The Growth of Science — Its Promise and Its Dangers

Abstract

The statistics of the growth of science in the U. S. during the postwar years read like a success story. The total expenditures for research and development were 3.5 billion dollars in 1947; they were over 20 billion in 1963. It is true that the gross national product also greatly increased during that period: it grew from about 200 billion dollars to almost 600. Nevertheless, even the percentage of the gross national product devoted to research and development more than doubled by 1963 its value of 1¾ per cent in 1947. This means that more than three people in a hundred now work directly or indirectly for increasing our store of knowledge, or for developing new methods of production of commodities now available, or on the design and production of new commodities. The increase of the annual federal expenditure on science and development was even more spectacular: it grew from one billion in 1947 to its present value of 15 billion dollars. None of these figures includes the compensation of the science teachers in our high schools and colleges-those on whom we depend to produce the scientists of tomorrow.¹