an essay entitled ‘As We May Think’, published in the Atlantic in 1945, the engineer and inventor Vannevar Bush wrote, There is a growing mountain of research. But there is increased evidence that we are being bogged down today as specialisation extends. The investigator is staggered by the findings and conclusions of thousands of other workers – conclusions which he cannot find time to grasp, much less to remember, as they appear. Yet specialisation becomes increasingly necessary for progress, and the effort to bridge between disciplines is correspondingly superficial.9
