The Importance of Inefficiency in Science

The rapid growth of science in the last century is itself in part responsible for its present difficulties. The scientist has remained far too concentrated on the immediate work in hand to notice the slowly growing complexity of the organization in which he is working. That is not to say that if the sources of inefficiency were removed, science would advance twice to 10 times as fast because under the present conditions of limited funds and recruitment,. any substantial increase in the rate of scientific advance would bring it up against these limiting factors.