PRACTICAL VALUE OF RESEARCHES ON THE CONSTITUTION OF MATTER
The layman has no difficulty in recognizing the practical value of researches directed toward the improvement of the incandescent lamp or the increased efficiency of the telephone. He can see the results in the greatly decreased cost of electric illumination and the rapid extension of the range of the human voice. But the very men who have made these advances, those who have succeeded beyond all expectation in accomplishing the economic purposes in view, are most emphatic in their insistence upon the importance of research of a more fundamental character. Thus Vice-President J. J. Carty, of the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, who directs its great Department of Development and Research, and Doctor W. J. Whitney, Director of the Research Laboratory of the General Electric Company, have repeatedly expressed their indebtedness to the investigations of the physicist, made with no thought of immediate practical return. Faraday, studying the laws of electricity, discovered the principle which rendered the dynamo possible. Maxwell, Henry, and Hertz, equally unconcerned with material advantage, made wireless telegraphy practicable. In fact, all truly great advances are thus derived from fundamental science, and the future progress of the world will be largely dependent upon the provision made for scientific research, especially in the fields of physics and chemistry, which underlie all branches of engineering.
The constitution of matter, therefore, instead of appealing as a subject to research only to the natural philosopher or to the general student of science, is a question of the greatest practical concern. Already the by-products of investigations directed toward its elucidation have been numerous and useful in the highest degree. Helium has been already cited; X-rays hardly require mention; radium, which has so materially aided sufferers from cancer, is still better known. Wireless telephony and transcontinental telephony with wires were both rendered possible by studies of the nature of the electric discharge in vacuum tubes. Thus the "practical man," with his distrust of "pure" science, need not resent investments made for the purpose of advancing our knowledge of such fundamental subjects as physics and chemistry. On the contrary, if true to his name, he should help to multiply them many fold in the interest of economic and commercial development.