A Scientist’s Self-Reflection

This author recently spoke with a young Japanese person who had studied for a long time at a university in Canada. This person explained that they did not want to be a scientist in the future because a scientist’s is too small. Scientists know nothing of the history of science and technology; they never think about the raison d’etre of their specialization. As a result, this person had the impression that a scientist’s life consists of just following their own interests, or they live a life surrounded by sophisticated, traditional scientific instruments handed down through successive generations.

As a scientist, it is important to provide a clear response to these doubts. In order that people like this young person understand that the work of scientists is to help human society, it is essential for them to give a clear explanation about trends and history of society, or sociality, and their own specialization. At the same time however, it is true that university professors are not traditionally in the habit of explaining such things.

Although a bit long, the following discussion on the nature of scientists is based on this author’s experience.

To start with another self-introduction, the author graduated in 1963 with the first cohort of students from the Department of Electronics and Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, at Kyushu University. He subsequently went on to discover the magnetic impedance effect of amorphous wire in 1993 in his laboratory at Nagoya University. In 1994, he presented a Special Session on Magneto-Impedance at INTERMAG ’94, an IEEE international magnetics conference held in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in the U.S., and was awarded an IEEE Fellowship in 1995. His joint research with a company into application of the magneto-impedance effect became a successful example of collaboration between industry, academia and government led by the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST), a government agency. As such, he had stepped into the field of invention, which is normally the work of companies and which is outside the conventional range of work done by a university professor. This even extended to the invention of an electronic circuit for high-performance micromagnetic sensors (MI sensors).

So, why did this author step outside the normal realm of a university professor to invent these technologies? Put simply, he was confident that his research at the time would contribute to the advancement of human society from the perspective of being complementary to technologies of the digital civilization.

As the readers would know, the Japanese system of university education and research after the Second World War basically followed the U.S. model, with industrial policies of government also following the U.S. When completing his graduation thesis, vacuum tube integrators (analog computers) were still being used as differential analyzers and Japan was right in the middle of a major debate over the merits of analog or digital.

Incidentally, the characteristics of each are as follows.

(1) Using digital technologies, logical operations using logic circuits take a lot of time and use a lot of power. On the other hand, the computational results are highly reliable.

(2) Using analog technologies (differential analyzers), the results contain errors, and those errors are passed between levels in multi-level systems. However, integrators are fast.

These days, there is no need to argue the superiority of digital technologies, but it is not an “either-or” situation. It is still a very significant argument that highlights the areas of analog technologies that complement the weaknesses of digital technologies. In the same way, in the modern context as well, it is also important to not minimize the importance of technologies that complement the digital civilization.

Having gone through boom times and influenced global trends, Japan focused on its next role of creating innovation to complement the digital civilization. It succeeded in finding the solution to this challenge in the framework of collaborations between industry, academia and government. However, with no prior experience in such collaborations in Japan at the time, the road has been difficult. This is why the process started by changing the mindset of university professors who then promoted economic growth through the development of science professionals.

With all of this going on, the author not only discovered and theorized the magnetic impedance effect of amorphous wire, but invented MI sensor electronic circuits as well. As a result, he was able to present radical solutions to the issues of walking navigation, which was facing problems with display lag and power consumption, and electronic compasses, which were having problems with sensitivity. These solutions have clarified the position of MI sensors and the complementary role they play in technologies of the digital civilization.

It is therefore the opinion of this author that, based on his experience, a scientist must help in the development of human society from the perspective of not only creating civilization, but complementing civilization as well.

2021.10.15