Sztuka badań naukowych

The great American bacteriologist Theobald Smith said that he always took up the problem that lay before him, chiefly because of the easy access of material, without which researchis crippled.

Darwin once said half seriously, "Nature will tell you a direct lie if she can."

This resulted in the recognition of the principle of immunisation with attenuated pathogens.

Many of the classic discoveries were anticipated in this way but were not properly developed until the right man came along. Edward Jenner was not the first to inoculate people with cowpox to protect them against smallpox, William Harvey was not the first to postulate circulation of the blood, Darwin was by no means the first to suggest evolution, Columbus was not the first European to go to America, Pasteur was not the first to propound the germ theory of disease, Lister was not the first to use carbolic acid as a wound antiseptic. But these men were the ones who fully developed these ideas and forced them on a reluctant world, and most credit rightly goes to them for bringing the discoveries to fruition.

Hypotheses should be used as tools to uncover new facts rather than as ends in themselves.

There is an interesting saying that no one believes an hypothesis except its originator but everyone believes an experiment except the experimenter. Most people are ready to believe something based on experiment but the experimenter knows the many little things that could have gone wrong in the experiment. For this reason the discoverer of a new fact seldom feels quite so confident of it as do others. On the other hand other people are usually critical of an hypothesis, whereas the originator identifies himself with it and is liable to become devoted to it. It is as well to remember this when criticising someone's suggestion, because you may offend and discourage him if you scorn the idea. A corollary to this observation that an hypothesis is a very personal matter, is that a scientist usually works much better when pursuing his own than that of someone else. It is the originator who gets both the personal satisfaction and most of the credit if his idea is proved correct, even if he does not do the work himself A man working on an hypothesis which is not his own often abandons it after one or two unsuccessful attempts because he lacks the strong desire to confirm it which is necessary to drive him to give it a thorough trial and think out all possible ways of varying the conditions of the experiment. Knowing this, the tactful director of research tries to lead the worker himself to suggest the line of work and then lets him feel the idea was his.

More serious is the fact that false hypotheses or concepts sometimes survive which, far from being productive, are actually responsible for holding up the advance of science.

More serious is the fact that false hypotheses or concepts sometimes survive which, far from being productive, are actually responsible for holding up the advance of science. Two examples are the old notion that every metal contains mercury, and the phlogiston doctrine. According to the latter, every combustible substance contains a constituent which is given up on burning, called phlogiston. This notion for long held up the advance of chemistry, and stood in the way of an understanding of combustion, oxidation, reduction, and other processes. It was finally exposed as a fallacy by Lavoisier in 1778, but the great English scientists, Priestley, Watt and Cavendish, clung to the belief for some time afterwards and Priestley had not been converted to the new outlook when he died in 1804.

Probably the main characteristic of the trained thinker is that he does not jump to conclusions on insufficient evidence as the untrained man is inclined to do.

As dr. E. L. Taylor says: "New associations and fresh ideas are more likely to come out of a varied store of memories and experience than out of a collection that is all of one kind". Scientists who have made important original contributions have often had wide interests or have taken up the study of a subject different from the one in which they were originally trained. Originahty often consists in finding connections or analogies between two or more objects or ideas not previously shown to have any bearing on each other.

Asking "why" is a useful stimulus towards imagining what the cause or purpose may be. "How" is also a useful question in provoking thought about the mechanism of a process.

Zastanawiając się nad celowością ogromnego i ciągłego niszczenia, stanąłem wobec pytania: Dlaczego jedne osobniki umierają a inne przeżywają? Jasne, że spośród wszystkich przeżywają te, które są najlepiej przystosowane do życia… Wtedy olśniło mnie, że ten automatyczny proces mógłby udoskonalić rasę…przeżywałyby osobniki najlepiej przystosowane. Wydało mi się wówczas, że widzę całą doniosłość i skutki tego.

Then it occurred to Wallace that the position was much the same in the animal world.

"Vaguely thinking over the enormous and constant destruction this implied, it occurred to me to ask the question, Why do some die and some live? and the answer was clearly that on the whole the best fitted live. … Then it suddenly flashed upon me that this self-acting process would improve the race … the fittest would survive. Then at once I seemed to see the whole effect of this."

Nicolle comments on the interesting and curious fact that the ancient Peruvian language had a single word (hamavec) for both poet and inventor.

Most people do not realise how often opinions that are supposed to be based on reason are in fact but rationalisations of prejudice or subjective motives.

The French philosopher Rene Descartes made people realise that reason can land us in endless fallacies. His golden rule was : "Give unqualified assent to no propositions but those the truth of which is so clear and distinct that they cannot be doubted."

"The slowness and difficulty with which the human race makes discoveries and its blindness to the most obvious facts, if it happens to be unprepared or unwilling to see them, should suffice to show that there is something gravely wrong about the logician's account of discovery."

" It is not too much to say that the more deference men of science have paid to logic, the worse it has been for the scientific value of their reasoning. . . . Fortunately for the world, however, the great men of science have usually been kept in salutary ignorance of the logical tradition."

Darwin said :
"Science consists in grouping facts so that general laws or conclusions may be drawn from them."

Most biological "facts" and theories are only true under certain conditions and our knowledge is so incomplete that at best we can only reason on probabilities and possibilities.

At a congress on psychology at Gottingen, during one of the meetings, a man suddenly rushed into the room chased by another with a revolver. After a scuffle in the middle of the room a shot was fired and both men rushed out again about twenty seconds after having entered. Immediately the chairman asked those present to write down an account of what they had seen. Although the observers did not know it at the time, the incident had been previously arranged, rehearsed and photographed. Of the forty reports presented, only one had less than 20 per cent mistakes about the principal facts, 14 had from 20 to 40 per cent mistakes, and 25 had more than 40 per cent mistakes. The most noteworthy feature was that in over half the accounts, 10 per cent or more of the details were pure inventions. This poor record was obtained in spite of favourable circumstances, for the whole incident was short and sufficiently striking to arrest attention, the details were immediately written down by people accustomed to scientific observation and no one was himself involved. Experiments of this nature are commonly conducted by psychologists and nearly always produce results of a similar type.

Jakość obserwacji zależy do tego, kto jej dokonuje. Aby obserwacje dokonane przez dwu ludzi były zgodne, muszą oni skupić się, życie ich nie może być zagrożone żadnym niebezpieczeństwem, ich zasadnicze potrzeby życiowe muszą być zaspokojone, a oglądane zjawisko nie ma ich zaskoczyć. Jeśli mają obserwować zjawisko przemijające, muszą obserwacje wielokrotnie powtórzyć, tym bardziej gdy mają dostrzec nie tylko całość, ale i każdy szczegół.

In discussing the thoroughly unreliable nature of eye-witness observation of everyday events, W. H. George says :

"What is observed depends on who is looking. To get some agreement between observers they must be paying attention, their lives must not be consciously in danger, their prime necessities of life must preferably be satisfied and they must not be taken by surprise. If they are observing a transient phenomenon, it must be repeated many times and preferably they must not only look at, but must look for, each detail."

Another illustration of false information arising from the sense organs is provided by placing one hand in hot water and one in cold for a few moments and then plunging them both into tepid water.

Remarkable demonstrations of the unreliability of visual observations are provided by the tricks of "magicians" and conjurors.

Most men can pass a day in the company of a woman and afterwards have only the vaguest ideas about what clothes she wore, but most women after meeting another woman for only a few minutes could describe every article the other was wearing.

Wilfred Trotter powiedział:
„umysł ludzki tak niechętnie znosi cudze koncepcje jak organizm obce białko, reaguje na nie równie energicznie. Nie będzie chyba przesadnym powiedzenie, że nowe koncepcje są najszybciej działającymi antygenami, jakie zna nauka. Gdy uczciwie przypatrzymy się sobie samym, to dostrzeżemy, że często oponujemy jakiejś koncepcji, zanim zostanie dokładnie sprecyzowana”.

Wilfred Trotter said:
"The mind likes a strange idea as little as the body likes a strange protein and resists it with similar energy. It would not perhaps be too fanciful to say that a new idea is the most quickly acting antigen known to science. If we watch ourselves honestly we shall often find that we have begun to argue against a new idea even before it has been completely stated".
In The Collected Papers of Wilfred Trotter, FRS (1941), 186

The dignitaries who hold high honours for past accomplishments do not usually like to see the current of progress rush too rapidly out of their reach.

… każdy oryginalny przyczynek do wiedzy musi pokonać trzy fazy oporu, zanim zostanie uznany: w fazie pierwszej jest on ośmieszany jako nieprawdziwy, niemożliwy lub nieużyteczny; w fazie drugiej przyznaje się odkryciu pewien sens, lecz odmawia mu się jakiegokolwiek znaczenia praktycznego; natomiast w fazie trzeciej, w której odkrycie zyskało powszechne uznanie, zjawiają się ludzie, którzy stwierdzają, że odkrycie nie jest oryginalne, gdyż zostało dokonane wcześniej przez innych.

It has been said that the reception of an original contribution to knowledge may be divided into three phases: during the first it is ridiculed as not true, impossible or useless; during the second, people say there may be something in it but it would never be of any practical use; and in the third and final phase, when the discovery has received general recognition, there are usually people who say that it is not original and has been anticipated by others.

The mental resistance to new ideas is partly due to the fact that they have to displace established ideas. New facts are not usually accepted unless they can be correlated with the existing body of knowledge; it is often not sufficient that they can be demonstrated on independent evidence. Therefore premature discoveries are usually neglected and lost. An unreasoning, instinctive mental resistance to novelty is the real basis of excessive scepticism and conservatism.

…the anti-planners (in England there is a Society for Freedom in Science) maintain that the research worker who is organised becomes only a routine investigator because, with the loss of intellectual freedom, originality cannot flourish.

There exists in some circles a certain amount of intellectual snobbery and tendency to look disdainfully on applied investigation. This attitude is based on the following two false ideas : that new knowledge is only discovered by pure research while applied research merely seeks to apply knowledge already available, and that pure research is a higher intellectual activity because it requires greater scientific ability and is more difficult. Both these ideas are quite wrong.

In many respects the research worker resembles the pioneer. He explores the frontiers of knowledge and requires many of the same attributes : enterprise and initiative, readiness to face difficulties and overcome them with his own resourcefulness and ingenuity, perseverance, a spirit of adventure, a certain dissatisfaction with well-known territory and prevailing ideas, and an eagerness to try his own judgment. Probably the two most essential attributes for the research worker are a love of science and an insatiable curiosity.

People may be divided roughly into those who habitually react vigorously to external influences—including ideas—and those who are passive and accept things as they come. The former question everything they are told even as children and often rebel against the conventional. They are curious and want to find out things for themselves. The other type fits into life with less trouble and, other things being equal, more easily accumulates information given as formal teaching. The mind of this latter type becomes furnished with generally accepted ideas and set opinions, whereas the reactive type has fewer fixed opinions and his mind remains free and flexible. Of course, not everyone can be classed as belonging to one of these two extremes, but clearly those approximating to the passive type are not cut out for research.

Ordinary examinations are not a good guide to a student's ability at research, because they tend to favour the accumulators of knowledge rather than the thinkers. Brilliant examinees are sometimes no good at research, while on the other hand some famous scientists have made a poor showing at examinations. Paul Ehrlich only got through his final medical examinations by the grace of the examiners who had the good sense to give recognition to his special talents, and Einstein failed at the entrance examination to the Polytechnic School. Probably the student who is reflective and critical is at a disadvantage in accumulating information as compared with the student who accepts without question all he is told. Charles Nicolle goes so far as to say that the inventive genius is not able to store knowledge and that inventiveness may be killed by bad teaching, fixed ideas and erudition.

Some psychologists consider that man's best work is usually done under adversity and that mental stress and even physical pain may act as a mental stimulant. Many prominent men have suffered from psychological troubles and various difficulties but for which perhaps they would never have put forward that effort required to excel.

Lord Kelvin wrote :
"One word characterises the most strenuous of the efforts for the advancement of science that I have made perseveringly during fifty-five years; that word is failure."

Diversion and holidays are very much a question of individual requirements but freshness and originality may be lost if the scientist works unremittingly for too long. In this connection a good maxim has been coined by Jowett : "Don't spare; don't drudge." Most of us require recreation and variety in interests to avoid becoming dull, stodgy and mentally constipated.

Czego chcę życzyć tej młodzieży mego kraju, która poświęciła się pracy naukowej?

Po pierwsze: pracy etapami. O tym tak ważnym warunku owocnej pracy naukowej nigdy nie mogę mówić bez wzruszenia. Stopniowo, stopniowo, stopniowo… nigdy nie rozpoczynajcie rzeczy następnej, zanim nie osiągniecie doskonałości w poprzedniej… Nie bądźcie tylko zbieraczami faktów. Usiłujcie przeniknąć tajemnicę mechanizmu zjawiska, wytrwale poszukując praw nim rządzących.

Po drugie: skromności… nigdy nie pozwalajcie unosić się pysze. Jeśli bowiem dojdzie do tego, że będziecie przeczyli tam, gdzie należy się zgodzić, będziecie odrzucać rzeczy pożyteczne i przyjacielską pomoc, utracicie obiektywizm.

Po trzecie: pasji. Pamiętajcie, że nauka wymaga od człowieka całego życia. Nie wystarczy nawet, gdybyście mieli dwa życia. Pracujcie i poszukujcie z pasją.

With advancing age most minds become less receptive to new ideas suggested by others and probably also arising from their work or thinking. William Harvey stated that no man over forty accepted the idea of the circulation when he first advanced it. The reason why many lose their productivity about middle age is often simply due to their having taken on administrative responsibilities that do not allow time for research. In other cases indolence develops with middle age and security, and drive is lost. Contact with young minds often helps to preserve freshness of outlook. Whatever the reasons for the frequent falling off of productivity after middle age, its occurrence shows that accumulation of knowledge and experience is not the main factor in successful research.

Lehman has collected some interesting data about man's most creative time of life. He extracted data from sources such as A Series of Primers of the History of Medicine and An Introduction to the History of Medicine, and found that the maximum output of people born between 1750 and 1850 was during the decade of life 30 to 39 years. Taking this as 100 per cent, the output for the decade 20—29 years was 30—40 per cent; for 40-49 years, 75 per cent; 50-59 years, about 30 per cent. Probably man's inventiveness and originality begins to decrease at an early age, possibly even in the 20s, but this is offset by increased experience, knowledge and wisdom.

W. Ostwald considered that the frequent decrease of productivity with increasing age is due to too long familiarity with the same subject.