Some of the Problems and Difficulties Encountered in the Early Years of Cosmic-Ray Research

Abstract

The history of cosmic rays is a history of failures and difficulties as well as successes. This is true of all fields of research but seems to be especially true in the case of cosmic rays. This arises partly from the difficulty of detecting the radiation in the first place but also from the wholly unexpected nature of the many phenomena encountered. Almost everyone in the game made mistakes. These involved errors not only in the taking of the data because of unknown influences at work but also in the interpretation of even the good data.