The government of the United States was developed under the idea that nobody knew how to make a government, or how to govern. The result is to invent a system to govern when you don’t know how. And the way to arrange it is to permit a system, like we have, wherein new ideas can be developed and tried out and thrown away. The writers of the Constitution knew of the value of doubt. In the age that they lived, for instance, science had already developed far enough to show the possibilities and potentialities that are the result of having uncertainty, the value of having the openness of possibility. The fact that you are not sure means that it is possible that there is another way some day. That openness of possibility is an opportunity. Doubt and discussion are essential to progress. The United States government, in that respect, is new, it’s modern, and it is scientific. It is all messed up, too. Senators sell their votes for a dam in their state and discussions get all excited and lobbying replaces the minority’s chance to represent itself, and so forth. The government of the United States is not very good, but it, with the possible exception the government of England, is the greatest government on the earth today, is the most satisfactory, the most modern, but not very good.

Russia is a backward country. Oh, it is technologically advanced. I described the difference between what I like to call the science and technology. It does not apparently seem, unfortunately, that engineering and technological development are not consistent with suppressed new opinion. It appears, at least in the days of Hitler, where no new science was developed, nevertheless rockets were made, and rockets also can be made in Russia. I am sorry to hear that, but it is true that technological development, the applications of science, can go on without the freedom. Russia is backward because it has not learned that there is a limit to government power. The great discovery of the Anglo-Saxons is—they are not the only people who thought of it, but, to take the later history of the long struggle of the idea—that there can be a limit to government power. There is no free criticism of ideas in Russia. You say, “Yes, they discuss anti-Stalinism.” Only in a definite form. Only to a definite extent. We should take advantage of this. Why don’t we discuss anti-Stalinism too? Why don’t we point out all the troubles we had with that gentleman? Why don’t we point out the dangers that there are in a government that can have such a thing grow inside itself? Why don’t we point out the analogies between the Stalinism that is being criticized inside of Russia and the behavior that is going on at the very same moment inside Russia? Well, all right, all right…

Now, I get excited, see.… It’s only emotion. I shouldn’t do that, because we should do this more scientifically. I won’t convince you very well unless I make believe that it is a completely rational, unprejudiced scientific argument.

I only have a little experience in those countries. I visited Poland, and I found something interesting. The Polish people, of course, are freedom-loving people, and they are under the influence of the Russians. They can’t publish what they want, but at the time when I was there, which was a year ago, they could say what they wanted, strangely enough, but not publish anything. And so we would have very lively discussions in public places on all sides of various questions. The most striking thing to remember about Poland, by the way, is that they have had an experience with Germany which is so deep and so frightening and so horrible that they cannot possibly forget it. And, therefore, all of their attitudes in foreign affairs have to do with a fear of the resurgence of Germany. And I thought while I was there of the terrible crime that would be the result of a policy on the part of the free countries which would permit once again the development of that kind of a thing in that country. Therefore, they accept Russia. Therefore, they explained to me, you see, the Russians definitely are holding down the East Germans. There is no way that the East Germans are going to have any Nazis. And there is no question that the Russians can control them. And so at least there is that buffer. And the thing that struck me as odd was that they didn’t realize that one country can protect another country, and guarantee it, without dominating it completely, without living there.

The other thing they told me was very often, different individuals would call me aside and say that we would be surprised to find that, if Poland did get free of Russia and had their own government and were free, they would go along more or less the way they are going. I said, “What do you mean? I am surprised. You mean you wouldn’t have freedom of speech.” “Oh, no, we would have all the freedoms. We would love the freedoms, but we would have nationalized industries and so on. We believe in the socialistic ideas.” I was surprised because I don’t understand the problem that way. I don’t think of the problem as between socialism and capitalism but rather between suppression of ideas and free ideas. If it is that free ideas and socialism are better than communism, it will work its way through. And it will be better for everybody. And if capitalism is better than socialism, it will work its way through. We have got 52 percent…

well…

The fact that Russia is not free is clear to everyone, and the consequences in the sciences are quite obvious. One of the best examples is Lysenko, who has a theory of genetics, which is that acquired characteristics can be passed on to the offspring. This is probably true. The great majority, however, of genetic influences are undoubtedly of a different kind, and they are carried by the germ plasm. There are undoubtedly a few examples, a few small examples already known, in which some kind of a characteristic is carried to the next generation by direct, what we like to call cytoplasmic, inheritance. But the main point is that the major part of genetic behavior is in a different manner than Lysenko thinks. So he has spoiled Russia. The great Mendel, who discovered the laws of genetics, and the beginnings of the science, is dead. Only in the Western countries can it be continued, because they are not free in Russia to analyze these things. They have to discuss and argue against us all the time. And the result is interesting. Not only in this case has it stopped the science of biology, which, by the way, is the most active, most exciting, and most rapidly developing science today in the West. In Russia it is doing nothing. At the same time you would think that from an economic standpoint such a thing is impossible. But nevertheless by having the incorrect theories of inheritance and genetics, the biology of the agriculture of Russia is behind. They don’t develop the hybrid corn right. They don’t know how to develop better brands of potatoes. They used to know. They had the greatest potato tuber collections and so on in Russia before Lysenko than anywhere in the world. But today they have nothing of this kind. They only argue with the West.

In physics there was a time when there was trouble. In recent times there has been a great freedom for the physicist. Not a hundred percent freedom; there are different schools of thought which argue with each other. They were all in a meeting in Poland. And the Polish Intourist, the analogue of Intourist in Poland, which is call Polorbis, arranged a trip. And of course, there was only a limited number of rooms, and they made the mistake of putting Russians in the same room. They came down and they screamed, “For seventeen years I have never talked to that man, and I will not be in the same room with him.”

There are two schools of physics. And there are the good guys and the bad guys, and it’s perfectly obvious, and it’s very interesting. And there are great physicists in Russia, but physics is developing much more rapidly in the West, and although it looked for a while like something good would happen there, it hasn’t.