Abstract
THE recently issued report of the Royal Commission, which has dealt with the private manufacture and sale of munitions of war, contains a number of special points of particular interest to the scientific worker. A considerable amount of evidence was laid before the Commission designed to show that the manufacture of armaments should be concentrated in Government hands to promote the development of research, design and invention. It was argued that centralization of research work under unified control prevents dissipation of effort and that closer contact is possible between research and experimental work in Government stations, which have greater facilities than private establishments for experiment. Similarly, it was urged that money is more readily available for research in Government establishments, where there is not the necessity to visualize a prospect of dividend on capital that there is with private enterprise, as well as the danger of prejudicing the interests of the State if a private manufacturer does not develop a new invention which may not be to his own advantage, the motive of profit-making in certain circumstances tending to retard the development of new ideas.
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Armaments and the Scientific Worker. Nature 138, 987–988 (1936). https://doi.org/10.1038/138987a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/138987a0