1092 PONTIFICIAE ACADEMIAE SCIENTIARVM SCRIPTA VARIA - 28
stimulus of free interchange of views and ideas and of appre-
ciation among professional colleagues.
5.2. The community of scientists has a structure of a series
of widening circles similar to the structure of scientific subjects
or of science as a whole. When a top scientists speaks appre-
ciately of some work in his special field, other scientists or
lay men accept his evaluation and pass on the information to
others. The social appreciation of science gradually emerges
as a result of the diffusion, in widening circles, of the views
of scientists, who are experts in specialised fields of research,
to scientists in related and associated fields, then to scientific
workers generally, and finally, through persons of position and
standing who have contacts with scientists, to the general
public. The speed with which such appreciation can spread
increases rapidly with the increase in the number of scientific
workers and improvements in the channels of communication.
In the advanced countries, the awareness of the importance of
science is increasing rapidly which, in its turn, is raising the
social status of scientists and is promoting an increasing flow
nf resources for research.
5.3. The whole process is extremely slow in underdeveloped
countries. The number of research scientists is very small, and
channels of scientific communication are non-existent or
meagre. Scientific workers usually receive lower pay and have
a lower status than the administrative staff in government or
in business concerns; and have to work in a rigid system of
hierarchical authorities. Promotion may depend, not so much
on the high quality of the scientific work done, but on success
in pleasing those who are higher up in the official hierarchy.
Even permission to apply for posts elsewhere is subject to
the discretion of superior officers. There is a continuing ten-
dency to bring scientists and scientific work under stricter con-
trol of the administrators, partly, perhaps. from an uncon-
scious fear of rivalry of power. Even if the right of criticism
‘14 Mahalanobis I - pag. 24
