Article To Question 3
Article To Question 3
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W E can only guess what historians of the A Calendar of Disputes over Priority. We
future will say about the condition of begin by noting the great frequency with
present-day sociology. But it seems which the history of science is punctuated by
safe to anticipate one of their observations. disputes, often by sordid disputes, over pri-
When the Trevelyans of 2050 come to write ority of discovery. During the last three
that history-as they well might, for this clan centuries in which modern science developed,
of historians promises to go on forever- numerous scientists, both great and small,
they will doubtless find it strange that so have engaged in such acrimonious contro-
few sociologists (and historians) of the versy. Recall only these few: Keenly aware
twentieth century could bring themselves, in of the importance of his inventions and dis-
their work, to treat science as one of the coveries, Galileo became a seasoned cam-
great social institutions of the time. They paigner as he vigorously defended his rights
will observe that long after the sociology of to priority first, in his Defense against the
science became an identifiable field of in- Calumnies and Impostures of Baldassar
quiry,' it remained little cultivated in a Capar, where he showed how his invention
world where science loomed large enough to of the "geometric and military compass" had
present mankind with the choice of destruc- been taken frotn him, and then, in The As-
tion or survival. They may even suggest sayer, where he flayed four other would be
that somewhere in the process by which so- rivals; Father Horatio Grassi, who tried "to
cial scientists take note of the world as it is diminish whatever praise there may be in
and as it once was, a sense of values appears this [invention of the telescope for use in
to have become badly scrambled. astronomy] which belongs to me"; Christo-
This spacious area of neglect may there- pher Scheiner, who claimed to have been
fore have room for a paper which tries to first to observe the sunspots (although, un-
examine science as a social institution, not known to both Scheiner and Galileo, Johann
in the large but in terms of a few of its Fabricius had published such observations
principal components. before); an unspecified villain (probably
the Frenchman Jean Tarde) who "attempted
* Presidential address read at the annual meet-
ing of the American Sociological Society, August, to rob me of that glory which was mine, pre-
1957. tending not to have seen my writings and
1 The rudiments of a sociology of science can trying to represent themselves as the original
be found in an overview of the subject by Bernard
discoverers of these marvels"; and finally,
Barber, Science and the Social Order, Glencoe: The
Free Press, 1952; Bernard Barber, "Sociology of Simon Mayr, who "had the gall to claim that
Science: A Trend Report and Bibliography," Cur- he had observed the Medicean planets which
rent Sociology, Vol. 5, No. 2, Paris: UNESCO, 1957. revolve about Jupiter before I had [and
635
used] a sly way of attempting to establish inferred the existence and predicted the po-
his priority." 2 sition of the planet now known as Neptune,
The peerless Newton fought several bat- which was found where their independent
tles with Robert Hooke over priority in op- computations showed it would be. Medicine
tics and celestial mechanics and entered into had its share of conflicts over priority; for
a long and painful controversy with Leibniz example, Jenner believed himself first to
over the invention of the calculus. Hooke,3 demonstrate that vaccination afforded se-
who has been described as the "universal curity against smallpox, but the advocates
claimant" because "there was scarcely a dis- of Pearson and Rabaut believed otherwise.
covery in his time which he did not conceive Throughout the nineteenth century and
himself to claim," (and, it might be added, down to the present, disputes over priority
often justly so, for he was one of the most continued to be frequent and intense. Lister
inventive men in his century of genius), knew he had first introduced antisepsis, but
Hooke, in turn, contested priority not only others insisted that Lemaire had done so be-
with Newton but with Huygens over the fore. The sensitive and modest Faraday was
important invention of the spiral-spring bal- wounded by the claims of others to several of
ance for regulating watches to eliminate the his major discoveries in physics: one among
effect of gravity. these, the discovery of electromagnetic ro-
The calendar of disputes was full also in tation, was said to have been made before
the eighteenth century. Perhaps the most by Wollaston; Faraday's onetime mentor,
tedious and sectarian of these was the great Sir Humphrey Davy (who had himself been
"Water Controversy" in which that shy, rich,involved in similar disputes) actually op-
and noble genius of science, Henry Caven- posed Faraday's election to the Royal So-
dish, was pushed into a three-way tug-of-war ciety on the ground that his was not the
with Watt and Lavoisier over the question of original discovery.4 Laplace, several of the
which one had first demonstrated the com- Bernoullis, Legendre, Gauss, Cauchy were
pound nature of water and thereby removed only a few of the giants among mathemati-
it from its millennia-long position as one of cians embroiled in quarrels over priority.
the elements. Earthy battles raged also over What is true of physics, chemistry, as-
claims to the first discovery of heavenly tronomy, medicine and mathematics is true
bodies, as in the case of the most dramatic also of all the other scientific disciplines, not
astronomical discovery of the century in excluding the social and psychological sci-
which the Englishman John Couch Adams ences. As we know, sociology was officially
and the Frenchman Urban Jean LeVerrier born only after a long period of abnormally
severe labor. Nor was the postpartum any
2 Galileo, The Assayer, 1623, translated by Still-
more tranquil. It was disturbed by violent
man Drake in Discoveries and Opinions of Galileo,
controversies between the followers of St.-
New York: Doubleday, 1957, pp. 232-233, 245.
Galileo thought it crafty of Mayr to date his book Simon and Comte as they quarreled over the
as published in 1609 by using the Julian calendar delicate question of which of the two was
without indicating that, as a Protestant, he had not the father of sociology and which merely
accepted the Gregorian calendar adopted by "us
the obstetrician. And to come to the very
Catholics" which would have shifted the date of
publication to January 1610, when Galileo had recent past, Janet is but one among several
reported having made his first observations. Later to have claimed that they had the essentials
in this paper, I shall have more to say about the of psycho-analysis before Freud.
implications of attaching importance to such short To extend the list of priority fights would
intervals separating rival claims to priority.
3 For scholarly reappraisals of Hooke's role in
be industrious and, for this occasion, super-
developing the theor: of gravitation, see Louis fluous. For the moment, it is enough to note
Diehl Patterson, "Hooke's Gravitation Theory and that these controversies, far from being a
Its Influence on Newton," Isis, 40 (November, rare exception in science, have long been fre-
1949), pp. 327-341; 41 (March, 1950), pp. 32-45;
quent, harsh, and ugly. They have practi-
and E. N. da C. Andrade, "Robert Hooke," Wilkins
Lecture, Proceedings of the Royal Society, SeriescallyB, become an integral part of the social
Biological Sciences, 137 (24 July, 1950). The recent
biography by Margaret 'Espinasse is too uncritical 4 Bence Jones, The Life and Letters of Faraday,
and defensive of Hooke to be satisfactory; Robert London: Longmans, Green, 1870, Vol. I, pp. 336-
Hooke, London: Heinemann, 1956. 352.
relations between scientists. Indeed, the pat- On other occasions, self-denial has gone
tern is so common that the Germans have even further. For example, the incomparable
characteristically compounded a word for it, Euler withheld his long "sought solution to
Prioritdtsstreit. the calculus of variations, until the twenty-
On the face of it, the pattern of conflict three-year-old Lagrange, who had developed
over priority can be easily explained. It a new method needed to reach the solution,
seems to be merely a consequence of the could put it into print, " 'so as not to de-
same discoveries being made simultaneously, prive you,' Euler informed the young man,
or nearly so, a recurrent event in the history 'of any part of the glory which is your
of science which has not exactly escaped the due.' "7 Apart from these and many other
notice of sociologists, or of others, at least examples of generosity in the annals of
since the definitive work of William Ogburn science, there have doubtless been many
and Dorothy Thomas. But on second glance, more that never found their way into the
the matter does not appear quite so simple. pages of history. Nevertheless, the recurrent
The bunching of similar or identical dis- struggles for priority, with all their intensity
coveries in science is only an occasion 5 for of affect, far overshadow these cases of
disputes over priority, not their cause or noblesse oblige, and it still remains necessary
their grounds. After all, scientists also know to account for them.
that discoveries are often made independ- Alleged Sources of Conflicts over Priority.
ently. (As we shall see, they not only know One explanation of these disputes would
this but fear it, and this often activates a regard them as mere expressions of human
rush to ensure their priority.) It would there- nature. On this view, egotism is natural to
fore seem a simple matter for scientists to the species; scientists, being human, will
acknowledge that their simultaneous dis- have their due share and will sometimes
coveries were independent and that the ques- express their egotism through self-aggrandiz-
tion of priority is consequently beside the ing claims to priority. But, of course, this
point. On occasion, this is just what has interpretation does not stand up. The history
happened, as we shall see in that most mov- of social thought is strewn with the corpses
ing of all cases of noblesse oblige in the his- of those who have tried, in their theory, to
tory of science, when Darwin and Wallace make the hazardous leap from human nature
tried to outdo one another in giving credit to particular forms of social conduct, as has
to the other for what each had separately been observed from the time of Montesquieu,
worked out. Fifty years after the event, through Comte and Durkheim, to the pre-
Wallace was still insisting upon the contrast sent.8
between his own hurried work, written within A second explanation derives these con-
a week after the great idea came to him, and flicts not from the original nature shared by
Darwin's work, based on twenty years of all men, but from propensities toward ego-
collecting evidence. "I was then (as often tism found among some men. It assumes
since) the 'young man in a hurry,' " said the that, like other occupations, the occupation
reminiscing Wallace; "he, the painstaking of science attracts some ego-centered people,
and patient student seeking ever the full and assumes further that it might even
demonstration of the truth he had discovered, attract many such people, who, hungry for
rather than to achieve immediate personal fame, elect to enter a profession that prom-
fame." 6 ises enduring fame to the successful. Unlike
5And not always even the occasion. Disputes 7 E. T. Bell, Men of Mathematics, New York:
over priority have occurred when alleged or actual Simon and Schuster, 1937, pp. 155-156. And see
anticipations of an idea have been placed decades the comparable act of generosity on the part of the
or, at times, even centuries or millennia earlier, venerable Legendre toward the mathematical genius,
when they are generally described as "rediscoveries." Niels Abel, then in his twenties, ibid., p. 337.
6 This remark is taken from Wallace's commen- 8 mile Durkheim had traced this basic theme
tary at the semi-centenary of the joint discovery, in sociological theory as early as his Latin thesis of
a classic of self-abnegation that deserves to be res- 1892, which has fortunately been translated into
cued from the near-oblivion into which it has French for the benefit of some of us later sociolo-
fallen. For a transcript, see James Marchant, Al- gists. See his Montesquieu et Rousseau: Pretcurseurs
fred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, de la Sociologie, Paris: Marcel Riviere, 1953, esp.
New York: Harper, 1916, pp. 91-96. Chapter I.
the argument from nature, this one, dealing Evidently, ingrained egotism is not re-
with processes of self-selection and of social quired to engage in a fight for priority.
selection, is not defective in principle. It is A second strategic fact shows the inade-
possible that differing kinds of personalities quacy of explaining these many struggles as
tend to be recruited by various occupations owing to egotistic personalities. Very often,
and, though I happen to doubt it, it is the principals themselves, the discoverers or
possible that quarrelsome or contentious inventors, take no part in arguing their
personalities are especially apt to be attracted claims to priority (or withdraw from the
to science and recruited into it. The extent controversy as they find that it places them
to which this is so is a still unanswered in the distasteful role of insisting upon their
question, but developing inquiry into the type own merits or of deprecating the merits of
of personality characteristic of those entering their rivals). Instead, it is their friends and
the various professions may in due course followers, or other more detached scientists,
discover how far it is so.9 In any event, it who commonly see the assignment of priority
should not be difficult to find some aggressive
as a moral issue that must be fought to a
men of science. conclusion. For example, it was Wollaston's
But even should the processes of selection friends, rather than the distinguished scien-
result in the recruitment of contentious men, tist himself, who insinuated that the young
there are theoretical reasons for believing Faraday had usurped credit for the experi-
that this does not adequately account for the ments on electromagnetic rotation.'2 Simi-
great amount of contention over priority that larly, it was Priestley, De Luc and Blagden,
flares up in science. For one thing, these "all men eminent in science and of unblem-
controversies often involve men of ordinarily ished character," who embroiled the shy
modest disposition who act in seemingly self- Cavendish and the unassertive Watt in the
assertive ways only when they come to Water Controversy.13 Finally, it was the
defend their rights to intellectual property.
notebooks were crowded with discoveries disprov-
This has often been remarked, and some-
ing then widely-held theories and anticipating dis-
times with great puzzlement. As Sir Hum- coveries not made again for a long time to come.
phrey Davy asked at the time of the great He stands as the example a fortiori, for even such
Water Controversy between Cavendish and a man as this was drawn into a controversy over
priority.
Watt, how does it happen that this conflict
The history of science evidently has its own
over priority should engage such a man as brand of chain-reactions. It was the reading of
Cavendish, "unambitious, unassuming, with Wilson's Life of Cavendish with its report of Caven-
difficulty . . . persuaded to bring forward dish's long-forgotten experiment on the sparking
of air over alkalis which led Ramsay (just as the
his important discoveries . . . and . . .
same experiment led Rayleigh) to the discovery of
fearful of the voice of fame." 10 And the the element argon. Both Rayleigh and Ramsay
biographer of Cavendish, writing about the delicately set out their respective claims to the
same episode, describes it as "a perplexing discovery, claims not easily disentangled since the
two had been in such close touch. They finally
dilemma. Two unusually modest and unam-
agreed to joint publication as "the only solution"
bitious men, universally respected for their
to the problem of assigning appropriate credit.
integrity, famous for their discoveries and The episode gave rise to a great controversy over
inventions, are suddenly found standing in priority in which neither of the discoverers would
a hostile position towards each other... ." 11 take part; the debate is continued in the biogra-
phies of the two: by the old friend and collabo-
9 Information about this is sparse and unsatis- rator of Ramsay, Morris W. Travers, in A Life of
factory. As a bare beginning, a study of the The- Sir William Ramsay, London: Edward Arnold Ltd.,
matic Apperception Test protocols of 64 eminent 1956, pp. 100, 121-122, 292, passim; and by the
biological, physical, and social scientists found no son of Lord Rayleigh, John William Strutt: Third
signs of their being "particularly aggressive." Anne Baron Rayleigh, London: Edward Arnold, 1924,
Roe, The Making of a Scientist, New York: Dodd, Chapter XI.
Mead, 1953, p. 192. 12 Jones, op. cit., pp. 351-352; see also the in-
10 Sir Humphrey Davy, Collected Works, VII, formative book by T. W. Chalmers, Historic Re-
p. 128, quoted by George Wilson, The Life of the searches: Chapters in the History of Physical and
Honorable Henry Cavendish, London, 1851, p. 63. Chemical Discovery, New York: Scribner's, 1952,
11 Wilson, op. cit., p. 64. There can be little p. 54.
doubt about the unassuming character of Cavendish, 13 This is the contemporary judgment by Wilson,
the pathologically shy recluse, whose unpublished op. cit., pp. 63-64.
quarrelsome, eminent, and justly esteemed the misbehavior of the culprit, they respond
scientist Francois Arago (whom we shall with hostility and want to see "fair play," to
meet again) and a crowd of astronomers, see that behavior conforms to the rules of
principally in France and England but also the game. The very fact of their entering
in Germany and Russia, rather than "the the fray goes to show that science is a social
shy, gentle and unaffected" co-discoverer of institution with a distinctive body of norms
Neptune, Adams, who stirred the pot of exerting moral authority and that these norms
conflict over priority until it boiled over and are invoked particularly when it is felt that
then simmered down into general acknowl- they are being violated. In this sense, fights
edgment that the planet had been independ- over priority, with all their typical vehe-
ently discovered by Adams and LeVerrier.'4 mence and passionate feelings, are not merely
And so, in one after another of the historic expressions of hot tempers, although these
quarrels over priority in science. may of course raise the temperature of con-
Now these argumentative associates and troversy; basically, they constitute responses
bystanders stand to gain little or nothing to what are taken to be violations of the
from successfully prosecuting the claims of institutional norms of intellectual property.
their candidate, except in the pickwickian
sense of having identified themselves with INSTITUTIONAL NORMS OF SCIENCE
him or with the nation of which they are all To say that these frequent conflicts over
a part. Their behavior can scarcely be ex- priority are rooted in the egotism of human
plained by egotism. They do not suffer from nature, then, explains next to nothing; to
rival claims to precedence. Their personal say that they are rooted in the contentious
status is not being threatened. And yet, over personalities of those recruited by science
and again, they take up the cudgels in the may explain part, but not enough; to say,
status-battle 15 and, uninhibited by any sem- however, that these conflicts are largely a
blance of indulging in self-praise, express consequence of the institutional norms of
their great moral indignation over the out- science itself comes closer, I think, to the
rage being perpetrated upon their candidate. truth. For, as I shall suggest, it is these
This is, I believe, a particularly significant norms that exert pressure upon scientists to
fact. For, as we know from the sociological assert their claims, and this goes far toward
theory of institutions, the expression of dis- explaining the seeming paradox that even
interested moral indignation is a signpost those meek and unaggressive men, ordinarily
announcing the violation of a social norm.16
slow to press their own claims in other
Although the indignant bystanders are them-spheres of life, will often do so in their
selves not injured by what they take to be scientific work.
Recognition of what one has accomplished tists but from the institution of science,
is thus largely a motive derived from institu- which defines originality as a supreme value
tional emphases. Recognition for originality and thereby makes recognition of one's
becomes socially validated testimony that originality a major concern.18
one has successfully lived up to the most When this recognition of priority is either
exacting requirements of one's role as scien- not granted or fades from view, the scientist
tist. The self-image of the individual scientist loses his scientific property. Although this
will also depend greatly on the appraisals kind of property shares with other types
by his scientific peers of the extent to which general recognition of the "owner's" rights,
he has lived up to this exacting and critically it contrasts sharply in all other respects.
important aspect of his role. As Darwin once Once he has made his contribution, the
phrased it, "My love of natural science . . . scientist no longer has exclusive rights of
has been much aided by the ambition to be access to it. It becomes part of the public
esteemed by my fellow naturalists." domain of science. Nor has he the right of
regulating its use by others by withholding
Interest in recognition,17 therefore, need
not be, though it can readily become, simply it unless it is acknowledged as his. In short,
a desire for self-aggrandizement or an ex- property rights 19 in science become whittled
pression of egotism. It is, rather, the motiva- down to just this one: the recognition by
tional counterpart on the psychological plane others of the scientist's distinctive part in
to the emphasis upon originality on the having brought the result into being.
institutional plane. It is not necessary that It may be that this concentration of the
individual scientists begin with a lust for numerous rights ordinarily bound up in other
fame; it is enough that science, with its forms of property into the one right of recog-
abiding and often functional emphasis on nition by others helps produce the great
originality and its assigning of large rewards concentration of affect that commonly
for originality, makes recognition of priority characterizes disputes over priority. Often,
uppermost. Recognition and fame then the intensity of affect seems disproportionate
become symbol and reward for having done to the occasion; for example, when a scientist
one's job well. feels he has not been given enough recogni-
This means that long before we know
18 In developing this view, I do not mean to
anything about the distinctive personality
imply that scientists, any more than other men, are
of this or that scientist, we know that he will merely obedient puppets doing exactly what social
be under pressure to make his contributions institutions require of them. But I do mean to say
to knowledge known to other scientists and that, like men in other institutional spheres, sci-
entists tend to develop the values and to channel
that they, in turn, will be under pressure to
their motivations in directions the institution de-
acknowledge his rights to his intellectual
fines for them. For an extended formulation of the
property. To be sure, some scientists are general theory of institutionalized motivation, see
more vulnerable to these pressures than Talcott Parsons, Essays in Sociological Theory,
others-some are self-effacing, others self- Glencoe: The Free Press, 1954 (rev. ed.), esp.
Chapters II and III.
assertive; some generous in granting recogni- 19 That the notion of property is part and
tion, others stingy. But the great frequency parcel of the institution of science can be seen
of struggles over priority does not result from the language employed by scientists in speak-
ing of their work. Ramsay, for example, asks Ray-
merely from these traits of individual scien-
leigh's "permission to look into atmospheric nitro-
gen" on which Rayleigh had been working; the
17 It is not only the institution of science, of young Clerk Maxwell writes William Thomson, "I
course, that instills and reinforces the concern with do not know the Game laws and Patent laws of
recognition; in some degree, all institutions do. science . . . but I certainly intend to poach among
This is evident since the time W. I. Thomas included your electrical images"; Norbert Wiener describes
'recognition' as one of what he called "the four "differential space, the space of the Brownian mo-
wishes" of men. The point is, rather, that with its tion" as "wholly mine in its purely mathematical
emphasis on originality, the institution of science aspects, whereas I was only a junior partner in the
greatly reinforces this concern and indirectly leads theory of Banach spaces." Borrowing, trespassing,
scientists to vigorous self-assertion of their priority. poaching, credit, stealing, a concept which "be-
For Thomas's fullest account of the four wishes, longs" to us-these are only a few of the many
see The Unadjusted Girl, Boston: Little, Brown, terms in the lexicon of property adopted by scien-
1925, Chapter I. tists as a matter of course.
tion for what is, in truth, a minor contribu- pressed by scientists when one of their
tion to knowledge, he may respond with as number has had his rights to priority denied
much indignation as the truly inventive or challenged. Even though they have no
scientist, or even with more, if he secretly personal stake in the particular episode, they
senses that this is the outermost limit of feel strongly about the single property-norm
what he can reasonably hope to contribute.20 and the expression of their hostility serves
This same concentration of property-rights the latent function of reaffirming the moral
into the one right of recognition may also validity of this norm.
account for the deep moral indignation ex- National Claims to Priority. In a world
made up of national states, each with its own
20 Some of this had occurred to Galileo in his share of ethnocentrism, the new discovery
counterattack on Sarsi (pseudonym for Grassi): redounds to the credit of the discoverer not
"Only too clearly does Sarsi show his desire to as an individual only, but also as a national.
strip me completely of any praise. Not content
From at least the seventeenth century, Bri-
with having disproved our reasoning set forth to
explain the fact that the tails of comets sometimes tons, Frenchmen, Germans, Dutchmen, and
appear to be bent in an arc, he adds that nothing Italians have urged their country's claims
new was achieved by me in this, as it had all been to priority; a little later, Americans entered
published long ago, and then refuted, by Johann
the lists to make it clear that they had
Kepler. In the mind of the reader who goes no
more deeply than Sarsi's account, the idea will
primacy.
remain that I am not only a thief of other men's The seventeenth-century English scientist
ideas, but a petty, mean thief at that, who goes Wallis, for example, writes: "I would very
about pilfering even what has been refuted. And
fain that Mr. Hooke and Mr. Newton would
who knows; perhaps in Sarsi's eyes the pettiness
set themselves in earnest for promoting the
of the theft does not render me more blameworthy
than I would be if I had bravely applied myself designs about telescopes, that others may not
to greater thefts. If, instead of filching some trifle, steal from us what our nation invents, only
I had more nobly set myself to search out books by for the neglect to publish them ourselves."
some reputable author not as well known in these
So, also, Halley says of his comet that "if
parts, and had then tried to suppress his name and
attribute all his labors to myself, perhaps Sarsi it should return according to our prediction
would consider such an enterprise as grand and about the year 1758 [as of course it did],
heroic as the other seems to him cowardly and impartial posterity will not refuse to ac-
abject." (Galileo, The Assayer, op. cit., pp. 261-
knowledge that this was first discovered by
262.)
This type of reaction to what I describe as the an Englishman." 21
"professional adumbrationist" (in the unpublished Or to move abruptly to the present, we
part of this paper) was expressed also by Benja- see the Russians, now that they have taken
min Franklin after he had suffered from claims by
a powerful place on the world-scene, begin-
others that they had first worked out the experi-
ment of the lightning kite. As he said in part (the
ning to insist on the national character of
rest of his observations are almost equally in science and on the importance of finding out
point), "The smaller your invention is, the more who first made a discovery. Although the
mortification you receive in having the credit of
pattern of national claims to priority is old,
it disputed with you by a rival, whom the jealousy
and envy of others are ready to support against the formulation of its rationale in a Russian
you, at least so far as to make the point doubtful. journal deserves quotation if only because
It is not in itself of importance enough for a dis- it is so vigorously outspoken:
pute; no one would think your proofs and reasons
worth their attention: and yet if you do not Marxism-Leninism shatters into bits the cos-
dispute the point, and demonstrate your right, mopolitan fiction concerning supra-class, non-
you not only lose the credit of being in that national, "universal" science, and definitely
instance ingenious, but you suffer the disgrace of proves that science, like all culture in modern
not being ingenuous; not only of being a plagiary
society, is national in form and class in con-
but of being a plagiary for trifles. Had the in-
tent.... The slightest inattention to questions
vention been greater it would have disgraced you
less; for men have not so contemptible an idea
of priority in science, the slightest neglect of
of him that robs for gold on the highway, as of them, must therefore be condemned, for it
him that can pick pockets for half-pence and plays into the hands of our enemies, who
farthings." (Quoted in the informed and far-reach- cover their ideological aggression with cosmo-
ing monograph by I. B. Cohen, Franklin and
Newton, Philadelphia: The American Philosophical 21 Louis T. More, Isaac Newton, New York:
Society, 1956, pp. 75-76.) Scribner's, 1934, pp. 146-147, and pp. 241; 477-478.
politan talk about the supposed non-existence complain all in one by saying that "it is
of questions of priority in science, i.e., the enough to check the growth of science, that
questions concerning which peoples [here, be efforts and labours in this field go unre-
it noted, collectivities displace the individual
warded.... And it is nothing strange if a
scientist] made what contribution to the gen-
thing not held in honour does not prosper."24
eral store of world culture . . . [And sum-
And a half-century later, much the same
marizing the answers to these questions in
compact summary] The Russian people has could be said by Thomas Sprat, the Bishop
the richest history. In the course of this his- of Rochester, in his official history of the
tory, it has created the richest culture, and newly-established Royal Society:
all the other countries of the world have drawn
... it is not to be wonder'd, if men have not
upon it and continue to draw upon it to this
been very zealous about those studies, which
day.22 have been so farr remov'd, from present bene-
Against this background of affirmation, fit, and from the applause of men. For what
should incite them, to bestow their time, and
one can better appreciate the recent state-
Art, in revealing to mankind, those Mysteries
ment by Khrushchev that "we Russians had
for which, it may be, they would be onely
the H-bomb before you" and the comment
despis'd at last? How few must there needs
by the New York Times that "the question be, who will be willing, to be impoverished
of priority in the explosion of the hydrogen for the common good? while they shall see,
bomb is . . . a matter of semantics," to be all the rewards, which might give life to their
settled only when we know whether the Industry, passing by them, and bestow'd on
"prototype-bomb" or the full-fledged bomb" the deserts of easier studies? 25
is in question.23
The echo of these complaints still rever-
The recent propensity of the Russians to
berates in the halls of universities and scien-
claim priority in all manner of inventions
tific societies, but chiefly with regard to
and scientific discoveries thus energetically
material rather than honorific rewards. With
reduplicates the earlier, and now less forceful
the growth and professionalization of science,
though far from vanished, propensity of
the system of honorific rewards has become
other nations to claim like priorities. The
diversely elaborated, and apparently at an
restraint often shown by individual scientists
accelerated rate.
in making such claims becomes rather incon-
Heading the list of the immensely varied
spicuous when official or self-constituted
forms of recognition long in use is eponymy,26
representatives of nations put in their claims.
far from finished. In the early days of modern but in very few cases even moderately learned.
Moreover this kind of progress is not only unre-
science, Francis Bacon could explain and
warded with prizes and substantial benefits; it
has not even the advantage of popular applause.
22 An editorial, "Against the Bourgeois Ideology For it is a greater matter than the generality of
of Cosmopolitanism," Voprosy filosofi, 1948, No. 2, men can take in, and is apt to be overwhelmed and
as translated in the Current Digest of the Soviet extinguished by the gales of popular opinions."
Press, February 1, 1949, Vol. 1, No. 1, pp. 9-10, 12. 25 Thomas Sprat, The History of the Royal
For an informed account, see David Joravsky, Society, London, 1667, p. 27.
"Soviet Views on the History of Science," Isis, 46 26 Galileo begins his "Message from the Stars,"
(March, 1955), pp. 3-13, esp. at pp. 9n. and 11, announcing his discovery of the satellites of Jupiter,
which treat of changing Russian attitudes toward with a paean to the practice of eponymy which
priority and simultaneous invention; see also opens with these words: "Surely a distinguished
Merton, Social Theory and Social Structure, op. cit., public service has been rendered by those who have
pp. 556-560. protected from envy the noble achievements of
23 New York Times, July 27, 1957, p. 3, col. 1. men who have excelled in virtue, and have thus
the practice of affixing the name of the scien- taph has it, also the Uncle of the Earl of
tist to all or part of what he has found, as Cork), then Priestley is the Father of Pneu-
with the Copernican system, Hooke's law, matic Chemistry, Lavoisier the Father of
Planck's constant, or Halley's comet. In this Modern Chemistry, and the nonpareil Wil-
way, scientists leave their signatures indelibly lard Gibbs, the Father of Physical Chemistry.
in history; their names enter into all the On occasion, the presumed father of a
scientific languages of the world. science is called upon, in the persons of his
At the rugged and thinly populated peak immediate disciples or later adherents, to
of this system of eponymy are the men who prove his paternity, as with Johannes Muller
have put their stamp upon the science and and Albrecht von Haller, who are severally
thought of their age. Such men are naturally regarded as the Father of Experimental
in very short supply, and these few some- Physiology.
times have an entire epoch named after them, Once established, this eponymous pattern
as when we speak of the Newtonian epoch, is stepped up to extremes. Each new spe-
the Darwinian era, or the Freudian age. cialty has its own parent, whose identity is
The gradations of eponymy have the char- often known only to those at work within
acter of a Guttman scale in which those men the specialty. Thus, Manuel Garcia emerges
assigned highest rank are also assigned as the Father of Laryngoscopy, Adolphe
lesser degrees of honorific recognition. Ac- Brongiart as the Father of Modern Palaeo-
cordingly, these peerless scientists are typi- botany, Timothy Bright as the Father of
cally included also in the next highest ranks Modern Shorthand, and Father Johann
of eponymy, in which they are credited with Dzierson (whose important work may have
having fathered a new science or a new influenced Mendel) as the Father of Modern
branch of science (at times, according to the Rational Beekeeping.
heroic theory, through a kind of partheno- Sometimes, a particular form of a disci-
genesis for which they apparently needed pline bears eponymous witness to the man
no collaborators). Of the illustrious Fathers who first gave it shape, as with Hippocratic
of this or that science (or of this or that medicine, Aristotelian logic, Euclidean geom-
specialty), there is an end, but an end not etry, Boolean algebra, and Keynesian eco-
easily reached. Consider only these few, nomics. Most rarely, the same individual
culled from a list many times this length: acquires a double immortality, both for what
Morgagni, the Father of Pathology he achieved and for what he failed to achieve,
Cuvier, the Father of Palaeontology as in the cases of Euclidean and non-Eu-
Faraday, the Father of Electrotechnics clidean geometries, and Aristotelian and non-
Daniel Bernoulli, the Father of Mathematical Aristotelian logics.
Physics In rough hierarchic order, the next echelon
Bichat, the Father of Histology is comprised by thousands of eponymous
van Leeuwenhoek, the Father of Protozoology laws, theories, theorems, hypotheses, instru-
and Bacteriology
ments, constants and distributions. No short
Jenner, the Father of Preventive Medicine
list can hope to be representative of the wide
Chladni, the Father of Modern Acoustics
range of these scientific contributions that
Herbart, the Father of Scientific Pedagogy
Wundt, the Father of Experimental Psychology have immortalized the men who made them.
Pearson, the Father of Biometry; But a few examples in haphazard array might
and, of course, include the Brownian movement, the Zeeman
Comte, the Father of Sociology. effect, Rydberg's constant, Moseley's atomic
number, and the Lorenz curve or to come
In a science as farflung and differentiated
closer home, where we refer only to assured
as chemistry, there is room for several pa-
contemporary recognition rather than to pos-
ternities. If Robert Boyle is the undisputed
sibly permanent fame, the Spearman rank-
Father of Chemistry (and, as his Irish epi-
correlation coefficient, the Rorschach ink-
preserved from oblivion and neglect those names blot, the Thurstone scale, the Bogardus so-
which deserve immortality." (Op. cit., p. 23.) *He cial-distance scale, the Bales categories of
then proceeds to call the satellites "the Medicean
interaction, the Guttman scalogram and the
Stars" in honor of the Grand Duke of Tuscany,
who soon becomes his patron. Lazarsfeld latent-structure analysis.
Each science, or art based on science, lines." 28 (This, I may say, will not be the
evolves its own distinctive patterns of epon- last occasion for us to see how the system
ymy to honor those who have made it what of rewards in science can be stepped up to
it is. In the medical sciences, for example, such lengths as to get out of hand and de-
the attention of posterity is assured to the feat its original purposes.)
discoverer or first describer of parts of the Eponymy is only the most enduring and
body (as with the Eustachian tube, the circle perhaps most prestigious kind of recognition
of Willis, Graffian follicles, Wharton's duct, institutionalized in science. Were the reward-
and the canal of Nuck) though, oddly system confined to this, it would not provide
enough, Vesalius, commonly described as for the many other distinguished scientists
the Father of Modern Anatomy has been without whose work the revolutionary dis-
accorded no one part of the body as dis- coveries could not have been made. Graded
tinctly his own. In medicine, also, eponymy rewards in the coin of the scientific realm-
registers the first diagnostician of a disease honorific recognition by fellow-scientists-
(as with Addison's, Bright's, Hodgkin's, are distributed among the stratified layers
Meniere's and Parkinson's diseases); the of scientific accomplishment. Merely to list
inventor of diagnostic tests (as with Rom- some of these other but still considerable
berg's sign, the Wassermann reaction, the forms of recognition will perhaps be enough
Calmette test, and the Babinski reflex); and to remind us of the complex structure of the
the inventor of instruments used in research reward-system in science.
or practice (as with the Kelly pad, the Kelly In recent generations, the Nobel Prize,
clamp, and the Kelly rectoscope). Yet, how- with nominations for it made by scientists
ever numerous and diversified this array of of distinction throughout the world, is per-
eponyms in medicine,27 they are still re- haps the pre-eminent token of recognized
served, of course, to only a small fraction of achievement in science.29 There is also an
the many who have labored in the medical iconography of fame in science, with medals
vineyard. Eponymy is a prize that, though honoring famous scientists and the recipients
large in absolute aggregate, is limited to the of the award alike (as with the Rumford
relatively few. medal and the Arago medal). Beyond these,
Time does not permit, nor does the occa- are memberships in honorary academies and
sion require, detailed examination of epony- sciences (for example, the Royal Society and
the French Academy of Sciences), and fel-
mous practices in all the other sciences.
lowships in national and local societies. In
Consider, then, only two other patterns: In
those nations that still preserve a titled
a special branch of physics, it became the
aristocracy, scientists have been ennobled,
practice to honor great physicists by at-
as in England since the time when Queen
taching their names to electrical and mag-
Anne added laurels to her crown by knighting
netic units (as with volt, ohm, ampere,
Newton, not, as might be supposed, because
coulomb, farad, joule, watt, henry, maxwell,
of his superb administrative work as Master
gauss, gilbert and oersted). In biology, it
is the long-standing practice to append the
28 Exercised by the excesses eponymy in natural
name of the first describer to the name of a history had reached, the usually mild Darwin re-
species, a custom which greatly agitated peatedly denounced this "miserable and degrading
Darwin since, as he saw it, this put "a passion of mere species naming." What is most in
point for us is the way in which the pathological
premium on hasty and careless work" as the exaggeration of eponymizing highlights the normal
"species-mongers" among naturalists try to role of eponymy in providing its share of incentives
achieve an easy immortality by "miserably for serious and sustained work in science. Francis
Darwin, ed., The Life and Letters of Charles Dar-
describ [ing] a species in two or three win, New York: Appelton, 1925, Vol. I, pp. 332-
344.
27 It has been suggested that, in medicine at 29 0n the machinery and results of the Nobel
least, eponymic titles are given to diseases only so and other prize-awards, see Barber, Science and
long as they are poorly understood. "Any disease the Social Order, op. cit., pp. 108 ff.; Leo Moulin,
designated by an eponym is a good subject for "The Nobel Prizes for the Sciences, 1901-1950,"
research." (0. H. Perry Pepper, Medical Etymology, British Journal of Sociology, 6 (September, 1955),
Philadelphia: W. B. Saunders Co., 1949, pp. 11-12.) pp. 246-263.
of the Mint, but for his scientific discoveries. Although scientific knowledge is imper-
These things move slowly; it required almost sonal, although its claim to truth must be
two centuries before another Queen of Eng- assessed entirely apart from its source, the
land would, in 1892, confer a peerage of the historian of science is called upon to prevent
realm upon a man of science for his work in scientific knowledge from sinking (or rising)
science, and thus transform the pre-eminent into anonymity, to preserve the collective
Sir William Thomson into the no less emi- memory of its origins. Anonymous givers
nent Lord Kelvin.30 Scientists themselves have no place in this scheme of things.
have distinguished the stars from the sup- Eponymity, not anonymity, is the standard.
porting cast by issuing directories of "starred And, as we have seen, outstanding scientists,
men of science" and universities have been in turn, labor hard to have their names in-
known to accord honorary degrees to sci- scribed in the golden book of firsts.82
entists along with the larger company of Seen in composite, from the eponyms en-
philanthropists, industrialists, businessmen, duringly recording the names of scientists in
statesmen and politicians. the international language of science to the
Recognition is finally allocated by those immense array of parochial and ephemeral
guardians of posthumous fame, the historians prizes, the reward-system of science rein-
of science. From the most disciplined schol- forces and perpetuates the institutional em-
arly works to the vulgarized and sentimen- phasis upon originality. It is in this specific
talized accounts designed for the millions, sense that originality can be said to be a
great attention is paid to priority of dis- major institutional goal of modern science,
covery, to the iteration and reiteration of at times, the paramount one, and recognition
'firsts.' In this way, many historians of sci- for originality a derived, but often as heavily
ence help maintain the prevailing institu-
tional emphasis on the importance of priority. may vary considerably according to the historian's
One of the most eminent among them, the experience, standpoint, or prejudices. ... It is
always risky, yet when every reasonable precaution
late George Sarton, at once expresses and
has been taken one must be willing to run the risk
exemplifies the commemorative function of and make the challenge, for this is the only means
historiography when he writes that ". of being corrected, if correction be needed." (Ibid.,
the first scholar to conceive that subject [the p. 36.) This is a telling sign of the deep-rooted
sentiment that recognition for originality in science
history of science] as an independent disci-
must be expressed, that it is an obligation-"the
pline and to realize its importance was . . . historian is expected . . ."-to search out the 'first'
Auguste Comte." He then goes on to propose to contribute an idea or finding, even though a
that great scholar, Paul Tannery, as most comprehensive view of the cumulative and inter-
locking character of scientific inquiry suggests
deserving to be called "the father of our
that the attribution of 'firsts' is often difficult and
studies," and finally states the thesis that sometimes arbitrary. For a further statement on
as the historian is expected to determine this matter of priority, see George Sarton, The
not only the relative truth of scientific ideas Study of the History of Mathematics, Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 1936, pp. 33-36.
at different chronological states, but also their
I cannot undertake here to examine the attitudes
relative novelty, he is irresistibly led to the commonly manifested by historians of science toward
fixation of first events." 31 this emphasis on searching out priorities. It can
be said that these too are often ambivalent.
30 For caustic comment on the lag in according 32 This was presumably not always so. As is
such recognition to men of science, see excerpts well known, medieval authors often tried to cloak
from newspapers of the day in Silvanus P. Thomp-their writings in anonymity. But this is not the
son, The Life of William Thomson: Baron Kelvin place to examine the complex subject of variations
of Largs, London: Macmillan, 1910, Vol. II, pp. in cultural emphases upon originality and recogni-
906-907. tion. For some observations on this, see George
31 George Sarton, The Study of the History of Sarton, A Guide to the History of Science, Waltham,
Science, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1936, Mass.: Chronica Botanica Co., 1952, p. 23, who
pp. 3-4, 35-36. Sarton goes on to observe that this reminds us of ancient and medieval practices in
practice of identifying first events "never fails which
to "modest authors would try to pass off their
involve him [the historian] in new difficulties, be- own compositions under the name of an illustrious
cause creations absolutely de novo are very rare, if author of an earlier time," ghost-writing in reverse.
they occur at all; most novelties are only novel See also R. K. Merton, Science, Technology and
combinations of old elements and the degree of Society in Seventeenth Century England, Bruges,
novelty is thus a matter of interpretation, which Belgium: Osiris, 1938, pp. 360-632, at p. 528.
emphasized, goal. In the organized competi- limitations and the limitations of scientific
tion to contribute to man's scientific knowl- knowledge altogether. Galileo taught himself
edge, the race is to the swift, to him who and his pupils to say, "I do not know." Per-
gets there first with his contribution in hand. haps another often-quoted image by Newton
Institutional Norm of Humility. If the most fully expresses this kind of humility in
institution of science placed great value only the face of what is yet to be known:
on originality, scientists would perhaps at- I do not know what I may appear to the
tach even more importance to recognition of world, but to myself I seem to have been
priority than they do. But, of course, this only like a boy playing on the seashore, and
value does not stand alone. It is only one of diverting myself in now and then finding a
a complex set making up the ethos of science smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordi-
-disinterestedness, universalism, organized nary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all
skepticism, communism of intellectual prop- undiscovered before me.36
erty, and humility being some of the others.33 If this contrast between public image
Among these, the socially enforced value of ("what I may appear to the world") and
humility is in most immediate point, serving, self-image ("but to myself I seem") is fitting
as it does, to reduce the misbehavior of sci- for the greatest among scientists, it is pre-
entists below the rate that would occur if
sumably not entirely out of place for the
importance were assigned only to originality
rest. The same theme continues unabated.
and the establishing of priority.
Laplace, the Newton of France, in spite of
The value of humility takes diverse expres-
what has been described as "his desire to
sion. One form is the practice of acknowl-
shine in the constantly changing spotlight
edging the heavy indebtedness to the legacy
of public esteem," reportedly utters an epi-
of knowledge bequeathed by predecessors.
This kind of humility is perhaps best ex- grammatic paraphrase of Newton in his last
pressed in the epigram Newton made his words, "What we know is not much; what
own: "If I have seen farther, it is by stand- we do not know is immense." 37 Lagrange
ing on the shoulders of giants" (this, inci- summarizes his lifetime of discovery in the
dentally, in a letter to Hooke who was then one phrase, "I do not know." And Lord
challenging Newton's priority in the theory Kelvin, at the Jubilee celebrating his fifty
of colors.) 34 That this tradition has not years as a distinguished scientist in the
always been honored in practice can be in- course of which he was honored by scores of
ferred from the admiration that Darwin, him- scientific societies and academies, character-
self lavish in such acknowledgments, ex- izes his lifelong effort to develop a grand and
pressed to Lyell for "the elaborate honesty
with which you quote the words of all living 36 David Brewster, Memoirs of the Life, Writ-
ings, and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton, Edin-
and dead geologists." 35 Exploring the litera-
burgh and London, 1855, Volume II, Chapter
ture of a field of science becomes not only an xxvii. For our purposes, unlike those of the his-
instrumental practice, designed to learn from torian, it is a matter of indifference whether New-
the past, but a commemorative practice, de- ton actually felt acutely modest or was merely
conforming to expectation. In either case, he ex-
signed to pay homage to those who have pre- presses the norm of personal humility, which is
pared the way for one's work. widely held to be appropriate. I. B. Cohen, (op.
Humility is expected also in the form of cit., pp. 47, 58, passim) repeatedly and incisively
makes the point that both admirers and critics of
the scientist's insisting upon his personal
Newton have failed to make the indispensable
distinction between what he said and what he did.
33 For a review of other values of science, see 37 Bell, op. cit., p. 172. Bell refers also to "a
Barber, op. cit., Chapter IV; Merton, Social Theory common and engaging trait of the truly eminent
and Social Structure, op. cit., pp. 552-561; H. A. scientist in his frequent confession of how little
Shepard, "The Value System of a University Re- he knows. . . ." What he describes as a trait of the
search Group," American Sociological Review, 19 scientist can also be seen as an expectation on the
(August, 1954), pp. 456-462. part of the community of scientists. It is not that
34 Alexander Koyre, "An unpublished letter of many scientists happen to be humble men; they
Robert Hooke to Isaac Newton," Isis, 43 (De- are expected to be humble. See E. T. Bell, "Mathe-
cember, 1952), pp. 312-337, at p. 315. matics and Speculation," The Scientific Monthly, 32
35 Darwin, op. cit., I, p. 263. (March, 1931), pp. 193-209, at p. 204.
opinion." 43 A quarter of a century after this himself of his feelings, he appends a post-
voyage, he is still wrestling with his ambition, script, "I will never trouble you or Hooker
exclaiming in a letter that "I wish I could on the subject again." 47
set less value on the bauble fame, either The next day he writes Lyell once more,
present or posthumous, than I do, but not, this time to repudiate the postscript. Again,
I think, to any extreme degree. . . ." he registers his ambivalence: "It seems hard
Two years before the traumatizing news on me that I should lose my priority of many
from Wallace, reporting his formulation of years' standing, but I cannot feel at all
the theory of evolution, Darwin writes his sure that this alters the justice of the case.
now-famous letter to Lyell, explaining that First impressions are generally right, and I
he is not quite ready to publish his views, as at first thought it would be dishonourable in
Lyell had suggested he do in order not to me now to publish." 48
be forestalled, and again expressing his un- As fate would have it, Darwin is just then
controllable ambivalence in these words: "I prostrated by the death of his infant
rather hate the idea of writing for priority, daughter. He manages to respond to the
yet I certainly should be vexed if any one request of his friend Hooker and sends him
were to publish my doctrines before me." 45 the Wallace manuscript and his own original
And then, in June 1858, the blow falls. sketch of 1844, "solely," he writes, "that
What Lyell warned would happen and what you may see by your own handwriting that
Darwin could not bring himself to believe you did read it.... Do not waste much time.
could happen, as all the world knows, did It is miserable in me to care at all about
happen. Here is Darwin writing Lyell of the priority." 49
crushing event: Other members of the scientific community
do what the tormented Darwin will not
[Wallace] has today sent me the enclosed,
and asked me to forward it to you. It seems do for himself. Lyell and Hooker take mat-
to me well worth reading. Your words have ters in hand and arrange for that momentous
come true with a vengeance-that I should session in which both papers are read at the
be forestalled. . . . I never saw a more striking Linnean Society. And as they put it in their
coincidence; if Wallace had my MS. sketch letter prefacing the publication of the joint
written out in 1842, he could not have made paper of "Messrs. C. Darwin and A. Wal-
a better short abstract! Even his terms now
lace," "in adopting our present course . . .
stand as heads of my chapters. . . . So all
we have explained to him [Darwin] that we
my originality, whatever it may amount to,
are not solely considering the relative claims
will be smashed ....46
to priority of himself and his friend, but the
Humility and disinterestedness urge Dar- interests of science generally." 50 Despite this
win to give up his claim to priority; the disclaimer of interest in priority, be it noted
wish for originality and recognition urges that scientific knowledge is not the richer
him that all need not be lost. At first, with or the poorer for having credit given where
typical magnanimity, but without pretense credit is due; it is the social institution of
of equanimity, he makes the desperate de- science and individual men of science that
cision to step aside altogether. A week later, would suffer from repeated failures to allocate
he is writing Lyell again; perhaps he might credit justly.
publish a short version of his long-standing This historic and not merely historical
text, "a dozen pages or so." And yet, he says episode so plainly exhibits the ambivalence
in his anguished letter, "I cannot persuade occasioned by the double concern with prior-
myself that I can do so honourably." Torn ity and modesty that it need not be examined
by his mixed feelings, he concludes his letter,
47 Ibid., pp. 474-475.
"My good dear friend, forgive me. This is
48 Ibid., p. 475.
a trumpery letter, influenced by trumpery 49 Ibid., p. 476.
feelings." And in an effort finally to purge 50 "On the Tendency of Species to Form Va-
rieties and on the Perpetuation of Varieties and
43 Darwin, op. cit., p. 54. Species by Natural Means of Selection," by C.
44 Ibid., p. 452. Darwin and A. R. Wallace. Communicated by Sir
45 Ibid., pp. 426-427. C. Lyell and J. D. Hooker, Journal of the Linnean
46 Ibid., p. 473. Society, 3 (1859), p. 45. Read July 1, 1858.
further. Had the institutionalized emphasis who are ordinarily men of the most scrupu-
on originality been alone in point, the claim lous integrity, will go to great lengths to
to priority would have invited neither self- press their claims to priority of discovery.
blame nor self-contempt; publication of the As I have often suggested, perhaps too often,
long antecedent work would have proclaimed any extreme institutional
its own originality. But the value of origi- emphasis upon achievement-whether this be
nality was joined with the value of humility scientific productivity, accumulation of wealth
and modesty. To insist on priority would be or, by a small stretch of the imagination, the
to trumpet one's own excellence, but scien- conquests of a Don Juan-will attenuate con-
tific peers and friends of the discoverers, formity to the institutional norms governing
acting as a third party in accord with the behavior designed to achieve the particular
institutional norms, could with full propriety form of 'success,' especially among those who
are socially disadvantaged in the competitive
announce the joint claims to originality that
race.51
the discoverers could not bring themselves
to do. Underneath it all lies a deep and agi- Or more specifically and more completely,
tated ambivalence toward priority. great concern with the goal of recognition for
I have not yet counted the recorded cases originality can generate a tendency toward
of debates about priority in science and the sharp practices just inside the rules of the
manner of their outcome. Such a count, game or sharper practices far outside. That
moreover, will not tell the full story for it this has been the case with the behavior of
will not include the doubtless numerous scientists who were all-out to have their
instances in which independent ideas and originality recognized, the rest of this paper
discoveries were never announced by those will try to show.
who found their ideas anticipated in print.
Nevertheless, I have the strong impression TYPES OF RESPONSE TO CULTURAL EMPHASIS
that disputes, even bitter disputes, over ON ORIGINALITY
priority outnumber the cases of despondent
Fraud in Science. The extreme form of
but unreserved admission that the other
deviant behavior in science would of course
fellow had made the discovery first.
The institutional values of modesty and
51 Merton, op. cit., p. 166. Scientists do not all
humility are apparently not always enough
occupy similar positions in the social structure;
to counteract both the institutional emphasis there are, consequently, differentials in access to
upon originality and the actual workings of opportunity for scientific achievement (and, of
the system of allocating rewards. Originality, course, differences of individual capacity for achieve-
ment). The theory of the relations of social struc-
as exemplified by the new idea or the new
ture to anomie requires us to explore differential
finding, is more readily observable by others pressures upon those scientists variously located in
in science and is more fully rewarded than the social structure. Contrast only the disputatious
the often unobservable kind of humility that Robert Hooke, a socially mobile man whose rise
in status resulted wholly from his scientific achieve-
keeps an independent discoverer from re-
ments, and the singularly undisputatious Henry
porting that he too had had the same idea Cavendish, high-born and very rich (far richer,
or the same finding. Moreover, after publi- and, by the canons of Burke's peerage, more ele-
cation by another, it is often difficult, if not vated even than that other great aristocrat of
impossible, to demonstrate that one had science, Robert Boyle) who, in the words of Biot,
was "le plus riche de tons les savans; et probable-
independently arrived at the same result.
ment aussi, le plus savant de tons les riches." Or
For these and other reasons, it is generally consider what Norbert Wiener has said of himself,
an unequal contest between the values of "I was competitive beyond the run of younger
recognized originality and of modesty. Great mathematicians, and I knew equally that this
was not a very pretty attitude. However, it was
modesty may elicit respect, but great origi-
not an attitude which I was free to assume or to
nality promises everlasting fame. reject. I was quite aware that I was an out among
In short, the social organization of science ins and I would get no shred of recognition that
allocates honor in a way that tends to vitiate I did not force." (I Am a Mathematician, New
York: Doubleday, 1956, p. 87.) But these are only
the institutional emphasis upon modesty.
straws in the wind; once again, limitations of
It is this, I believe, which goes far toward space allow me only to identify a problem, not
explaining why so many scientists, even thoseto examine it.
be the use of fraud to obtain credit for an inasmuch as this vast collection included
original discovery. For reasons to be ex- letters by Pontius Pilate, Mary Magdalene,
amined, the annals of science include very the resurrected Lazarus, Ovid, Luther, Dante,
few instances of downright fraud although, Shakspere, Galileo, Pascal and Newton, all
in the nature of the case, an accurate esti- written on paper and in modern French. Most
mate of frequency is impossible. Darwin, provocative among these documents was the
for example, said that he knew of only "three correspondence between Pascal and the then
intentionally falsified statements" in sci- eleven-year-old Newton (all in French, of
ence.52 Yet, some time before, his contem- course, although even at the advanced age
porary, Charles Babbage, the mathematician of thirty-one Newton could struggle through
and inventor of calculating machines (one French only with the aid of a dictionary),
of which prophetically made use of perfo- for these letters made it plain that Pascal,
rated cards), had angrily taken a classified not Newton, had, to the greater glory of
inventory of fraud in science.53 France, first discovered the law of gravita-
At the extreme are hoaxes and forgery: tion, a momentous correction of history,
the concocting of false data in science and which for several years excited the interest
learning-or, more accurately, in pseudo- of the Academie des Sciences and usurped
science and anti-scholarship. Literary docu- many pages of the Comptes Rendus until,
ments have been forged in abundance, at in 1869, Vrain-Lucas was finally brought to
times, by men of previously unblemished book and sentenced to two years in prison.
reputation, in order to gain money or fame. For our purposes, it is altogether fitting that
Though no one can say with confidence, it Vrain-Lucas should have had Pascal address
appears that love of money was at the root of this maxim to the boy Newton: "Tout
the forgery of fifty or so rare nineteenth- komme qui n'aspire pas a se faire un nom
century pamphlets by that prince of bibli- n'executera jamais rien de grand." 55
ographers, that court of last appeal for the Such lavish forgery is unknown to science
authentication of rare books and manu- proper, but the pressure to demonstrate the
scripts, Thomas J. Wise. Of quite another truth of a theory or to produce a sensational
stripe was John Payne Collier, the Shak- discovery has occasionally led to the faking
sperian scholar who, unrivalled for his of scientific evidence. The biologist Paul
genuine finds in Elizabethan drama and Kammerer produced specimens of spotted
"encouraged by the steadily growing plaudits salamanders designed to prove the Lam-
of his colleagues," could not rest content
arckian thesis experimentally; was thereupon
with this measure of fame and proceeded to
offered a chair at the University of Moscow
forge, with great and knowledgeable skill,
where in 1925 the Lamarckian views of
a yet-uncounted array of literary papers.54
Michurin held reign; and upon proof that
But these rogues seem idle alongside the
the specimens were fakes, attributed the
fecund and audacious Vrain-Lucas who, in
fraud to a research assistant and committed
the space of eight years, created more than
27,000 pieces of manuscript, all duly sold 55The definitive reports on the Vrain-Lucas
to Michel Chasles, perhaps the outstanding affair by M. P. Faugere and by Henri Bordier and
French geometer of the mid-nineteenth cen- Mabille are not available to me at this telling; sub-
tury, whose credulity stretches our own, stantial details, including extracts from the court-
proceedings, are given by the paleographer, ktienne
52 Darwin, op. cit., p. 84. Charavay, Affair Vrain-Lucas: ttude Critique,
53 Charles Babbage, The Decline of Science in Paris, 1870; a more accessible summary that does
England, London, 1830, pp. 174-183. George Lund- not, however, do full justice to the prodigious in-
berg has independently noted that "a scientist's ventiveness of Vrain-Lucas is provided by J. A.
greed for applause [sometimes] becomes greater Farrer, Literary Forgeries, London: Longmans
that his devotion to truth." [Social Research, New Green, 1907, Chapter XII. The biographer of New-
York: Longmans Green, 1929, p. 34 (and in less ton, Sir David Brewster, at the age of 87, did his
detail, in the second edition, 1946, p. 52).] share to safeguard the integrity of historical scholar-
54 I have drawn these examples of frauds in ship, but this did not prevent Chasles from prizing
anti-scholarship from the zestful and careful ac- the three thousand letters of Galileo which he had
count by Richard D. Altick, The Scholar Adven- acquired from his friend, although they happened
turers, New York: Macmillan, 1951, Chapters 2 to be in French, rather than in the Latin or Italian
and 6. in which Galileo wrote.
suicide.56 Most recently, the Piltdown man the medical scientist of the greatest distinc-
-that is, the skull and jaw from which his tion who told me that during his graduate
fellowship at one of the great English uni-
existence was inferred-has been shown,
versities he encountered for the first time the
after forty years of uneasy acceptance, to
idea that in scientific work one should be
be a carefully contrived hoax.57
really honest in reporting the results of his
Excessive concern with "success" in scien-
experiments. Before that time he had always
tific work has on occasion led to the types been told and had quite naturally assumed
of fraud Babbage picturesquely described that the point was to get his observations and
as "trimming" and "cooking." The trimmer theories accepted by others, and published.59
clips off "little bits here and there from
Yet, these deviant practices should be
observations which differ most in excess
seen in perspective. What evidence there is
from the mean, and [sticks] . . . them on
suggests that they are extremely infrequent,
to those which are too small . . . [for the
and this temporary focus upon them will
unallowable purpose of] 'equitable adjust-
surely not be distorted into regarding the
ment.'" The cook makes "multitudes of ob-
exceptional case as the typical. Apart from
servations" and selects only those which
the moral integrity of scientists themselves
agree with an hypothesis and, as Babbage and this is, of course, the major basis for
says, "the cook must be very unlucky if he honesty in science, there is much in the social
cannot pick out fifteen or twenty which organization of science that provides a fur-
will do for serving up." This eagerness to ther compelling basis for honest work. Scien-
demonstrate a thesis can, on occasion, lead tific research is typically, if not always,
even truth to be fed with cooked data, as it under the exacting scrutiny of fellow-experts,
did for the neurotic scientist, described by involving, as it usually though not always
Lawrence Kubie, "who had proved his case, does, the verifiability of results by others.
but was so driven by his anxieties that he Scientific inquiry is in effect subject to rigor-
had to bolster an already proved theorem ous policing, to a degree perhaps unparalleled
by falsifying some quite unneccessary addi- in any other field of human activity. Personal
tional statistical data." 58 honesty is supported by the public and
The great cultural emphasis upon recogni- testable character of science. As Babbage
remarked, "the cook would [at best] procure
tion for original discovery can lead by
a temporary reputation . . . at the expense
gradations from these rare practices of out-
of his permanent fame."
right fraud to more frequent practices just
Competition in the realm of science,
beyond the edge of acceptability, sometimes
intensified by the great emphasis on original
without the scientist's being aware that he
and significant discoveries, may occasionally
has exceeded allowable limits. Scientists may
generate incentives for eclipsing rivals by
find themselves reporting only "successful illicit or dubious means. But this seldom
experiments or results, so-called, and neg- occurs in the form of preparing fraudulent
lecting to report 'failures.'" Alan Gregg, data; instead, it appears in quite other forms
that informed observer of the world of of deviant behavior involving spurious claims
medical research, practice, and education, to discovery. More concretely, it is an occa-
reports the case of sional theft rather than forgery, and more
often, libel and slander rather than theft
56 Martin Gardner, In the Name of Science, that are found on the small seamy side of
New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1952, p. 143; science.
W. S. Beck, Modern Science and the Nature of
Plagiary: Fact and Slander. Deviant be-
Life, New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1957, pp. 201-
202; Conway Zirkle, "The Citation of Fraudulent havior most often takes the form of occa-
Data," Science, 120 (30 July, 1954), pp. 189-190. sional plagiaries and many slanderous
57 William L. Straus, Jr., "The Great Piltdown
charges or insinuations of plagiary. The
Hoax," Science, 119 (26 February, 1954), pp. 265-
269.
historical record shows relatively few cases
58 Lawrence S. Kubie, M.D., "Some Unsolved
Problems of the Scientific Career," American Scien-
59 Alan Gregg, Challenges to Contemporary
tist, 41 (1953), pp. 596-613; 42 (1954), pp. 104- Medicine, New York: Columbia University Press,
112, at p. 606. 1956, p. 115.
(and of course the record may be defective) vision in order to avoid prolonged de-
in which one scientist actually pilfered lays.62 But even with such cases of larceny
another. We are assured that in the Mecan- on the grand scale, the aggregate of demon-
ique celeste (until then, outranked only by strable theft in modern science is not large.
Newton's Principia) "theorems and formulae What does loom large is the repeated
are appropriated wholesale without acknowl- practice of charging others with pilfering
edgement" by Laplace.60 Or, to take a mar- scientific ideas. Falsely accused of plagiariz-
ginal case, Sir Everard Home, the distin- ing Harvey in physiology, Snell in optics,
guished English surgeon who was appointed and Harriot and Fermat in geometry,
custodian of the unpublished papers of his Descartes in turn accuses Hobbes and the
even more distinguished brother-in-law, teen-age Pascal of plagiarizing him.63 To
John Hunter, published 116 papers of uncer- maintain his property, Descartes implores
tain origin in the Philosophical Transactions his friend Mersenne, "I also beg you to tell
after Hunter's death, and burned Hunter's him [Hobbes] as little as possible about
manuscripts, an action greatly criticized by what you know of my unpublished opinions,
knowledgeable and suspicious contempo- for if I'm not greatly mistaken, he is a man
raries.6' It is true also that Robert Boyle, who is seeking to acquire a reputation at
not impressed by the thought that theft of my expense and through shady practices." 64
his ideas might be a high tribute to his All unknowing that the serene and unam-
talent, was in 1688 driven to the desperate bitious Gauss had long since discovered the
expedient of printing an "Advertisement about method of least squares, Legendre, himself
the Loss of many of his Writings," later "a man of the highest character and scrupu-
describing the theft of his work and reporting
lously fair," practically accuses Gauss of
that he would from then on write only on having filched the idea from him and com-
loose sheets, in the hope that these would plains that Gauss, already so well-stocked
tempt theives less than "bulky packets" and, with momentous discoveries, might at least
going on to say that he was resolved to send have had the decency not to adopt his
his writings to press without extensive re- brainchild.65
At times, the rivalrous concern with nounce a discovery. Since it is often the
priority can go so far as to set, not the case that these are truly independent dis-
Egyptians against the Egyptians, but coveries, with each scientist having separately
brother against brother, as in the case of exhibited originality of mind, the process
the great eighteenth-century mathematicians, is sometimes stabilized at that point, with
the brothers Jacob and Johannes Bernoulli, due credit to both, as in the instance of
who repeatedly and bitterly attacked one Darwin and Wallace. But since the situation
another's claims to priority. (Johannes im- is often ambiguous with the role of each not
proved on this by throwing his own son out easy to demonstrate and since each knows
of the house for having won a prize from that he had himself arrived at the discovery,
the French Academy on which he himself and since the institutionalized stakes of
had had his eye.) 66 reputation are high and the joy of discovery
Or to turn to our own province, Comte, immense, this is often not a stable solution.
tormented by the suggestion that his law One or another of the discoverers-or fre-
of three stages had really been originated quently, his colleagues or fellow-nationals-
by St. Simon, denounces his one-time master suggests that he rather than his rival was
and describes him as a "superficial and de- really first, and that the independence of the
praved charlatan." 67 Again, to take Freud's rival is at least unproved. Then begins the
own paraphrase, Janet claims that "every- familiar deterioration of standards governing
thing good in psychoanalysis repeats, with conflictful interaction: the other side, group-
slight modifications, the views of Janet- ing their forces, counter with the opinion
everything else in psychoanalysis being that plagiary had indeed occurred, that let
bad." 68 Freud refuses to lock horns with him whom the shoe fits wear it and further-
Janet in what he describes as "gladiator more, to make matters quite clear, the shoe
fights in front of the noble mob," but some is on the other foot. Reinforced by group-
years later, his disciple, Ernest Jones, reports loyalties and often by chauvinism, the con-
that at a London Congress he has "put an troversy gains force, mutual recriminations of
end to" Janet's pretensions, and Freud plagiary abound, and there develops an
atmosphere of thoroughgoing hostility and
applauds him in a letter that urges him to
mutual distrust.
"strike while the iron is hot," in the interests
On some occasions, this can lead to out-
of "fair play." 69
right deceit in order to buttress valid claims,
So the almost changeless pattern repeats
as with Newton in his controversy with
itself. Two or more scientists quietly an-
Leibniz over the invention of the calculus.
When the Royal Society finally established
owing to his appropriation, with scant acknowl-
edgment, of the other's labors." Encyclopaedia a committee to adjudicate the rival claims,
Britannica, Vol. XVI, p. 202. Newton, who was then president of the Royal
66 Bell, op. cit., p. 134. Society, packed the committee, helped direct
67 Frank E. Manuel, The New World of Henri
its activities, anonymously wrote the preface
Saint-Simon, Cambridge: Harvard University Press,
1956, pp. 340-342; also Richard L. Hawkins, Au-
for the second published report-the draft
guste Comte and the United States, Cambridge: is in his handwriting-and included in that
Harvard University Press, 1936, pp. 81-82, as cited preface a disarming reference to the old
by Manuel. legal maxim that "no one is a proper witness
68 Sigmund Freud, History of the Psychoanalytic
for himself [and that] he would be an
Movement, London: Hogarth Press; also, Freud,
An Autobiographical Study, London: Hogarth Press, iniquitous Judge, and would crush underfoot
1948, pp. 54-55, where he seeks "to put an end the laws of all the people, who would admit
to the glib repetition of the view that whatever is anyone as a lawful witness in his own
of value in psycho-analysis is merely borrowed from
the ideas of Janet . . . historically psycho-analysis
cause." 70 We can gauge the immense pres-
is completely independent of Janet's discoveries,
just as in its content it diverges from them and 70 There is a sizeable library discussing the
goes far beyond them." For Janet's not always Newton-Leibniz controversy. I have drawn chiefly
delicate insinuations, see his Psychological Healing, upon More, op. cit., who devotes the whole of
New York: Macmillan, 1925, I, pp. 601-640. Chapter XV to this subject; Auguste de Morgan,
69 Ernest Jones, Sigmund Freud: Life and Work, Essays on the Life and Works of Newton, Chicago:
London: Hogarth Press, 1955, Vol. II, p. 112. Open Court Pub. Co., 1914, esp. Appendix II; and
sures for self-vindication that must have in abstracts, as when Halley urged Newton
operated for such a man as Newton to have to do so in order to secure "his invention to
adopted these means for defense of his valid himself till such time as he would be at
claims. It was not because Newton was so leisure to publish it." 72 There is also the
weak but because the institutionalized values long-standing practice of depositing sealed
were so strong that he was driven to such and dated manuscripts with scientific acade-
lengths. mies in order to protect both priority and
This interplay of offensive and defensive idea.73 Scientific journals often print the
maneuvers-no doubt, students of the theory date on which the manuscript of a published
of games can recast it more rigorously- article was received, thus serving, even apart
thus gives further emphasis to priority. Sci- from such intent, to register the time it first
entists try to exonerate themselves in advance came to notice. Numerous personal expe-
from possible charges of filching by going dients have been developed: for example,
to great lengths to establish their priority of letters detailing one's own ideas are sent
discovery. Often, this kind of anticipatory off to a potential rival, thus disarming him;
defense produces the very result it was de- preliminary and confidential reports are cir-
signed to avoid by inviting others to show culated among a chosen few; personal
that prior announcement or publication need records of research are meticulously dated
not mean there was no plagiary. (as by Kelvin). Finally, it has often been
The effort to safegard priority and to have suggested that the functional equivalent of
proof of one's integrity has led to a variety a patent-office be established in science to
of institutional arrangements designed to adjudicate rival claims to priority.74
cope with this strain on the system of re- In prolonged and yet overly quick sum-
wards. In the seventeenth century, for ex- mary, these are some of the forms of deviance
ample, and even as late as the nineteenth, invited by the institutional emphasis on
discoveries were sometimes reported in the priority and some of the institutional expe-
form of anagrams-as with Galileo's "triple dients devised to reduce the frequency of
star" of Saturn and Hooke's law of tension- these deviations. But as we would expect
from the theory of alternative responses to
for the double purpose of establishing prior-
excessively emphasized goals, other forms of
ity of conception and of yet not putting
behavior, verging toward deviance though
rivals on to one's original ideas, until they
still well within the law and not as subject to
had been further worked out.7' Then, as
moral disapproval as the foregoing, have also
now, complex ideas were quickly published
made their appearance.
Alternative Responses to Emphasis on Orig-
Brewster, op. cit., Chapter XXII; cf. Cohen, op. cit.,
who is properly critical of the biography by More inality. The large majority of scientists, like
at various points (e.g., pp. 84-85). On the basis the large majority of artists, writers, doctors,
of his examination of the Portsmouth Papers, More
bankers and bookkeepers, have little pros-
concludes that "the principals, and practically all
those associated with them wantonly made state-
ments which were false; and not one of them came 72 Thomas Birch, The History of the Royal
through with a clean record." (P. 567.) E. N. Society of London, London, 1756-1757, Vol. IV,
da C. Andrade has aptly summed up Newton's p. 437.
ambivalence in this judgment: "Evidence can be 73 For a recent instance, see the episode de-
cited for the view that Newton was modest or scribed by Wiener in which the race between Bouli-
most overweening; the truth is that he was a very gand and Wiener to contribute new concepts "in
complex character . . . when not worried or irri- potential theory" ended in a "dead heat," since
tated he was modest about his achievements." See Bouligand had submitted his "results to the [French]
also Andrade's Sir Isaac Newton, London: Collins, Academy in a sealed envelope, after a custom sanc-
1954, esp. pp. 131-132. tioned by centuries of academy tradition," (Wiener,
71 The earlier widespread use of anagrams is op. cit., p. 92.)
well-known. As late as the 19th century, the physi- 74 J. Hettinger, "Problems of Scientific Prop-
cists Balfour Stewart and P. G. Tait reintroduced erty and Its Solution," Science Progress, 26 (Janu-
this practice and "to secure priority . . . [took] ary, 1932), pp. 449-461; also the paper by Dr.
the unusual step of publishing [their idea] as an A. L. Soresi, of the New York Academy of Medi-
anagram in Nature some months before' the publi- cine, cited by Bernhard J. Stern, Social Factors in
cation of their book." Sir J. J. Thomson, Recollec- Medical Progress, New York: Columbia University
tions and Reflections, London: G. Bell, 1936, p. 22. Press, 1927, p. 108.
pect of great and decisive originality. For To this point (and I provide comfort by
most of us artisans of research, getting things reporting that the end of the paper is in
into print becomes a symbolic equivalent to sight), we have examined types of deviant
making a significant discovery. Nor could responses to the institutional emphasis on
science advance without the great unending priority that are active responses: the fabri-
flow of papers reporting careful investiga- cation of "data," aggressive self-assertion,
tions, even if these are routine rather than the denouncing of rivals, plagiary, and
distinctly original. The indispensable report- charges of plagiary. Other scientists have re-
ing of research can, however, become con- sponded to the same pressures passively or
verted into an itch to publish that, in turn, at least by internalizing their aggressions and
becomes aggravated by the tendency, in many directing them against themselves.78 Since
academic institutions, to transform the sheer these passive responses, unlike the active
number of publications into a ritualized ones, are private and often not publicly ob-
measure of scientific or scholarly accomplish- servable, they seldom enter the historical
ment.75 record. This need not mean, of course, that
The urge to publish is given a further push passive withdrawal from the competition for
by the moral imperative of science to make originality in science is infrequent; it might
one's work known to others; it is the ob- simply mean that the men responding in this
verse to the culturally repudiated practice of fashion do not come to public notice, unless
jealously hoarding scientific knowledge for they do so after their accomplishments have
oneself. As Priestley liked to say, "whenever qualified them for the pages of history.
he discovered a new fact in science, he in- Chief among these passive deviant re-
stantly proclaimed it to the world, in order sponses is what has been described, on oc-
that other minds might be employed upon casion, as retreatism, the abandoning of the
it besides his own." 76 Indeed, John Aubrey, once-esteemed cultural goal of originality
that seventeenth-century master of the and of practices directed toward reaching
thumbnail biography and member of the that goal. In such instances, the scientist
Royal Society, could extend the moral im- withdraws from the field of inquiry, either by
perative for communication of knowledge to giving up science altogether or by confining
justify even plagiary if the original author himself to some alternative role in it, such
will not put his ideas into print. In his view as teaching or administration. (This does
it was better to have scientific goods stolen not say, of course, that teaching and admin-
and circulated than to have them lost en- istration do not have their own attractions,
tirely.77 or that they are less significant than inquiry;
I refer here only to the scientists who reluc-
75There is not space here to examine the in-
tantly abandon their research because it does
stitutional conditions which lead the piling up of
publications to become a virtually ritualistic activity. not measure up to their own standards of
76 Priestley's remark as paraphrased by his excellence.)
longtime friend, T. L. Hawkes, and reported by A few historical instances of such retreat-
George Wilson, op. cit., p. 111. The 17th-century
Dutch genius of microscopy, Anton van Leeuwen-
ism must stand in place of more. The nine-
hoek, also adopted a policy, as he described it, teenth-century physicist Waterston, his
that "whenever I found out anything remarkable, classic paper on molecular velocity having
I have thought it my duty to put down my dis-
covery on paper, so that all ingenious people might
been rejected by the Royal Society as "noth-
be, informed thereof." (Quoted by Major, History
of Medicine, Vol. I, p. 531.) The same sentiment owneing the authors. This frequently of which they
was expressed by St.-Simon, among many others. complained. But though he does an Injury to the
Cf. Manuel, op. cit., pp. 63-64. Inventors, he does good to Learning, in publishing
77 Aubrey could say, irresponsibly and probably such curious notions, which the author (especially
without malice, that the mathematician John Sir Christopher Wren) might never have the leisure
Wallis "may stand with much glory upon his owne to write of himselfe," (John Aubrey, Brief Lives,
basis, and need not be beholding to any man, for ed. by Andrew Clark, Oxford, 1898, Vol. II, pp.
Fame, yet he is so greedy of glorie, tlat he steales 281-282.)
feathers from others to adorn his own cap; e.g. he 78 The distinction between active and passive
lies at watch, at Sir Christopher Wren's discours, forms of deviant behavior is drawn from Talcott
Mr. Robert Hooke's, &c.; putts down their notions Parsons, The Social System, Glencoe: The Free
in his note booke, and then prints it, without Press, 1951, pp. 256-267.
ing but nonsense," becomes hopelessly dis- in all truth, that he cannot express his en-
couraged and leaves science altogether.79 thusiasm as fully as he would like, for "to
Deeply disappointed by the lack of response praise it, would be to praise myself. Indeed,
to his historic papers on heredity, Mendel the whole contents of the work, the path
refuses to publish the now-permanently lost taken by your son, the results to which he
results of his further research and, after be- is led, coincide almost entirely with my
coming abbot of his monastery, gives up his meditations, which have occupied my mind
research on heredity.80 Robert Mayer, tor- partly for the last thirty or thirty-five years
mented by refusals to grant him priority for . . . I am very glad that it is just the son
the principle of conservation of energy, tries of my old friend, who takes the precedence
a suicide leap from a third-story window and of me in such a remarkable manner." De-
succeeds only in breaking his legs and being lighted by this accolade, the elder Bolyai
straitjacketed, for a time, in an insane sends the letter to his son, innocently saying
asylum.8' that it is "very satisfactory and redounds to
Perhaps the most telling instance of re- the honor of our country and our nation."
treatism in mathematics is that of Janos Young Bolyai reads the letter, but has no
Bolyai, inventor of one of the non-Euclidean eye for the statements which say that his
geometries. The young Bolyai tries to obey ideas are sound, that in the judgment of
his mathematician-father who, out of the the incomparable Gauss he is blessed with
bitter fruits of his own experience, warns hisgenius. He sees only that Gauss has antici-
son to give up any effort to prove the postu- pated him. For a time, he believes that his
late on parallels-or, as his father more pic- father must have previously confided his
turesquely put it, to "detest it just as much ideas to Gauss who had thereupon made them
as lewd intercourse; it can deprive you of his own.82 His priority lost, and, with the
all your leisure, your health, your rest, and further blow, years later, of coming upon
the whole happiness of your life." He duti- Lobachevsky's non-Euclidean geometry, he
fully becomes an army officer instead, but never again publishes any work in mathe-
his demon does not permit the twenty-one- matics.83
year-old Bolyai to leave the postulate alone.
After years of work, he develops his geom- 82 The principal source on the Bolyais, including
etry, sends the manuscript to his father whothe germane correspondence, is Paul Stackel, Wolf-
in turn transmits it to Gauss, the prince of gang und Johann Bolyai, Geometrische Unter-
suchungen, Leipzig: 1913, two vols. which was not
mathematicians, for a magisterial opinion. available to me at this writing. An excellent short
Gauss sees in the work proof of authentic account is provided by Roberto Bonola, Non-
genius, writes the elder Bolyai so, and adds,Euclidean Geometry (trans. by H. S. Carslaw), La
Salle, Illinois: Open Court Publishing Company,
79Murray, op. cit., pp. 346-348; and David L. 1938, 2d rev. ed., pp. 96-113; see also Dirk J.
Watson, Scientists are Human, London: Watts & Struik, A Concise History of Mathematics, New
Co., 1938, pp. 58, 80; Baron Rayleigh, op. cit., York: Dover Publications, 1948, Vol. II, pp. 251-
169-171. Evidently, Sidney Lee, the editor of the 254; Franz Schmidt, "Lebensgeschichte des Un-
Dictionary of National Biography by the time it garischen Mathematikers Johann Bolyai de Bolya,"
reached the volume in which Waterston should have Abhandlungen zur Geschichte der M athematik, 8
had an honored place, could not penetrate the ob- (1898), pp. 135-146.
scurity into which the great discoverer was plunged 83 Two letters provide context for Bolyai's
by the unfounded rejection of his work; there is great fall from the high peak of exhilaration into
no biography of Waterston in the DNB. the slough of despond. In 1823, he writes his
80 Hugo Iltis, Life of Mendel, New York: father: ". . . the goal is not yet reached, but I
W. W. Norton, 1932, pp. 111-112; and see Mendel's have made such wonderful discoveries that I have
prophetic remark, "My time will come," p. 282. been almost overwhelmed by them, and it would
81 Mayer's having been rejected by his liberal be the cause of continual regret if they were lost.
friends who took part in the revolution of 1848, When you will see them, you too will recognize it.
which he as a conservative opposed, may have con- In the meantime I can say only this: I have cre-
tributed to his disturbance. For some recent evi- ated a new universe from nothing. All that I have
dence on how Mayer's priority was safeguarded by sent you till now is but a house of cards com-
the lay-sociologist Josef Popper, see Otto Blilh, pared to the tower. I am as fully persuaded that
"The Value of Inspiration: A Study on Julius it will bring me honor, as if I had already com-
Robert Mayer and Josef Popper-Lynkeus," Isis, pleted the discovery." And just as, a generation
43 (September, 1952), pp. 211-220. Bluh's opinion later, Lyell was prophetically to warn Darwin of
that claims of priority in science are no longer being forestalled, so does the elder Bolyai warn the
taken seriously seems exaggerated. younger: "If you have really succeeded in the
Apart from historical cases of notable tically no relation to their merits and ef-
scientists retreating from the field after de- forts." 86
nial of the recognition owing them, there are Kubie hazards some further observations
many contemporary cases that come to the that read almost as if they were describing
notice of psychiatrists rather than historians. the behavior of delinquents in response to
Since Lawrence Kubie is almost alone among a condition of relative anomie. "Success or
psychiatrists to have described these in print, failure, whether in specific investigations or
I shall draw upon his pertinent account of in an entire career may be almost accidental,
the maladaptations of scientists suffering with chance a major factor in determining
from an unquenched thirst for original dis- not what is discovered, but when and by
covery and ensuing praise. whom. . .. Yet young students are not
When the scientist's aspirations become warned that their future success may be
too lofty to be realized, the result sometimes determined by forces which are outside their
is apathy, imbued with fantasy. In Kubie's own creative capacity or their willingness to
words. work hard." 87 As a result of all this, Kubie
the young scientist may dwell for years in suspects the emergence of what he calls a
secret contemplation of his own unspoken "new psychosocial ailment among scientists
hope of making great scientific discoveries. which may not be wholly unrelated to the
As time goes on, his silence begins to frightengangster tradition of dead-end kids. Are
him; and in the effort to master his fear, he we witnessing the development of a genera-
may build up a secret feeling that his very tion of hardened, cynical, amoral, embittered,
silence is august, and that once he is ready todisillusioned young scientists?"
reveal his theories, they will shake the world.
Lacking the evidence, this had best be
Thus a secret megalomania can hide among
left as a rhetorical question. But the import
the ambitions of the young research worker.84
of the question needs comment. There have
Perhaps most stressful of all is the situa- been diagnoses of the ways in which a cul-
tion in which the recognition accorded the
ture giving emphasis to aspirations for all,
scientist is not proportioned to his industry
aspirations which cannot be realized by
or even to the merit of his work. He may
many, exerts a pressure for deviant behavior
find himself serving primarily to remove
and for cynicism, for rejection of the reigning
obstacles to fundamental discoveries by
moralities and the rules of the game. We see
others. His "negative experiments clear the
road for the steady advance of science, but here the possibility that the same pressures
at the same time they clear the road for the may in some degree be at work in the insti-
more glamorous successes of other scientists, tution of science. But even though the pres-
who may have used no greater intelligence,
skill or devotion; perhaps even less." 85 86 Gilbert Murray, quoted in a similar theo-
retical context by Merton, op. cit., p. 147.
Like other men, scientists become disturbed
871bid., pp. 111-112. This reading of the case
by the pan-human problem of evil, in which is not inconsistent with the facts of multiple inde-
"the fortunes of men seem to bear prac- pendent discoveries and inventions. As the long
history of multiple discoveries makes clear, and as
question, it is right that no time be lost in makingW. F. Ogburn and D. S. Thomas among the soci-
it public, for two reasons: first, because ideas pass ologists have shown, certain discoveries become
easily from one to another, who can anticipate its almost "inevitable" when the cultural base cumu-
publication; and secondly, there is some truth in lates to a certain level. But this still leaves some
this, that many things have an epoch, in which theyindeterminacy in the matter of who will first make
are found at the same time in several places, just the discovery. Kubie mentions some "near-misses"
as the violets appear on every side in spring. Also of discoveries that suggest undoubted merit is not
every scientific struggle is just a serious war, in all when it comes to the first formulation of a dis-
which I cannot say when peace will arrive. Thus covery, and this list can be greatly extended. In
we ought to conquer when we are able, since the the nature of the case, moreover, we often do not
advantage is ways to the first comer." (Quoted know of those scientists who have abandoned a
by Bonola, op. cit., pp. 98, 99.) Small wonder that line of inquiry that was moving toward a particular
though young Bolyai continued to work sporadically discovery when they found it had been made and
in mathematics, he never again published the results announced by another. These "personal tragedies"
of his work. of near-discovery-tragedy in terms of the prevail-
84 Kubie, "Some Unsolved Problems of the Sci- ing cutural belief that all credit is due him who
entific Career," op. cit., p. 110. is "first,"-are the silent tragedies that leave no
85 Ibid. mark in the historiography of science.
sures are severe, they need not produce not confined within functional limits. Once
deviant behavior. There are great differences it becomes established, forces of rivalrous
between the social structure of science and interaction lead it to get out of hand. Recog-
other social structures in which deviance is nition of priority, operating to reward those
frequent. Among other things, the institution who advanced science materially by being
of science continues to have an abiding em- the first to make a significant discovery, be-
phasis on other values that curb the cultur- comes a sentiment in its own right. Ration-
ally induced tendency toward deviation, an alized as a means of providing incentives for
emphasis on the value of truth by whomso- original work and as expressing esteem for
ever it is found, and a commitment to the those who have done much to advance sci-
disinterested pursuit of truth. Simply be- ence, it becomes transformed into an end-in-
cause we have focused on the deviant be- itself. It becomes stepped up to a dysfunc-
havior of scientists, we should not forget tional extreme far beyond the limits of
how relatively rare this is. Only a few try utility.89 It can even reach the revealing ex-
to gain reputation by means that will lose treme where, for example, the permanent
them repute. Scientists may feel the pres- secretary of the French Academy of Sciences,
sures whose institutional sources I have Frangois Arago, could exclaim (apropos of
tried to describe, but we can suppose that the controversy involving Cavendish and
most will continue in the future as they Watt) that to describe discoveries as having
manifestly have done in the past to abide been made " 'about the same time' proves
by the institutional norms. nothing; questions as to priority may depend
on weeks, on days, on hours, on minutes." 90
FUNCTIONS AND DYSFUNCTIONS OF EMPHASIS
When the criteria of priority become as
ON PRIORITY
finely discriminated as this-and Arago only
It has sometimes been said that the em- put in words what many others have ex-
phasis upon recognition of priority has the pressed in behavior-then priority has lost
function of motivating scientists to make
discoveries. For example, Sir Frederick the social benefit of the advancement of science.
Banting, the major figure in the discovery of Men of science, he said, "have the highest motives
insulin-therapy for diabetes, was long dis- that can animate the pursuits of a generous mind.
They consider themselves as under the notice of
turbed by the conviction that the chief of
the public, to which every ingenious person labours
his department had been given too much to approve himself. A love of fame and a laudable
credit for what he had contributed to the dis- ambition allure him with the most powerful charms.
covery. Time and again, Banting returned These passions have, in all ages, fired the souls of
heroes, of patriots, of lovers of science, have made
to the importance of allocating due credit for them renowned in war, eminent in government and
a discovery: ". . . it makes research men," peace, justly celebrated for the improvement of
he said. "It stimulates the individuality and polite and useful knowledge." In effect, "other-
develops personality. Our religion, our moral directedness" can be functional to the society, pro-
viding that the criteria of judgment by others are
fabric, our very basis of life are centered
sound. See John Morgan, A Discourse upon the
round the idea of reward. It is not abnormal Institution of Medical Schools in America, photo-
therefore that the research man should desire offset reprint of first edition, Philadelphia, 1765,
the kudos of his own work and his own idea. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1937, pp.
59-60.
If this is taken away from him, the greatest
89 For suggestive observations on the process
stimulant for work is withdrawn." 88 of "stepping up patterns to unanticipated extremi-
From this, it would seem that the insti- ties," a process which he called "perseveration,"
tutional emphasis is maintained with an eye see W. I. Thomas, Primitive Behavior, New York:
McGraw-Hill, 1937, p. 9 and passim; see also,
to its functional utility. But as I have tried
Merton, op. cit., pp. 199 ff. As I have tried to show
to show, the emphasis upon priority is often in this paper, science has experienced this step-
ping-up of functional norms to an extreme at
88 Quoted in Lloyd Stevenson, Sir Frederick which they become dysfunctional to the workings
Banting, London: Heinemann Medical Books, 1947, of the institution.
p. 301. Two hundred years before, John Morgan, 90 M. [F.] Arago, Historical loge of James
the celebrated founder of the first American medi- Watt, trans. by J. P. Muirhead, London, 1839, p.
cal school, had expressed the same conception, but 106. The whole of this document and Arago's role
in sociologically more acceptable terms. To his in the Adams-LeVerrier controversy clearly exem-
mind, personal motivation for fame was linked with plify the forces producing conflicts over priority.
all functional significance. For when two Against this cultural and social back-
scientists independently make the same dis- ground, one can begin to glimpse the sources,
covery months or weeks apart, to say noth- other than idiosyncratic ones, of the mis-
ing of days or hours, it can scarcely be behavior of individual scientists. The culture
thought that one has exhibited greater origi- of science is, in this measure, pathogenic. It
nality than the other or that the short in- can lead scientists to develop an extreme
terim that separates them can be used to concern with recognition which is in turn
speed up the rate of scientific achievement. the validation by peers of the worth of their
work. Contentiousness, self-assertive claims,
CONCLUSION
secretiveness lest one be forestalled, reporting
only the data that support an hypothesis,
The interpretation I have tried to de- false charges of plagiarism, even the occa-
velop here is not, I am happy to say, a new sional theft of ideas and in rare cases, the
one. Nor do I consider it fully established fabrication of data,-all these have appeared
and beyond debate. After all, neither under in the history of science and can be thought
the laws of logic nor under the laws of any of as deviant behavior in response to a dis-
other realm, must one become permanently crepancy between the enormous emphasis in
wed to an hypothesis simply because one has the culture of science upon original discovery
tentatively embraced it. But the interpreta- and the actual difficulty many scientists ex-
tion does seem to account for some of the perience in making an original discovery. In
otherwise puzzling aspects of conflicts over this situation of stress, all manner of adaptive
priority in science and it is closely bound to behaviors are called into play, some of these
a body of sociological theory. being far beyond the mores of science.
In short review, the interpretation is this. All this can be put more generally. We
Like other social institutions, the institution have heard much in recent years about the
of science has its characteristic values, norms, dangers brought about by emphasis on the
and organization. Among these, the emphasis relativity of values, about the precarious
on the value of originality has a self-evident condition of a society in which men do not
rationale, for it is originality that does much believe in values deeply enough and do not
to advance science. Like other institutions feel strongly enough about what they do
also, science has its system of allocating re- believe. If there is a lesson to be learned
wards for performance of roles. These re- from this review of some consequences of a
wards are largely honorific, since even today, belief in the absolute importance of origi-
when science is largely professionalized, the nality, perhaps it is the old lesson that un-
pursuit of science is culturally defined as be- restricted belief in absolutes has its dangers
ing primarily a disinterested search for truth
too. It can produce the kind of fanatic zeal
and only secondarily, a means of earning a
in which anything goes. In its way, the abso-
livelihood. In line with the value-emphasis,
lutizing of values can be just as damaging
rewards are to be meted out in accord with
as the decay of values to the life of men in
the measure of accomplishment. When the
society.91
institution operates effectively, the aug-
menting of knowledge and the augmenting
91 Limitations of time and space do not allow
of personal fame go hand in hand; the insti-
me to do as I originally intended: to examine pat-
tutional goal and the personal reward are terns of rediscovery, that is, the independent but
tied together. But these institutional values considerably later discovery of something that had
have the defects of their qualities. The in- been found before but was since lost to view. These
patterns have their own sociological characteristics
stitution can get partly out of control, as
which have not been considered here. A systematic
the emphasis upon originality and its recog- sociological investigation of priority and rediscovery
nition is stepped up. The more thoroughly in science is being planned to test the validity of
scientists ascribe an unlimited value to origi- the interpretations set out in this paper and of other
nality, the more they are in this sense dedi- hypotheses mercifully omitted from it.
It is of some interest that just when this paper
cated to the advancement of knowledge, the
was in galley proof, all the world came to experience
greater is their involvement in the successful the social, political, and scientific repercussions of a
outcome of inquiry and their emotional vul- spectacular "first" in science, when Russian scien-
nerability to failure. tists put a man-made sphere into space.