Michael Gibbons: It is the first opportunity I have to bring you greetings from your brothers and sisters across the Atlantic, particularly from Robert Stevens, the chairman of the Marshall Commission, and all of the commissioners themselves. But I think, too, I should in my opening remarks say I bring you special greetings from the current crop of Marshall Scholars who, like you were in your day, an extraordinary group of people. I should tell you that at the dinner we had in London on Friday of last week, addressed by the American ambassador, the Marshall Scholars of this particular grouping have dedicated themselves to the strengthening of the Marshall alumni, so you can look for some upwards pressure from them when they get back here in the USA.

I have five things left to say.

I want to just take your eye off the ball for a second. We don't want to get drawn into this discussion entirely in terms of hype around information technology. It's important; I'm not going to talk about it.

There are deeper things going on, though, in the world that we need to watch. First of all, we're producing the kind of society where there are many more demands for specialized knowledge of different kinds. It is a demand which is increasing. It is a difference of orders of magnitude from what characterized agricultural societies and even early industrial societies.

Second, equally, we have been busy for the last fifty years in a vast expansion of the supply of specialist knowledge, and we're paying the price for our success, because the number of places where recognizably competent research can now be carried out are enormous. They spread well beyond the walls of academia.

Third, there has been a significant shift within the research community away from trying to understand the basic laws that govern the universe to examining the properties and behavior of complex systems. You had a marvelous exposition of that in the opening lecture.

Fourth. The consequence of this is that within the scientific community, within academia, the focus of intellectual activity is shifting towards working on complex problems of every conceivable kind. These problems have two characteristics. They are essentially interdisciplinary, or if you like, they don't arise naturally from within the disciplinary structure that you and I were brought up and educated in. And secondly and just as important, in this world where the increased demand for specialized knowledge is being matched by an equal supply, the university is only one player among many, and in fact it's doubtful if it's the primary player. It's one among many, and when you're one among many you have to play a different game than when you thought you were at the head of the train that was drawing knowledge from the brains of individuals and diffusing it into society.

There are two implications of this, I think, for research and scholarship under this theme. I have two predictions to make. One, universities are going to get smaller. They're going to have a much tighter structure, a small core staff with a vast expansion in the number of associative relationships with other forms of expertise. That's the only way the universities are going to be able to take part in these complex problems that I've outlined. It's far too expensive to do it any other way. I know there's a university president sitting in the audience, so I'll add on to this and say that smart university presidents in the future are going to be those who can develop the links with the expert community, largely outside the universities now, and achieve mission objectives not by doing what they've always done in the past, bringing onto the staff all the people they need. That's a no-no; we can't do that anymore.

The second thing touches deeply on the values which we all hold dear. As a consequence of a university's being only one player in this new knowledge realm, I think the structures which support teaching and the structures which support research are diverging. Dan has just given a hint of what they are. They have different reward structures. They involve academics being drawn out of the institutions to work on complex problems of various kinds. Is this a weakening of institutional loyalty? It might be. But I can tell you from the promotion committees that I sit on, a different reward structure is emerging.

I think if I could summarize the whole thing, we are in the midst of a transformation from a culture of science to a culture of research. You'll say, "Aren't they the same thing?" Am I just playing with words? I don't think so. I think a culture of research is a very, very different animal from the culture of science in which you and I were brought up and made our humble way. Thank you very much.