The Far Reach of Science : conference sponsored by Life magazine in cooperation with faculty members of the California Institute of Technology, New York-Chicago, March 18-20, 1968

The idea for this conference was born in October of 1966 when several of us from LIFE attended the 75th anniversary convocation at the California Institute of Technology. We were intrigued at that time by reports of advances made in many of the scientific disciplines and, in the weeks that followed, decided that LIFE could serve a most useful function by disseminating this information to an even wider audience. "The Far Reach of Science," an exchange of ideas between scientists and businessmen, was the result.

When we extended invitations to such a meeting, the high rate of acceptance indicated that along with feelings and concerns about the crises arising from man's yearning heart, there is a genuine and widespread interest in the wondrous visions of man's reaching mind.

Two conferences were held : in Lincoln Center, New York, on March 18, 1968 and at the Ambassador Hotel in Chicago on March 20. The transcript on the following pages attempts to digest the best of those two meetings. It deals with real thing - things that are happening now or will happen soon. In a few short years they will be affecting how you and I live, the kind of work we do, and, even more important, they will enormously complicate the world our children seem so eager to start running. Obviously we could not begin in one day to close all the gaps in our knowledge that have occurred since last most of us sat in a university lecture hall. But it seemed to us that the impact of new information on our body social and political is now so profound that we must somehow begin to find a wisdom to match our knowledge. This conference may be at least a start in the right direction.

All of us at LIFE hope that this record of the proceedings will refresh your recollection of what we trust was a stimulating day.