p The turning of science into a direct productive force does not mean that it is becoming some third, relatively independent element of the productive forces side by side with the means of production and with people, who produce material values. Science acquires the role of a productive force through implements of production, in which it finds its material embodiment, and through people who master science and utilise its achievements in production.

p The fact that science is increasingly becoming a direct productive force is due primarily to the development of modern production, which is inconceivable without science. Today entire branches of production and technology ( chemistry of polymers, nuclear power engineering, electronics, and so forth) are technological applications of science. Moreover, this trend issues from the development of science itself. Only some fifty years ago, scientists worked alone in the quiet of laboratories and used apparatuses made by themselves from glass, tin and wood. The situation is altogether different today.

p For modern science it is imperative to have close links with production which supplies it with equipment, ensures it with the engineers, technicians and workers for the building and operation of equipment and provides it with broad facilities for experimentation. The secrets of the atomic nucleus, for instance, cannot be studied without super-powerful accelerators and other modern instruments and apparatuses produced by industry. The magnet of one of the world’s largest nuclear particle accelerators—the 10,000 million electron-volt proton phasotron installed at Dubna in 1957—has a diameter of nearly 60 metres and weighs 36 tons. Energy equal to nearly one-fourth of the capacity of the huge Dnieper Hydropower Station is required to start this accelerator, in whose building hundreds 224 of factories and research institutions throughout the Soviet Union co-operated. Today one cannot visualise science without electronic microscopes, space vehicles, radio telescopes and countless other simple and intricate mean-s of knowledge. All these means are the products of co-operation between science and production.

p When \ve speak of science turning into a direct productive force we mean mainly mechanics, physics, chemistry, biology and other natural and technical sciences. The achievements of these sciences are being embodied in implements of production and in the production experience of people. At the same time, communist construction presupposes the steady improvement of the running of social processes, particularly the whole of material production. To this end it is necessary to promote scientific administration, which is studied by social sciences. Economic science, which improves methods of planning and management, is becoming increasingly important in the organisation and direction of production. A new science, economic cybernetics, which, strictly speaking, is not a purely natural science, is emerging virtually before our eyes. This science utilises mathematical methods and modern computers to indicate how best to utilise material, manpower and financial resources and distribute industries and material and technical supplies. It estimates expenditures and forecasts the results of investments in the economy. Thus, social sciences, too, play an important role in resolving production problems.

p New industries are springing up and “old”, traditional branches of production are being completely recast under the revolutionising influence of science. Take the iron and steel industry. Formerly the word metallurgy was associated only with the process of extracting metals from ores. Today it is a science in its own right and the modern iron and steel industry cannot do without it. Iron, steel, pig iron and non-ferrous metals continue to comprise the bulk of the metals used in industry, but other metals—uranium, thorium, beryllium and cesium—are beginning to play an important role. Although their total volume used in industry is only a drop in the ocean they are vital to nuclear power engineering, radio electronics and rocketry. Incidentally, these metals are effective only when 225 they are super-pure, i.e., almost completely devoid of admixtures.

When we speak of the link between science and production, we must not regard this link as being completely utilitarian and demand instant production returns from scientists. Science must see not only the present but also the future, create a reserve for that future by working on theoretical problems that open new roads in science and technology. It does not matter if some of this work does not yield tangible results as quickly as we would have liked. Tangible results will be forthcoming where really new and important paths of science are concerned. It will be remembered that that is what happened in the case of atomic power, \vhich man learned to apply in practice half a century after it was discovered. It took long decades for Konstantin Tsiolkovsky’s breath-taking ideas about space travel, which he worked on in the small and sleepy town of Kaluga, to be embodied in artificial Earth satellites and spaceships.