EDITORIAL
I f I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants. NEWTON YOU MAY HAVE NOTICED: T h a t this journal is striving to change-seeking self-engendered youthful purpose and direction. The logo in 1969 was an incidental recognitional sign, relatively insignificant to the present more substantive mission. This is: to offer a broad-spectrum coverage topical to scientists and technologists associated with R&D in chemical products and to be both archival and newsworthy with respect to specific products and technology. Newsworthy, but not a purveyor of current events. Here we may share our self-confessed culpabilitiesthat obsolescence begins the day after graduation; that our own corporate employers expect us all to “come up with something” NEW and NOW; that the principles of creativity are neither cognitive, taught, nor natural gifts; that many of us drift into satisfaction with a mastery of the craft of our objectives; and that younger scientists readily and shamefully supplant us because they are better informed.
SIGNALS us. ANSWERS In an opinion-sampling of industrial chemists we asked, “What is the value of PRODUCT R&D to you?” The typical answer: “The papers are good, but I rarely find solutions to my problems.” Very discouraging! To this point I have a sermonettein-rebuttal. The wrong thinking of many R&D people is the belief that there exists a publication which promises solutions by recording specifically applicable answers. If your problem has been solved, and like a pharmacist, you seek merely to reproduce the result prescribed by others, you have accomplished half the job-poorly. Imitation obviously sacrifices originality. Corporate objectives are defined in terms of domination over all competition. To dominate is to do it better. “It matters not if you win but how well
you played” is reasonable poetry but such rationalization is destructive in our profession. One of our saints (T. A. Edison) in an early news conference had the brash courage to announce that his staff would make a minor invention every week and a major one every month. Expand the time schedule and this boast meets today’s expectations. The custodianship of professional responsibility demands that an individual find new answers to his problems. The best a journal can do is to supply the signals. In minds properly conditioned, signals become raw materials to be translated and scaledup into answers. I would fault the person who reads technical accounts primarily to find quick answers if in so doing he fails to read also for new inferences. Study the history of good inventions. Each culde-sac yielded to a new idea. One source of relief is signals, and these appear in unexpected places. People have the compulsion to create yet few are satisfied with the results. An editor cannot relieve this condition materially, but an ACS journal can offer a variety of reports on current research from which each scientist can derive his private arsenal of signals that are the primary input for future creative results. We have tried in two years to develop a journal with appropriate content and spirit to persuade the industrial chemist/engineer to select PRODUCT R&D as required reading. The organization in terms of Plenary Accounts, Product Reviews, Technical Reviews, Special Sections, and General Articles has evolved as the format for the future. The previous issue cited an invention which has yielded the prestigious sum of $90 million in royalty payment to date on a licensed invention. The raw materials were commonplace-propylene, ammonia, and oxygen. The innovation derived from detailed examination of appropriate conditions and finding a specific catalyst. New signals were necessaryninety million dollars worth.
“In such fashion a few confer upon themselves the letters-patent of nobility. ”
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Ind. Eng. Chem. Prod. Res. Develop., Vol. 9,No. 4,1970
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