Vol. 19, No. 12
Cash Register Research N EDITORIAL in a recent issue of the Evening BulleA tin of Philadelphia on “Industrial Research in $merica” reflects the justifiable pride which we all share in the support of industrial research. The Yational Industrial Conference Board has computed that the annual expenditures for industrial research in the laboratories of the United States aggregate $200,000,000. More than a thousand of these research laboratories are in the various units of industry and to their expenditures are added the appropriations for various federal bureaus. Within seven years the number of firms having special research departments is said to have virtually doubled, and the point is properly made that in these laboratories is to be found one of the reason9 for the industrial supremacy of the United States. American manufacturers have always been ready to replace old machinery with more efficient types, no matter how short the service of the discarded equipment, and now they are equally willing t o adopt new processes, most of which are evolved by the industries, instead of waiting for discoveries to come from the laboratories in the institutions of higher learning. INDUSTRIAL AND ENGINEERING CHEMISTRY has always occupied a place in the front ranks of those who have urged research in applied science, and has recorded with pleasure and pride the results of such investigations. I n emphasizing applied science, the necessity of furthering fundamental research has never been overlooked. We have merely recognized that the majority of people are interested first in the results expressed in tangible things which they can use, see, and enjoy in a variety of ways. It is only when an obstacle is met which cannot be overcome until the sum of our knowledge is increased through the establishment of new truth that the necessity of accumulating knowledge for its own sake is borne in upon the majority of those who must pay the research bills. There are fortunately a considerable number of notable exceptions, but we realize that for far too many research to be attractive must be of the cash register variety. Every time a dollar is rung up for the support of research, they want the bell to summon some one with a basket to catch the returning dollars. We believe that a carel’ulstudy of the reasons whyannouncements of important advances in the chemical and other industries emanate more often from countries other than our own will disclose that our appreciation of the part fundamental science plays in industry is further from being adequately developed. Industrial research, which has demonstrated that it is a profitable investment, receives support in increasing measure, notwithstanding the occasional setback a t the hands of an isolated industry, or in one or two extreme cases from a trade association, because those who have come into temporary power believe only in cash register research. This support shows clearly that, industrially speaking, we have made gratifying progress in the first stage of our scientific development. We have still before u s the very considerable undertaking
DECEMBER 1, 1927 of bringing our industrial leaders and our financial giants to underptand that underlying all the benefits of applied science there is A foundation laid through research in fundamentals, all of which involves patience in the extreme, financial support in abundance, and the recruiting and training of our best brains. The outlook is by no means discouraging. You can name a dozen industries, more foresighted than :he others, which have long supported fundamental work in their own laboratories as well as in our universities. It is only when support is sought for basic research and particularly for the tools of research, both fundamental and spplied, that this necessity of beginning a t once the education of those who profit first and most directly from the rePults is impressed upon us. We must continue our work of bringing the public to sympathetic appreciation of the relationships between science and our present level of civilization. There are still thousands of industrialists and financiers who do not understand the necessity of forming an alliance with applied science if they are to meet the demand for ever better materials of commerce. The exceptions, among even our leaders who recognize how vital is research in fundamentals and a supply of adequate tools for its furtherance, are so few as to lay a monumental task before us. This education, which must be carried forward primarily by scientific men themselves, will be slow of growth and a t times discouraging in its returns, but we believe it is one of the most important activities in which we can a t present engage.
,The Farmer’s Dollar which has been centered around the farmer’s IintoNTEREST problem has led to a number of impartial investigations his economic status, and one such inquiry under the auspices of the National Industrial Conference Board provides the best analysis of the expenditure of the total cash income of the average farmer that has so far been provided. Food accounts for 16.4 per cent, clothing 14.3, farm equipment 15.4, hired labor 12.3, rent 10.7, fuel and light 1.0, interest 7.7, taxes 6.3, fertilizer 3.1, and unclassified, made up of a number of miscellaneous items including whatever profit and saving he may be able to make, 12.8. From this unclassified item he must educate his children, make his contribution to religious activities, provide such culture as his home enjoys, and so on throughout the list not specifically indicated by the other items. At the moment we are most impressed by the relation between hi5 tax bill, his fertilizer bill, and the activities of his political friends who would save him from economic disaster. Taxes require 6.3 and fertilizer 3.1 per cent of his total cash income. It will be noted that the taxes, largely imposed by politicians, are twice the sum that the farmer pays for fertilizer. A group composed of certain representatives in Congress and gentlemen who pose as the farmers’ duly appointed representatives but who, we believe, continually misrepre-
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sent their actual interests, would have the country go into business and at least subsidize fertilizer manufacture and distribution for the purpose of somewhat lowering this 3.1 per cent item. How much it could be reduced depends upon the imagination of the spokesman of the moment, and figures as high as 43 per cent have been mentioned in political addresses. I n discussing the economics of the fertilizer problem, most of these orators are quite beyond their natural field of knowledge or activity. Why not have the politicians devote attention to taxes, a professional question with them, where something might be done to affect more directly the economic status of the farmer? The fertilizer question is safer in the hands of experienced industry, governed by supply and demand and benefited by constantly advancing science.
A Unique Foundation HE Ohio Chamber of Commerce a t Columbus has created the Fuel-Power-Transportation Educational Foundation for the purpose of acquainting the public, through the schools and other agencies, with the fundamentals of the problems of fuel, power, and transportation. The Foundation undertakes to secure impartial facts on various phases of the topics named and to distribute these nationwide where they can be studied and evaluated and conclusions drawn by the individual. So far a Primer on Economics and a Study of St. Lawrence Waterway Project have appeared. At an early date a monograph on Fundamentals of Transportation Problem may be expected. Early in December there will be available for distribution a sixteen-page treatise on the Fundamentals of the Fertilizer Problem, in which a connection will be shown between our fuel, power, and fertilizer problems, besides setting forth in concise form important data applicable to the Muscle Shoals controversy. The booklet will contain no argument but will present facts as the investigator for the Foundation has uncovered them, and there is reason to expect that the information will be presented attractively to the student, the teacher, and the general public. The work so far conducted by this unique Foundation has been warmly commended by educators and public men throughout the country, and a demand for the printed studies has clearly emphasized the need for the type of work which has been inaugurated by the Ohio Chamber of Commerce.
Government Purchases NTIL recently a duly signed government requisition has been acceptable as equivalent to cash in the bank, but the Comptroller-General of the United States has lately refused to pay bills for reprints, even though they were ordered on the proper government requisition. I n the ComptrollerGeneral’s letter on the subject it is stated, among other things, that “this office may settle claims only in accordance with law, and that all persons having transactions with government agents are chargeable with knowledge of their limited authority.” While the ruling will force the SOCIETYto take a stand which may make it inconvenient for government bureaus to purchase reprints, this is a small matter compared with the general effect upon business of such a rulixig. Apparently, any firm accepting an order on a government requisition must hereafter establish all the legal aspects and the attitude which the Comptroller-General may assume toward the transaction before it is safe in delivering the goods ordered. We still have difficulty in understanding why a duly signed and issued government requisition should be open to suspicion.
VOl. 19, No. 12
International Congresses A M O N G the many things of value lost through the World War was that informal yet efficient organization known as the International Congress of Applied Chemistry, which was responsible for holding once in three years a scientific conclave, truly international in its attendance, work, and publications. Four languages were official-French, Italian, German, and English. Representatives on an equal footing came from everywhere and were welcome. Latest accounts of scientiiic progress furnished the keynote. How well we remember the last of these international congresses in 1912! There was the gathering in Washington in Continental Hall where the leader of each national delegation spoke following the playing of his national anthem by the Marine Band. There was a notable afternoon with the President of the United States, the reception, the halfday of sight-seeing, and then the special trains to New York where the work of the Congress was conducted. Columbia University and the College of the City of New York fairly swarmed with hundreds of chemists. The meetings, held on the sectional plan according to subject, were open to all and a t stated times the Congress gathered to hear the principal addresses delivered by repredentatives of the leading foreign countries. Here we heard the glowing account of the development of the arc process in Norway by Eyde himself. Bernthsen demonstrated that nitrogen and hydrogen could be compelled to combine to form ammonia. Perkin discoursed on synthetic rubber, and the address of Ciarnician on photochemistry remains a classic. No one who saw the multitude of products of industrial chemistry which Duisberg brought from Germany will ever forget that occasion in the great hall a t City College. Of course there were banquets, sight-seeing, garden parties, and receptions, but they were incidental. The Congress did real work, as the twenty-nine volumes now on our shelves amply testify. The International Congress was able to function without a continuous organization and without a paid secretariat and headquarters subject to national iduences. The Congress decided where its next meeting would be held, selected the man to be responsible at that place, and left it to him to form his own organization, work out the details, and proceed. The war spoiled the congress planned for 1915, which was to have been in Russia under the chairmanship of Doctor Walden, the eminent scientist who is the visiting lecturer a t Cornel1 this semester. It is history that the war gave rise to scientific organizations in several countries, and it is but natural that these should have been the ones to form a new international organization. With the effect of the war still upon them, conditions were a t first imposed which prevented the adherence of the former enemy countries to the new union, but fortunately those difficulties have been remedied and any country, the science of which can be represented through a central national body, is welcome. At first the principal business of the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, which is sponsored by the International Research Council, was the creation of good will and better understandings and beginning anew the promotion of scientific work on a true international basis. Although some committees for scientific work have been formed, it is patent that the Union has added little, if anything, to the sum total of scientific knowledge and has devoted itself more to questions of policy and diplomacy through social activities. This has been going on for eight years, but for the last year or two the active members of
