[00:03.79]1999 Passage5

[00:07.41]Science, in practice, depends far less

[00:10.29]on the experiments it prepares

[00:12.59]than on the preparedness of the minds of the men

[00:15.71]who watch the experiments.

[00:18.55]Sir Isaac Newton supposedly discovered gravity

[00:21.69]through the fall of an apple.

[00:23.81]Apples had been falling in many places for centuries

[00:26.93]and thousands of people had seen them fall.

[00:30.62]But Newton for years had been curious

[00:33.04]about the cause of the orbital motion

[00:35.36]of the moon and planets.

[00:37.88]What kept them in place?

[00:39.80]Why didn't they fall out of the sky?

[00:42.82]The fact that the apple fell down toward the earth

[00:46.35]and not up into the tree answered the question

[00:49.68]he had been asking himself

[00:51.56]about those larger fruits of the heavens,

[00:54.49]the moon and the planets.

[00:57.39]How many men would have considered the possibility

[01:00.16]of an apple falling up into the tree?

[01:03.79]Newton did because he was not trying

[01:06.21]to predict anything.

[01:08.02]He was just wondering.

[01:10.54]His mind was ready for the unpredictable.

[01:13.88]Unpredictability is part of the essential nature of research.

[01:19.24]If you don't have unpredictable things,

[01:21.45]you don't have research.

[01:23.37]Scientists tend to forget this when writing their

[01:26.25]cut and dried reports for the technical journals,

[01:29.67]but history is filled with examples of it.

[01:32.99]In talking to some scientists,

[01:35.06]particularly younger ones,

[01:37.18]you might gather the impression that they find

[01:39.70]the "scientific method" a substitute for imaginative thought.

[01:45.25]I've attended research conferences

[01:47.48]where a scientist has been asked

[01:49.23]what he thinks about the advisability

[01:51.82]of continuing a certain experiment.

[01:54.85]The scientist has frowned,

[01:56.87]looked at the graphs,

[01:58.38]and said "the data are still inconclusive."

[02:02.31]"We know that," the men from the budget office have said.

[02:06.25]"But what do you think? Is it worthwhile going on?

[02:10.77]What do you think we might expect?"

[02:14.00]The scientist has been shocked

[02:15.87]at having even been asked to speculate.

[02:20.12]What this amounts to, of course,

[02:21.93]is that the scientist has become

[02:23.65]the victim of his own writings.

[02:26.36]He has put forward unquestioned claims so consistently

[02:30.47]that he not only believes them himself,

[02:33.59]but has convinced industrial

[02:35.41]and business management that they are true.

[02:38.93]If experiments are planned and carried out

[02:41.86]according to plan as faithfully as the reports

[02:45.19]in the science journals indicate,

[02:47.50]then it is perfectly logical for management

[02:50.28]to expect research to produce results

[02:53.29]measurable in dollars and cents.

[02:56.71]It is entirely reasonable for auditors to believe

[02:59.75]that scientists who know exactly

[03:02.06]where they are going and how they will get there

[03:04.87]should not be distracted by the necessity

[03:07.94]of keeping one eye on the cash register

[03:10.84]while the other eye is on the microscope.

[03:14.46]Nor, if regularity and conformity to a standard pattern

[03:18.90]are as desirable to the scientist

[03:21.41]as the writing of his papers

[03:23.03]would appear to reflect,

[03:24.91]is management to be blamed

[03:26.79]for discriminating against the "odd balls" among researchers

[03:31.03]in favor of more conventional thinkers

[03:33.75]who "work well with the team."