When conditions are changing rapidly, policies for national welfare are especially in need of guiding principles. To this end, knowledge of probable technological trends is, in modern times, of very great help. This idea which is the subject of this section of the report of the National Resources Committee may be set forth briefly in a paragraph.

In an age of great change, anticipation of what will probably happen is a necessity for the executives at the helm of the ship of state. A study of invention offers a very good clue to future social conditions and problems of a nation. For, of four material factors that determine the economic well-being of nations, to wit, invention, population, natural resources, and economic organization, the first changes the most frequently in the modern world and hence is most often a cause. Thus, there are 50,000 patents a year and some of them have great influence. For instance, the airplane will change the nature of national defense in case of war. In this case the growth of the airplane precedes the development of national defense. This sequence is common. The scientific achievement comes first and the social effects later. The fact that there is a lag makes invention a social barometer. The production curve of automobiles forecasts the growth of suburbs. Furthermore, since it requires a quarter of a century more or less for an invention to be perfected and to be put into wide use, it is possible to anticipate their results some years ahead. Whether the social effects of inventions can in practice be read off this barometer with sureness is doubtful in the present stage of the advancement of social science. But that inventions are an indicator seems clear though it may require special education so to use them. The usefulness of scientific discovery as a guide for national policy is also strengthened because of (a) the great variety of inventions and (b) the number of points of contact between a modern government and the affairs of its citizens. It follows, then, that whether plans are made and executed or not, trying to anticipate is an endeavor of prime importance, unless drifting is to be the course.

These conclusions were at the basis of the recommendations of the President's Research Committee on Social Trends appointed by President Hoover in the autumn of 1929 and which reported their findings 3 years later in their report, Recent Social Trends. In

1 Professor of Sociology, University of Chicago.

discussing the vast complexity of problems that confront our Nation, that committee found "* * that the clue to their understanding as well as the hope for improvement lies in the fact of social change. Not all parts of our organization are changing at the same speed, or at the same time. Some are rapidly moving forward and others are lagging. These unequal rates of change in economic life, in government, in education, in science and religion make zones of danger and points of tension *. Scientific discoveries and inventions instigate changes first in the economic organization and social habits which are most closely associated with them The next

** *

*

Thus the analysis in the Committee's report, which is here quoted because of its significance for national policies, was based upon a recognized lack of balance in civilization occasioned by unequal rates of change in the different parts of the social organism, beginning in point of time with mechanical invention and scientific discovery. Thus invention and discovery become guides to future changes, though, of course, not the only ones; nor are they infallible.

This report of the National Resources Committee then begins where the President's Committee on Social Trends left off. The development proceeds from this point in the sections which follow. Great Inventions and Progress in the Twentieth Century

The significance of technology for economic and social life may be shown by considering certain developments of the twentieth century. Only 35 years have elapsed since the beginning of the century, during which time the Nation has experienced a phase of unparalleled development. Most of the Members of the present Congress had at that time finished school and college, and were already launched on the career that was to place them among the policy-makers of the Nation. It would have been enlightening for them to have looked ahead then at the probable course of technology. A scanning of the technological horizon at that time would have revealed the beginnings of several of our largest industries, based upon inventions then relatively new.

For instance, there were not many telephones in use in 1900, around a million in number. Yet the telephone industry was destined to grow into the third largest public utility in the United States, with an investment of nearly $5,000,000,000 and giving employment to hundreds of thousands. Its influence has been far reaching. It broke the isolation of the farms, increased the number of business transactions, and speeded the tempo of modern life. Its importance to special industries, such as newspapers, has been of inestimable value. It has tended to break down State lines, to eradicate regional differences, and to increase international contacts. It has been of aid in safety, in transportation, in fighting fires, and crime.

The automobile was just coming into use in 1900, as is illustrated by the newspaper comments of the time commending Theodore Roosevelt for his "characteristic courage", when he rode in an automobile. Thirty-five years later there is one automobile to every five persons in the United States. The automobile has had a profound effect on cities. Just as the railroads caused cities to spring up all over the country, so the automobile is changing them, hurling their population with a centrifugal force outward into the suburbs and drawing into an ever-widening trading area many millions of inhabitants drawn from remoter regions. Thus it has created a new unit of population neither city, town, nor hamlet, for which there is as yet no name, but which is often referred to as a metropolitan area. As the railroad built up the big city, so the truck is helping to build up the small place within the metropolitan area. Some metropolitan areas have many hundreds of different governmental units when one or at least a few would make many economies and produce efficiencies impossible in small units. In addition, the gas engine has brought the industrial revolution to the farm, has been of great aid to the criminal, and has become an engine of death to thousands of the people every year. There is therefore reason to the remark that the inventors of the automobile have had more influence than Caesar, Napoleon, and Ghengis Khan.

Most of the present Members of Congress did not go to moving-picture shows as children, for there were none for them to attend. This is probably no matter of regret, but it meant that they had little opportunity to speculate on the future of this industry which today in the United States draws every 10 days patrons equivalent in number to the whole population, a truly marvelous growth within a quarter of a century. This great industry, like that of the telephone and the automobile, has helped to knit the territory together in a psychological sense, for the entire population is now exposed to the same stimuli,

which brings them news, tells them the same stories, familiarizes them with the same types of manners and morals and hence opens up a new agency of education and propaganda. Florida sees the same moving pictures as Oregon; the farmer learns better than before the ways of a city. A great new competition for leisure time arose, affecting home, church, and school. It was difficult to foresee these consequences in 1900.

The airplane was not taken seriously at that time. Simon Newcomb, dean of science, wrote in 1903: "May not our mechanicians be ultimately forced to admit that aerial flight is one of that great class of problems with which man can never hope to cope and give up all attempts to grapple with it?" That passengers would be flown across the Atlantic Ocean to Europe was not contemplated. Nor was it envisioned that a thousand enemy airplanes of the bomber type could swoop down on a city and utterly destroy it, with hardly an effective gesture of defense on the part of the helpless inhabitants. Clearly the airplane has brought about changes that affect the functions of both Congress and the Chief Executive.

Other inventions have been developed since the beginning of the century which have influenced public policy less directly, but yet effectively. It is reported that a visitor came to this country recently from the land of Aladdin, who, according to all accounts, possessed a wonderful lamp that could do truly miraculous things such as transporting a person from one city to another on a rug or creating a ship full of jewels. This visitor, though nurtured on tales so stimulating to the imagination, was truly astounded when he saw factories in the United States where a wooden box was turned into a pair of silk stockings, where a lump of coal yielded colors more beautiful than royal purple and perfumes more delicate than attar of roses. Rayon has blurred lines between the social classes, once looked upon as barriers that were beginning to form even in the homeland of Andrew Jackson. Perhaps more impressive, this chemical product with other influences has helped to imperil a cotton kingdom and a textile industry which brought on the industrial revolution, and clothed the world with cotton garments.

The development of the radio, unheralded in 1900, must have appeared equally miraculous to the visitor from the East when he heard a man at the South Pole talking through the air to hundred of thousands of listeners in continents separated by oceans. The radio broadcast has affected profoundly public policies, sirce it is an agency of unparalleled power for propaganda. But it has influenced the lives of the people more by bringing them recreation and education with dramatic ease, especially in the relatively isolated farms and villages.

There are other industries built on inventions that have been developed since the beginning of the century. But these six industries based on the telephone, the automobile, the airplane, the motion picture, rayon, and the radio represent great accumulations of capital and give employment to millions, besides having had social influences so vast in number and extent as to be impossible to calculate.

If the Legislators, Governors, and Presidents since the beginning of the century could have foreseen the development of these six great industries and could have anticipated their influence on society and the changes precipitated, they would have been in a much better position for directing the policies of the State. Highways are too narrow. The metropolitan area could have been planned better; much crime could have been prevented. Industries could have been located to greater advantage. The growing inadequacies of small local governments could have been more clearly foreseen, and the transfer of some of their functions to a more capable centralized government would have been facilitated. In hundreds of ways the governments, industries, and individuals could have planned more soundly.

What has been written in the preceding paragraphs is past history. This is 1936 and not 1900. The Nation does not stand on the threshold of a new century. But progress is not confined to calendar arrangement. A new hundred years begins at any time. The question that naturally arises is, Will the second third of the twentieth century see the rise of such great industries based on new inventions as was seen in the first third? There may very well be six equally significant inventions during the next phase of our national growth as in the one just concluded.

For instance, all are agreed that one such invention is the electron tube, said to be the greatest invention of the twentieth century. Its most brilliant form is the photoelectric cell, popularly known as the electric eye. This eye sees everything that the human eye can see and more. It is even said to be able to detect certain types of counterfeit money. It will distinguish colors better than human beings can do. When it is joined with another form of the electron tube, the vacuum tube, it becomes able to act on what it sees. Thus it sees a waitress approaching a door with trays in both hands and at once swings the door open for her to pass. Unlike a human being it does not suffer from fatigue. For instance, in a factory it can watch the tin cans go by on a belt, pick out the defective ones, letting only the good ones go by. This monotonous work can be done without strain for as long hours as the manager wishes. That it will cause unemployment is obvious, but it will also lighten the tasks of the

workmen. Indeed it brings the automatic factory and the automatic man one step closer. It may be used to regulate automobile traffic, to measure the density of smoke, to time horse racing, to read, to perform mathematical calculations. Hardly a month passes without some new use of the photo-electric cell being reported. Indeed it will require decades to learn the many things this versatile instrument can do.

There are other such new inventions described in the chapter which follow-inventions which will carry the Nation on to even greater achievement during the years to come. But it should be remarked here that the changes of the future do not rest wholly on these new inventions. While the six inventions mentioned in previous paragraphs are past history, their social effects are by no means all past. Many of these inventions will continue to precipitate problems of policy for the Congressmen yet to come. The full effects of artificial fibers have not yet been felt. The influence of the airplane has just begun. Even the familiar telephone will have many new and profound effects, when long distance telephoning becomes more widespread, upon the distribution of population between metropolis and smaller city, upon the physical separation of management control from production, upon remote controls in general. The telephone wire may be used to record messages, bulletins, even newspapers in the home and office. Nor are the influences of the very common automobile matters of past history either. The new social and economic unit of population called the metropolitan area so encouraged by the automobile is in its infancy, while the trailer may be destined to change the habits of living and working of vast numbers of the people.

The problem is thus posed. The various papers which follow are attempts to answer this question in the light of present knowledge. But prior to their presentation the problem needs to be further amplified. This is done under the accompanying headings. The Probability of Invention in the Future

That invention will continue in the future may be taken for granted. Still, it is desirable to support this assumption with some evidence. Such evidence is the record of patents in the United States. The number of thousands of patents issued every 10 years since 1880 are the following: 218, 235, 334, 401, and 442 in the decade 1921-30. It would be most unusual if such a continuous series of inventions should suddenly cease. In the first third of the twentieth century there were 1,330,000 patents issued in the United States. In the second third of the century even more than one and a third million patents may be expected, since the line showing the number of patents per decade is a rising one. But even if the curve should turn down

ward, there would still be a very large number of inventions made.

The statistics are sufficiently convincing, but the message they bring is not often remembered, possibly because curiosity concerns particular inventions, not aggregates. The importance of the inventions previously discussed is not that they were six in number, but that they were the telephone, automobile, radio, rayon, motion picture, and airplane. Similarly, it may be argued that though there may be in the next 30 years more than 1,300,000 patents, there is no assurance that out of so large a number of inventions, there will be any of the rank or importance of the radio and the other five that were discussed. The point is discussed much more fully in the papers which follow. It is only necessary to note here that patents are of very unequal value; that while most of them are minor and at the base of the pyramid there are others of great importance at the peak. So, out of a million or more inventions, it seems reasonable to assume that some will be very important.

It should be observed that not all of these six inventions were made in the twentieth century. The patent on the telephone was granted to Bell in 1876. As regards the airplane, though the Wright brothers secured a patent in 1906, flights had been made here and abroad earlier and the heavier-than-air flying machine was recognizably under advanced development in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Automobiles were in use in the last quarter of the nineteenth century; and though the motion picture was made practicable in the 1890's the date of its invention has been pushed still further back. Hence, many new inventions that will aid in shaping our destiny in the next 30 years are in embryonic existence

now.

Invention is a process, the granting of a patent being only an incident in the process. The idea of the invention is first conceived with some definiteness. It may then be demonstrated as a plan on paper or in the form of a model. Many years may be required before it takes concrete form. Then follows a period in which the design is constructed in a form that is workable. Improvements are then made and sales promotion efforts applied. If these two developments are successful, a point is finally reached where the invention is marketable. Only some time later does it become sufficiently sturdy, simple, and low priced that a relatively large sale is possible. The process is generally to be measured in decades and sometimes in centuries.

Since this report deals with the social implications of inventions, and since these implications manifest themselves where there is extended use of these inventions, it is possible to have considerable knowledge of

these implications before the inventions attain large commercial success. Many of the inventions that will have marked social influence in the next generation are well along in the process by this time. So that the problem of finding out what will be the inventions that will have the widest and most significant social influence in the near future is not a problem of predicting inventions as much as it is of selecting inventions which will prove to be effective among those that are already known. While it is possible to do something toward the actual prediction of invention, as is shown in a later chapter, that is a different task from choosing among existing inventions those that will have great influence.

What Inventions Will Be Great

Since invention is not so much an act as a process, there is a lapse of time before the invention is perfected sufficiently to have extensive use. This period of time focuses then the search for existing inventions significant for the future. But even though this task may be less difficult than predicting inventions, it is sufficiently difficult to discourage anyone, not urged on by an appreciation of the great value to society of success, or not under pressure to do so by organizations that must plan and act in anticipation of the future.

The problem is difficult because the death rate of inventions is so high. The death rate has never been calculated, but it is much greater than the death rate ever was for human babies. For invention is in process from the fertilization of the idea on through various successive stages of development. On the other hand, perhaps, other reasons for anticipating a premature death of an invention are more discernible than in the case of a human infant. Naturally the nearer the end of its evolution the easier it is to pick the successful inventions.

For instance, 25 years ago a good deal was heard about the telegraphone, an invention that recorded a conversation or music on a magnetized wire, which could be used over again after demagnetizing. This invention would probably have been chosen at that time as a prospective successful invention of considerable social influence. Yet today nothing is heard of it. A quarter of a century ago these machines were put into commercial use. Indeed, stock in the corporation was sold generally to the public. As to why it is not in general use today many reasons are given; technical defects, suppression of the invention by others, the success of the phonograph, etc. Of course, the invention may not be dead. It may be revived.

The teletypesetter was announced about a decade ago, making it possible for one person sitting at one machine to set up the type for an indefinite number of newspapers, thus forecasting technological unemploy