Hastings States New Science Advance Vital

A. Baird Hastings, Hamilton Kuhn Professor of Biological Chemistry, told the Sponsors of the Harvard Foundation for Advanced Study and Research last night that new scientific knowledge will be just as necessary in the future as the proper application of knowledge we already-have. Hastings spoke at a private dinner given at Dunster House.

Hastings served on the Committee on Medical Research of the office of Scientific Research and Development during World War II. He emphasized the need for preserving "free imaginative research" while mobilizing science for the national emergency.

In World War II, he explained, "it was largely development of information already available--not new research--that was accomplished," but assuming "a 20 years war of peoples," mobilization of scientists for such a long period must include the long-range search for knowledge as well as immediately practical applications