the scientist w h o must conform to the
rules of society and for those responsible
for seeing that security is observed, yet
without quenching either scientific per-
formance or creativity.
This, then, to be m o r e specific, will be
m y main purpose: to show h o w to improve
the chances of coming to practical terms
with the apparent contradiction of secrecy
in science by handling the problem in such
a w a y as to m a k e it m o r e acceptable to
scientists on intellectual grounds rather
than o n moral or political ones. T o d o so,
it is necessary to consider the nature of the
inner conflicts created by the problem of
secrecy in the ideas business, and in par-
ticular to acknowledge that such conflicts
occur at a number of very different intel-
lectual levels.
First let m e begin with a few defini-
tions, for I shall use the words 'informa-
tion', 'data', 'knowledge' and 'creativity'

freely, but not—I hope—indiscriminately.
B y 'information', I m e a n some kind of
representation of knowledge, such as ac-
tions, words, figures, formulae, pictures,
graphs, or conceptual models describable
in any of these forms. O n the basis of this
definition, it must be apparent that k n o w -
ledge can only flow from one mind to an-
other through the m e d i u m of information.
B y 'data', I m e a n that important c o m -
ponent of information concerned with the
representation of quantitative aspects of
knowledge.
B y 'knowledge', I m e a n that which is
assimilated by the mind from the informa-
tion and experiences presented to it, plus
that which results—new knowledge—from
the synergistic symbiosis of what has been
assimilated.
Finally, this synergistic symbiosis—a
process of which only the isolated h u m a n
mind seems at present capable—is what I
understand by 'creativity'.
N o t everyone would agree with these
definitions, but m y concern is only to m a k e
clear what I mean w h e n I use these terms.
SECRECY A N D CONFLICTS
OF LOYALTY
T h e most fundamental of the inner con-
flicts which can arise through secrecy in-
volves such basic but little-understood
matters as moral value judgements, truth
and loyalties. In this connexion, it is impor-
tant to appreciate that where scientists are
subject to secrecy it is seldom about science
alone. Rather, the concern with secrecy
about scientific information is almost
always only an important component of
the secrecy about the policy or operations
Aspects of secrecy in science
of a government, of a company or of some
other kind of organization.
Furthermore, some scientists have to
become concerned with secrecy about
purely commercial or political matters
which have no scientific content. But if they
are good scientists, they are likely to apply
the same objective scrutiny and evaluation
to these matters as they d o to scientific
ones. This is not necessarily a c o m m e n d -
able trait but merely the result of an attitude
of m i n d which their scientific training and
intellectual development produces, and
from which they cannot escape. It also has
a considerable influence o n fixing their
loyalties and beliefs [l].1
Whatever the basis for one's system
of values and morals—religion, humanism,
materialism, or as is usually the case, some
blend of these—makes little difference to
the severity of the secrecy problem at this
most fundamental, psychological level. For
secrecy seems to be incompatible with the
phenomenological observation that the
unrestricted flow of thought is essential to
intellectual progress in anyfield;it appears
to contradict the popular—but unproven—
premise that knowledge generated in one
mind is some kind of intellectual c o m m o n
property; and it seems to be in conflict
with the moral precept of truth.
N o w truth is another concept whose
exact meaning has continually exercised
some of the best intellects of every age. But
both religious and secular moralists could
probably agree that truth as a relationship
between h u m a n beings—and as additional
to or, perhaps, distinct from the objective
truth of physical phenomena—is concerned
1. T h efiguresin brackets refer to the references
at the end of this article.
183
Joseph A . Cade
with transferring as completely and as
accurately as possible the contents of one
mind to another.
Therefore, both moral and intellectual
considerations provide the highest motives
for divulging the contents of the mind,
whatever they m a y be.
Pulling against this compulsion on
most thinkers to m a k e public every creative
thought in which they can justifiably take
pride—and let us note that this psycho-
logical compulsion is by n o means confined
to scientists—is the equally strong pressure
exerted by loyalties of various kinds. T h e
key psychological problem here is that
whereas a person's attitudes towards the
free dissemination of knowledge are usually
consistent, loyalties to different h u m a n
associations to which one and the same
m a n can simultaneously belong are often
inconsistent to the point of becoming
incompatible.
M o s t scientists are supported by a
c o m p a n y , a foundation, a university, a
government department or some other
organization. Very few are independent in
the sense of beingfinanciallyself-support-
ing. Even in the few rare cases where this
m a y still occur, the m e n concerned are
m e m b e r s of a society or community, just as
are the scientists working for some public
or private organization.
It is often argued that the m a n w h o
accepts the support of such an organization
or of society and then betrays it because of
greater loyalty to an ideal lacks integrity.
But this argument refuses to acknowledge
that both absolute and relative value judge-
ments can change with time as a result of
personal intellectual development, or denies
that the real worth of an organization or
society can diminish.
184
Thus difficultiesfirstoccur w h e n , as a
result of intellectual development, scientists
begin to suspect that the logic or integrity
on which rests the value system of the
society or organization to which they
belong is inferior to that of the universal
intellectual community of which as scien-
tists they are also a part. For in the final
analysis, loyalties are dictated by such rela-
tive value judgements concerning the orga-
nization of which the scientist is a m e m b e r
—be it a nation, company, or whatever—
and of what Polanyi has so eloquently
described as 'the scientific republic' [2].
It is worth recalling, too, that studies
on the originality of scientists have shown
that the most original ones are those w h o
are more independent in their judgements,
more self-assertive and dominant in their
personalities, and m o r e inclined to reject
suppression as a mechanism for the con-
trol of impulse [3]. All these are traits
which must tend to m a k e the most creative
scientists the biggest security risks, since
they will value before all others their o w n
judgement of the relative significance of
their ideas to national, political or sectorial
interest on the one hand, and to the prog-
ress of science on the other.
T H E INEVITABILITY
OF DISCOVERY
Inner conflict of a different kind and at a
more pragmatic level can follow from the
recognition that the rate of scientific dis-
covery is probably governed by a combina-
tion of r a n d o m biological processes, which
seriously calls into question the idea that
knowledge can be permanently denied by
withholding information.
 Aspects of secrecy in science

O n e feature of living things, such as h u m a n minds differ in their ability as

h u m a n beings, is variability; any measur- regards the n u m b e r of thought patterns
able property or quality varies widely they can bring to interact simultaneously;
a m o n g the members of a group or of a the separate thought patterns whose inter-
species. A number of different factors are action (or 'intersection') are essential to the
involved in determining the degree or creative act are identifiable with the n u m -
extent to which any given property is ber of factors which affect creative ability ;
present in an individual. and the number of such thought patterns a
If the factors which control the prop- person possesses is directly related to the
erty or characteristic being measured do a m o u n t of knowledge he has assimilated
not affect each other—or as w e say, d o not [4, 5].
interact—then their combined effect is Thus, if the generation of a n e w idea
additive and a so-called 'normal' distribu- requires the interaction of, for example,
tion of the property in the sample is four relevant thought patterns, the m a n
observed. M o s t individuals then show a whose mental characteristics only enable
near-average value for this property which, h i m to bring three such thought patterns
except for a few extreme cases, does not to bear simultaneously on the problem will
vary by a factor of m o r e than about two never produce it. O n the other hand, the
or three. T h e heights of people in a popula- m a n whose mental make-up is such that
tion is an example of a property showing he can bring, say, six such relevant thought
such a normal distribution. patterns to bear o n the problem has fifteen
Sometimes, however, the factors which times—the permutation of four from six—
affect the extent to which individuals pos- as m a n y chances of producing the required
sess a property or ability interact or mul- creative act as the m a n w h o can bring the
tiply. Then an 'abnormal' distribution m a y m i n i m u m of four relevant thought patterns
be observed in which the performance of together simultaneously. Thus, a 50 per
some individuals in the group m a y exceed cent increase in what William Shockley
that of others by ten- or a hundredfold. describes as 'brain capacity' can produce
All the indications are that the dis- as m u c h as afifteenfoldincrease in crea-
tribution of levels of mental creativity tivity. ¡3
a m o n g h u m a n beings is of this second T h e implications here are obvious.
kind, although it has to be acknowledged For some the creative act of a particular
that creativity is a difficult thing to measure. invention or discovery will never occur
Instead, means are usually devised for even when all the necessary information is
measuring several aspects of mental pro- to hand. For others it m a y take place even
ductivity which can be regarded as mani- if one or more of the separate ingredients
festations of important components in the are absent or deliberately withheld. A d d to
total creative process. this the consideration that in any large
There are various theories as to w h y population of scientists there must be a
creative ability should vary so widely small but finite number whose mental
a m o n g individuals. However, central to characteristics are such that they can bring
most of them are the following ideas: together a very large number of thought

185
Joseph A . Cade
patterns relevant to a particular creative
act, and it is not difficult to be persuaded
of the potential inevitability of multiple
discovery or rediscovery in almost any
field of science—provided, of course, a
mechanism exists for bringing the key
minds to bear on the problem of interest.
A memorable example of this type
of multiple discovery was provided in a
dramatic w a y in the 1950s at the British
Atomic Energy Research Establishment at
Harwell. O n that occasion an outstanding
Soviet nuclear physicist, I. V . Kurchatov,
a m e m b e r of a visiting Soviet delegation,
gave a lecture on Soviet work in hydrogen
fusion. His speech came as an enormous
surprise to his scientific audience, for the
results of Soviet work in this field that
Academician Kurchatov revealed, work
that was done completely independently,
might well have been based on the secret
files of the Atomic Energy Authority.
At this point the reader will probably
be convinced that the main message I a m
trying to get across is the essential futility
of attempting to keep n e w knowledge
secret. T o a certain extent this is true, and
I have tried to show what I regard as the
biological basis for the widely held con-
viction that secrecy in science cannot in
fact deny knowledge, but can only delay
the generation of that same n e w k n o w -
ledge somewhere else by withholding infor-
mation, so that those from w h o m w e
would have secrets must go through the
same creative metamorphosis to discover
them.
The management lesson here is that
to reconcile the scientist to accept secrecy,
he must be assured that those w h o d e m a n d
it are as fully aware as he is of the inevita-
bility of eventual rediscovery, that they
186
are fully realistic about what they hope to
achieve—delay, not permanent suppression
—in demanding from him the sacrifice of
not communicating his n e w discoveries,
and that science in the long term will not
necessarily be damaged by his secrecy.
C O M M U N I C A T I O N , ASSIMILATION
A N D SECRECY
The conviction that scientific knowledge
cannot be kept permanently secret has to
be moderated to some extent by another
consideration: that the availability of
information does not necessarily m e a n dis-
covery or rediscovery. T h e impediment
derives out of what is probably the most
important difficulty associated with im-
parting knowledge through the transfer of
information, namely that of assimilation.
T o appreciate the nature of the assi-
milation problem it is necessary to under-
stand the enormous difference there is
between the input requirements of the
h u m a n mind and those of, say, an elec-
tronic computer [6]. Most data and almost
all other information on which w e at pre-
sent depend for transferring knowledge
from one mind to another exist in the form
of symbols, figures and words. These are
all essentially serial forms of representation
of knowledge, that is, the information is
supplied bit by bit. Such serial inputs are
not well suited to reception by the mind,
though well suited to the computer, for the
mind has a unique and preferred capacity
for absorbing information m u c h more effi-
ciently through parallel forms of input, such
as are provided by pictures, where the
whole situation is perceived essentially
simultaneously. (For this reason, there is

some justification for regarding the inven-
tion of writing as one of the worst disasters
ever to befall mankind.)
T h e nature of the assimilation prob-
lem is best appreciated when one describes
in words—serially—the face of a person to
someone else w h o has never seen him,
with the listener then invited to pick out
that face in a crowd. This usually proves to
be an impossible task, which a photograph
•—even one taken ten or more years before
—solves in an instant because it enables all
the information about a very complex
thing to be perceived at a glance (in paral-
lel).
The difficulties of the serial presenta-
tion of information are highly relevant to
secrecy because they call into question
some of the premises on which the need for
secrecy is claimed. For research results are
communicated in serial form, in writing in
scientific journals or orally in direct con-
tact between scientists. But because of the
assimilation problems, the imparting of
information in this form is not the same as
imparting knowledge on the subject.
The difficulties of communication, as
distinct from assimilation, put another
barrier in the w a y of acquisition of k n o w -
ledge and provide a further argument
against the need for secrecy. Only part of
the existing knowledge on a problem or
subject which is stored somewhere—in the
literature, in c o m p a n y records, in comput-
ers, or in h u m a n minds—ever reaches those
w h o could m a k e use of it, owing to imper-
fections in the available methods of infor-
mation retrieval and transfer.
Hence, a consideration of the c o m -
bined problems of assimilation and c o m -
munication can lead to the counter-convic-
tion that knowledge transfer is a difficult
Aspects of secrecy in science
process and goes far beyond the mere
release of information. T h e apparent need
to transfer personnel in order to realize
effective technology transfer between c o m -
panies, or to interchange scientists and
engineers between industrially developed
countries and relatively underdeveloped
ones, seems to provide some evidence to
support this belief.
T h e foregoing considerations—the
nature of discovery as a random biological
process and the difficulties of communica-
tion and assimilation—can tend to induce
an attitude of cynicism in scientists towards
the whole idea that secrecy in science is
either feasible or necessary.
O n the other hand, these considera-
tions can also be used to m a k e a case for
the practicability of such secrecy. For it can
be argued on these very grounds that with-
holding the results of the creative output of
an individual or nation will not in the long
run affect general intellectual progress.
This then only leaves the lowest forms of
motivation, such as the prestige associated
with priority or personal economic gain,
for insisting that information about all
n e w knowledge be instantly disseminated.
So herein lies the basis of a rationale for
accepting a measure of restraint about
imparting new knowledge.
THE ABUSES OF SECRECY
H o w e v e r , such a rational basis for keeping
s o m e n e w knowledge secret in cases of
alleged extreme necessity can be c o m -
pletely undermined by some of the m a n y
current abuses of secrecy that are perpe-
trated in science, in politics and in c o m -
merce. Thus, the use of secrecy as a mere
187
Joseph A . Cade
operational expedient can place loyalty to
a company or government organization at
a severe disadvantage by comparison with
loyalty to intellectual integrity, especially
when there is an apparent contradiction
between principles and practice.
For instance, both national and inter-
national organizations concerned with
military security subscribe in principle to
the 'need to k n o w ' philosophy as regards
w h o should receive what classified mat-
erial. However, h u m a n and political pres-
sures often reduce this ideal to a 'wish to
k n o w ' situation in practice. A s an example,
m a n y of those whose military or political
rank entitles them to see documents graded
above a certain level of classification are
offended if they are not included on stan-
dard distribution lists. S o , to avoid giving
offence, hundreds of copies of the 'secret'
document are produced and distributed
even to those to w h o m it is of n o concern.
But to receive, say, copy 395 of a
secret document which he knows he has no
real need to see completely undermines
credibility in the security system for the
really creative independent thinker w h o is
probably already the worst security risk for
the m u c h more profound reasons discussed
above. This does not m e a n to imply that
he will then become actively disloyal. But
it significantly reduces the chances of his
taking the whole thing seriously.
It is also likely to lead to basic ques-
tions about the justification or judgement
of 'the Establishment' in deciding upon a
course of secrecy in particular circum-
stances, not only as regards keeping n e w
scientific knowledge secret, but also with
respect to social, political and economic
intentions. For example, the notion that
'secrecy in science m a y be necessary to
188
protect the h u m a n race from d a m a g e or
extinction' seems entrenched in political
thinking to the point of being sacrosanct
[7]. The basis of this argument seems to be
that if certain secrets enable 'us' to produce
highly destructive weapons, w e can be
relied o n to handle these weapons in
decent fashion, whereas 'they' w h o might
also produce the same weapons cannot.
But where is there a single example of
secrecy having protected the h u m a n race
from damage resulting from the abuse of
science? Lack of knowledge about scientific
work in G e r m a n y during the Second World
W a r accelerated the development of the
atomic b o m b : the Americans undertook
the project and pressed on with it for fear
that the Germans would develop the
weaponfirst,w h e n in fact G e r m a n devel-
opments were far behind.
Similarly, secrecy about the research
activities going o n at government laborato-
ries at Portón D o w n and Nancekuke almost
compromised the security of the British
nation recently. These establishments were
concerned with defence measures against
chemical and biological weapons, whereas
the secrecy that surrounded them led m a n y
young activists to believe that new offensive
weapons were being developed there, and
there were demonstrations against the two
establishments. T h e situation was finally
resolved simply by opening them u p for a
visit by the public. Meanwhile, through
misguided zeal—misguided because of
secrecy—the country came close to being
deprived of protection against the threat
of chemical or biological weapons.
It is clear that a good case can be
m a d e for the opposite hypothesis—that
secrecy, in fact, endangers the race.
O n the other hand, it is also difficult

to concur with the postulate that 'secrecy
in science in order to increase private profit
is morally indefensible' and is an abuse [7].
T h e generation of n e w scientific knowledge
costs a great deal of m o n e y and part of the
loyalty of an industrial scientist to the orga-
nization which provides both his livelihood
and the means of sublimating his creative
talents should surely consist in ensuring
that his patrons are rewarded with the first
fruits of their enterprise. W h y should
secrecy in science o n behalf of a political
system or society to which the discoverer
belongs through an accident of birth—and
m a y despise because of its political, moral,
ethical and social short-comings—be con-
sidered m o r e morally defensible than that
on behalf of a smaller h u m a n association
which is contributing to the material
wealth of the society to which it belongs?
N o , the basic abuse of secrecy in
commerce occurs w h e n companies conceal
or otherwise restrict n e w discoveries which
they d o not propose to develop themselves
in order to prevent their development by
competitors and in this w a y deny their
advantages to society as a whole.
However, the kinds of abuse that cause
the greatest tensions for the scientist—
especially those w h o work in the public
service—are those which involve security
as a cover for ineptitude, corruption and
inefficiency. These abuses can take m a n y
different forms, and one of the most subtle
turns o n the subjective interpretation of
classification criteria.
O n e can often accept in principle the
reasoning that lies behind the systems of
markings and gradings adopted by govern-
ments or international organizations to
protect information, even though these
systems are often designed to conceal eco-
Aspects of secrecy in science
nomic or political intentions which m a y
have nothing to d o with scientific matters.
But n o m a n of integrity can endure for
long the lack of distinction between 'caus-
ing grave h a r m to the nation' and causing
great harm to an individual—which m a y ,
indeed, be advantageous to the nation. Yet
it is a regrettable fact that m a n y govern-
ments and political systems only survive in
the world today b y perpetuating and
exploiting this lack of distinction.
This matter becomes of particular
concern w h e n w e realize the extent to
which certain features of science—its
rigour and its methodology—are being
introduced into m a n y other domains of
h u m a n activity, such as information, oper-
ations, planning, management and policy,
especially in the public sector. These fields
deal directly with the control and manage-
ment of h u m a n activities, which have not
been the specific concerns of traditional
fields of science and technology. Therefore,
the abuse of secrecy in thesefieldsm a y
have even more severe consequences for
society than such abuse in the traditional
areas of science.
Already there is considerable public
uneasiness about the existence of comput-
erized data banks containing the personal
dossiers of large numbers of citizens, to
which business and political agencies seem
to have indiscriminate access. Such data
banks are increasingly being established by
credit agencies, debt collectors and govern-
ment agencies, both o n local and national
levels. For both scientists and non-scien-
tists working in thisfieldthe question of
secrecy is a particularly difficult one, for
they are effectively developing a technology
of secrecy and face the very difficult prob-
lem of devising criteria to establish w h o
189
Joseph A . Cade

shall have the right of access to such c o m - rewards by teaching us not only m u c h of
puterized information. life but also a special kind of humility. Our
imaginations always fall far short of what
For every reason, then, the key to the is eventually revealed by objective study
successful management of secrecy in and research.
science lies in ruthlessly eliminating its This sense of humility can be of con-
abuses and in applying it rationally, thus siderable help in resolving the strain of
increasing belief in the need for it in the living with secrecy. Even the most brilliant
rare instances where a case can be m a d e and independent thinkers m a y be led to
for greater loyalty to an organization or question their right to be thefinalarbiters
society than to general intellectual prog- in a complex h u m a n socio-political situa-
ress. So m u c h for management. tion of which the scientific considerations
And now a thought for scientists. The form only a part. They may then refrain
greatest scientific achievements have occur- from broadcasting unreservedly the fruits
red only when the study of natural phe- of their intellect out of respect for the
n o m e n a has been approached with a c o m - expressed or implied intentions of the
pletely open mind. Such an attitude to life society to which they belong, despite the
and the physical world provides its o w n intellectual compulsion to do so.

SELECTED REFERENCES

1. B E E R , S. Decision and control, p. 17. London, Wiley, 1966.

2. P O L A N Y I , M . Minerva, vol. 1, no. 54, 1962.
3. B A R R O N , F. The disposition toward originality. In: C. W . Taylor and F . Barron (eds.),
Scientific creativity. New York, Wiley, 1963.
4. R A S H E V S K Y , N . Mathematical biophysics. Chicago, 111., University of Chicago Press, 1938.
5. S H O C K L E Y , W . O n the statistics of individual variations of productivity in research labora-
tories. Proc. Inst. Radio Engrs, vol. 45, no. 284, 1957.
6. W O L F F , H . Biomedical engineering. London, Weidenfeld & Nicholson, 1970.
7. C R O W T H E R , J. G . Fifty years with science. London, Barrie & Jenkins, 1970.

190
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Greece Librairie H . KaurTmann, 28, rue du Stade, A T H E N AI.
Librairie Eleftheroudakis, Nikkis 4, A T H E N A I .
Guatemala Comisión Nacional de la Unesco, 6.a calle 9.27, zona 1, G U A T E M A L A .
Haiti Librairie ' A la Caravelle', 36, rue Roux, B.P. 111, P O R T - A U - P R I N C E .
Hong Kong Swindon Book Co., 13-15 Lock Road, K O W L O O N .
Hungary Akadémiai Könyvesbolt, Váci u. 22, B U D A P E S T V . A . K . V . Konyvtárosok Boltja,
Népkoztársaság utja 16, B U D A P E S T VI.
Iceland Snaebjörn Jonsson & Co., H . F . , Hafnarstraeti 9, R E Y K J A V I K .
India Orient Longman Ltd.: Nicol Road, Ballard Estate, B O M B A Y 1; 17 Chittaranjan
Ave., C A L C U T T A 13; 36A M o u n t Road, M A D R A S 2; 3/5 Asaf A H Road, N E W
D E L H I 1.
Sub-depots: Oxford Book and Stationery Co., 17 Park Street, C A L C U T T A 16, and
Scindia House, N E W D E L H I ; Publications Section, Ministry of Education and Youth
Services, 72 Theatre Communication Building, Connaught Place, N E W D E L H I 1.
Indonesia Indira P.T., Djl. Dr. Sam Ratulangie 31, D J A K A R T A .
Iran Commission nationale iranienne pour l'Unesco, 1/154 avenue Roosevelt, B.P. 1533,
TÉHÉRAN.
Iraq McKenzie's Bookshop, al-Rashid Street, B A G H D A D . University Bookstore, Univer-
sity of Baghdad. P . O . Box 75, B A O H D A D .
Ireland The National Press, 2 Wellington Road, Ballsbridge. D U B L I N 4.
 Israel Emmanuel Brown, Formerly Blumstein's Bookstores, 35 Allenby R o a d and 48
Nahlat Benjamin Street, T E L Avrv.
Italy Librería Commissionaria Sansoni S.p.A., via Lamarmora 45, casella postale 552,
50121 F R E N Z E ; Librería Internazionale Rizzoli, Galería Colonna, Largo Cbigi,
R O M A ; Librería Zanicbelli, Piazza Galvani 1/h, B O L O G N A ; Hoepli, via Ulrico
Hoepli 5, M I L A N O ; Diffusione Edizioni Anglo-Americane, via Lima 28,00198 R O M A .
Ivory Coast Centre d'édition et de diffusion africaines, boîte postale 4541, A B I D J A N P L A T E A U .
Jamaica Sangster's Book Stores Ltd., P . O . Box 366, 101 Water Lane, K I N G S T O N .
Japan Maruzen C o . Ltd., P . O . Box 5050, Tokyo International, T O K Y O .
Kenya The E S A Ltd., P . O . Box 30167, N A I R O B I .
K h m e r Republic Librairie Albert Portail, 14, avenue BouIIoche, P H N O M P E N H .
Korea Korean National Commission for Unesco, P . O . Box Central 64, S E O U L .
Kuwait The Kuwait Bookshop C o . Ltd., P . O . Box 2942, K U W A I T
Lebanon Librairies Antoine, A . Naufal et Frères, B . P . 656, B E Y R O U T H .
Liberia Cole & Yancy Bookshops Ltd., P . O . Box 286, M O N R O V I A .
Libya Agency for Development of Publication and Distribution, P . O . Box 34-35, TRIPOLI.
Liechtenstein Eurocan Trust Reg., P . O . B . 125, S C H A A N .
Luxembourg Librairie Paul Brück, 22 Grand-Rue, L U X E M B O U R G .
Madagascar Commission nationale de la République malgache, Ministère de l'éducation
nationale, T A N A N A R I V E .
For 'The Courier': Service des œuvres post- et périscolaires, Ministère de l'éducation
nationale, T A N A N A R I V E .
Malaysia Federal Publications Sdn Bhd., Balai Berita, 31 Jalan Riong, K U A L A L U M P U R .
Mali Librairie populaire du Mali B . P . 28, B A M A K O .
Malta Sapienza's Library, 26 Kingsway, V A L L E T T A .
Mauritius Nalanda C o . Ltd., 30 Bourbon Street, P O R T - L O U I S .
Mexico Editorial Hermes, Ignacio Marisca 41, M É X I C O D . F .
Monaco British Library, 30, boulevard des Moulins, M O N T E - C A R L O .
Morocco Librairie ' A u x belles images', 281, avenue M o h a m m e d - V , R A B A T ( C C P 68.74).
For 'The Courier'(for teachers): Commission nationale marocaine pour l'Unesco,
20, Zenkat Mourabitine, R A B A T ( C C P 324-45).
Mozambique Salema and Carvalho Ltda., caixa postal 192, B E I R A .
Netherlands N . V . Martinus Nijhoff, Lange Voorhout 9, 's G R A V E N H A G E .
Netherlands Antilles G . C . T . V a n Dorp and C o . (Ned. Ant.) N . V . , W I L L E M S T A D (Curaçao, N . A . ) .
N e w Caledonia Reprex, avenue de la Victoire, Immeuble Painbouc, N O U M É A .
N e w Zealand Government Printing Office, Government Bookshops: Rutland Street, P . O . Box
5344, A U C K L A N D ; 130 Oxford Terrace, P . O . Box 1721, C H R I S T C H U R C H ; A l m a Street,
P . O . Box 857, H A M I L T O N ; Princess Street, P . O . Box 1104, D U N E D I N ; Mulgrave
Street, Private Bag, W E L L I N G T O N .
Nicaragua Librería Cultural Nicaragüense, calle 15 de Septiembre y avenida Bolivar, apartado
n.° 807, M A N A G U A .
Norway All publications: Johan Grundt Tanum (Booksellers), Karl Johansgate 43, O S L O 1.
For 'The Courier' only: A / S Narvesens Litteraturjeneste, Box 6125, O S L O 6.
Pakistan The West-Pak Publishing C o . Ltd., Unesco Publications House, P . O . Box 374,
G . P . O . L A H O R E . Showrooms: Urdu Bazaar, L A H O R E & 57-58 Murree Highway,
G / 6 - 1 , Islamabad; Pakistan Publications Bookshop: Sarwar Road, R A W A L P I N D I ;
Paribagh, D A C C A .
Paraguay Melchor García, Eligió Ayala 1650, A S U N C I Ó N .
Peru For 'The Courier* only: Editorial Losada Peruana, apartado 472, L I M A . Other
publications: Distribuidora Inca, S.A., Emilio Althaus 470, Lince, casilla 3115, L I M A .
Philippines The M o d e m Book C o . , 928 Rizal Avenue, M A N I L A .
Poland Osrodek, Rozpowszecbiania Wydawnictw Naukowych P A N , Palac Kultury i
Nauki, W A R S Z A W A .
Portugal Dias & Audra de Ltda. Livraria Portugal, rue do Carmo 70, LISBOA.
Romania Cartimex, P . O . Box 134-135, 126 calea Victorici, B U C U R E S T I . Telex: 226.
Senegal La Maison du livre, 13 avenue R o u m e , D A K A R .
Singapore Federal Publications Sdn Bhd., Times House, River Valley Road, S I N G A P O R E 9.
South Africa Van Schaik's Bookstore (Pty) Ltd., Libri Building, Church Street, P . O . Box 724,
PRETORIA.
Southern Rhodesia Textbook Sales (PVT) Ltd., 67 Union Avenue, S A L I S B U R Y .
Spain All publications: Ediciones Iberoamericanas, S.A., calle de Oñate 15, M A D R I D 2 0 ;
Distribución de Publicaciones del Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas,
Vitrubio 16, M A D R I D 6; Librería del Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cien-
tíficas, Egipcíacas 15, B A R C E L O N A .
*The Courier' only: Ediciones Liber, apartado 17, O N D Á R R O A (Viscaya).
Sudan Al Bashir Bookshop, P . O . Box 1118, K H A R T O U M .
Sweden A II publications: A / B C . E . Fritzes Kungl. Hovbokhandel, Fredsgatan 2, Box 16356.
103 27 STOCKHOLM 16.
4
The Courier ' only : Svenska F N - Förbundet, Vasagatan 15, IV, 101 23, S T O C K H O L M 1.
Postgiro 18 46 92.
Switzerland Europa Verlag, Ramistrasse 5, Z U R I C H ; Librairie Payot, 6, r. Grenus, 1211G E N È V E 11.
Syria Librairie Sayegh, Immeuble Diab, rue d u Parlement, B . P . 704, D A M A S .
Tanzania D a r es Salaam Bookshop, P . O . B o x 9030, D A R E S S A L A A M .
Thailand Suksapan Panit, Mansion 9, Rajdamnern Avenue, B A N G K O K .
Tunis Société tunisienne de diffusion, 5 avenue de Carthage T U N I S .
Turkey Librairie Hachette, 469 Istiklal Caddesi, Beyoglu, I S T A N B U L .
 Uganda Uganda Bookshop, P . O . B o x 145, K A M P A L A .
U.S.S.R. Mezhdunarodnaja Kniga, M O S K V A G-200.
United Arab Republic Librairie Kasr El Nil, 38, rue Kasr El Nil, C A I R O .
Sub-dépót: L a Renaissance d'Egypte. 9 Sh. Adly Pasha, C A I R O (Egypt).
United Kingdom H . M . Stationery Office, P . O . Box 569, London, S.E.I. Government bookshops:
London, Belfast, Birmingham, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Manchester.
United States of America Unesco Publications Center, P . O . Box 433, N E W Y O R K , N . Y . 10016.
Uruguay Editorial Losada Uruguaya, S.A./Librería Losada, Maldonado 1092/ Colonia 1340,
MONTEVIDEO.
Venezuela Librería Historia, Monjas a Padre Sierra, Edificio Oeste 2, n.° 6 (frente ai Capitolio),
apartado de correos 7320, C A R A C A S .
Republic of Viet-Nam Librairie-papeterie Xuân-Thu, 185-193 rue T u - D o , B . P . 283, S A I G O N .
Yugoslavia Jugoslovenska Knjiga, Terazije 27, B E O G R A D ; Drzavna Zaluzba Slovenije, Mestni
Trg. 26, L J U B L J A N A .

UNESCO BOOK COUPONS

Unesco Book Coupons can be used to purchase all books and periodicals of an
educational, scientific or cultural character. For full information please write to:
Unesco Coupon Office, Place de Fontenoy, 75 Paris-7e (France). [331