42 DOC.
7
MOTIVES FOR RESEARCH
224
CONTRIBUTIONS TO SCIENCE
PRINCIPLES
OF
RESEARCH
Address delivered
at
a
celebration
of
Max Planck’s
sixtieth
birthday
(1918)
before
the
Physical Society
in
Berlin. Pub-
lished in Mein Weltbild, Amsterdam:
Querido
Verlag,
1934. Max
Planck
(1858-1947) was
for
many years pro-
fessor of
theoretical
physics
at
the
University of
Berlin.
By
far
the
most
outstanding of
his
contributions
to
physics
is
his
quantum
theory,
which he advanced in
1900
and
which
has
provided
the
basis for
the whole
development of
modern atomic
physics.
Next
to
Planck
it
was
Einstein
who did the
pioneering
work in the
young
field,
above
all
in his
theory of light
quanta
or
photons
(1905)
and his
theory
of
specific
heats
(1907).
It
was
he who
perceived
more
than
anyone
else
the
fundamental
and
pervasive
char-
acter
of
the
quantum
concept
in
all its
ramifications.
[1]
In the
temple
of science
are many
mansions,
and various
indeed
are
they
that
dwell
therein and
the motives
that
have
led
them thither.
Many
take
to
science
out
of
a
joyful sense
of
superior
intellectual
power;
science is
their
own special
sport to
which
they
look for vivid
experience
and the satisfaction of
am-
bition;
many
others
are
to
be
found in the
temple
who have
offered the
products
of
their
brains
on
this altar for
purely
utili-
tarian
purposes.
Were
an angel
of
the
Lord
to
come
and
drive
all
the
people
belonging
to
these
two categories out
of the
temple,
the
assemblage
would be
seriously
depleted,
but there
would
still be
some men,
of both
present
and
past
times,
left
inside.
Our
Planck
is
one
of
them,
and
that
is
why we
love
him.
I
am
quite
aware
that
we
have
just
now
light-heartedly
ex-
pelled
in
imagination
many
excellent
men
who
are largely, per-
haps chiefly,
responsible
for
the
building
of the
temple
of
science;
and in
many cases
our
angel
would find it
a
pretty
ticklish
job to
decide. But of
one
thing
I
feel
sure:
if the
types
we
have
just
expelled
were
the
only types
there
were,
the
temple
would
never
have
come
to
be,
any
more
than
a
forest
can
grow