Science: The Stalled Leap Forward

"Marxist philosophy holds that the most important problem does not lie in understanding the laws of the objective world and thus being able to explain it, but in applying the knowledge of these laws actively to change the world. "

—Mao Tse-tung

For the past three decades, the People's Republic of China has sought to apply Chairman Mao's idea by demanding that its scientists be politically orthodox and by subjugating all scientific research to the solution of the country's most pressing national problems. China has made impressive progress in increasing agricultural and industrial output and providing health care for its 850 million people. But. says a contingent of scientists from New York City's Rockefeller University, the Chinese have realized these auspicious goals by ignoring basic research almost entirely. As a result, the Rockefeller researchers revealed in interviews with TIME Science Editor Peter Stoler, Chinese science has been stagnating. Says Physicist Frederick Seitz, Rockefeller's president: "They're doing basic and applied research to the best of their limited ability, but are still highly dependent for their innovations on the scientific community of the rest of the world. All they can do is work with what they've already got."

The Rockefeller scientists base their grim conclusions on an 18-day tour of China completed in May. Nearly two years in the planning, the trip to the People's Republic was arranged at Seitz's request after several groups of Chinese scientists had visited the U.S. and toured Rockefeller, which counts 16 Nobel laureates among its alumni and faculty. The eleven American scientists visited five major Chinese cities, half a dozen universities and nine of the country's 100 research institutes, many of which exist in name only. With few exceptions, they found their hosts open and eager to accommodate them. "We didn't see everything," says Rodney Nichols, a Rockefeller vice president. "But we saw enough to get the picture."

Minimal Care. The Rockefeller researchers discovered that the Chinese health system aims to bring at least minimal medical care to every citizen, largely through the wide use of paramedics known as "barefoot doctors" and a network of spartan but well-staffed clinics and hospitals across the country. "Everyone we saw looked healthy and well fed," said Dr. Maclyn McCarty, a Rockefeller vice president and professor of biomedicine. The Chinese were well informed about what their Western colleagues were doing. They religiously read such scientific publications as the British Nature and the U.S. Science. The visiting scientists were impressed by the work the Chinese have been doing in protein synthesis, in the use of insect and viral agents to replace chemical pesticides, and in trying to find the scientific basis of acupuncture as an anesthetic. Says Biophysicist Floyd Ratliff: "Their work in neurophysiology is very good, comparable to that in the West."