INTOLERANCE

It is an unfortunate truth that the Newtonian theory "for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction" does not apply so accurately in the field of human relations as it does in the field of natural science. Professor Percy Bridgman, famed member of the University's Physics Department, has ignored this truth in his recent "Manifesto by a Physicist," and the omission has had repercussions which already have increased the gravity of the initial offense. Scientists from all over the country have been endorsing Bridgman's stand until now it seems likely that this individual protest may well become the spearhead of a concerted anti-fascist attack on the part of the nation's scientific leaders. Such action would not only fail to achieve its avowed end, but would in reality have results quite opposite to those desired by the earnest physics professor.

By closing his laboratory henceforth to "visits from citizens of totalitarian states" Dr. Bridgman has, to be sure, made a magnificent protest. As an attempt to object publicly to the prostitution of knowledge to the worldly aims of an individual state the effort has proved wildly successful--the whole world is indisputably convinced of Dr. Bridgman's aversion to government regulation of scientific research. But in its broader significance, in the possible scope of its influence, the recently pronounced ban has several conspicuous aspects which stamp it as an impractical, misguided, dangerous effort.

It is impractical because, by barring totalitarians from his laboratories, Bridgman does not prevent them from obtaining the information contained therein. If anything of military importance is developed in the Bridgman sanctum sanctum, it is being sane rather than romantic, to admit that the dictatorships can easily obtain the required information at second hand. But the most telling criticism levelled at the recent ban is not one of impracticality. By endeavoring to combat fascism by means of a typical fascist technique, the learned professor is setting a precedent which may easily lead to less harmless abuses of the American tradition of freedom. From prohibition of fascists in specific laboratories to a prohibition extending to graduate courses is no long step; from there the virus may spread to whole universities, and then go on to infect the entire educational system. Thus do such efforts to eliminate totalitarianism breed of themselves the germ they seek to destroy, and although Professor Bridgman has repeatedly maintained that science must know no nationalism if it is to continue to contribute to universal civilization, his present action contradicts to an alarming extent these very words.