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SCIENCE is a system for ordering knowledge, built on a foundation of
laws, hypotheses and principles which usually carry the name of the person
most closely associated with them. Like all trained scientists, I have learnt
many of these names, partly to pass examinations and partly for my own interest.
Boyle’s law, Charles’ law, Le Chatelier’s principle, Avogadro’s hypothesis,
Einstein’s law of relativity, Hess’s law, are but a few of them. Chemistry,
for example, has a whole gamut of reactions bearing the names of their discoverers,
names which sometimes trip not so lightly from the tongue.

Musing on this one day, it occurred to me how confusing it would be
if several scientists with a very common surname all had laws named after
them. Now, in Britain at least, Smith is one of the most common names, and
I began to imagine a plethora of Smith’s laws appearing in the textbooks.
How would we know which was which? Life could get tedious if Smith’s law
of thermodynamics could be confused with Smith’s law of conservation of
energy, or Smith’s law of genetics. The marking of examination answers beginning
‘Using Smith’s law, we can show. . .’ could be a nightmare. Thankfully,
no such surfeit of Smith’s laws exists, and we are indeed fortunate in having
such a diverse range of names at our disposal.

While this idea was still bouncing around in my head, a stunning fact
revealed itself to me. Not only was science spared a glut of Smith’s laws;
in fact I didn’t know a single one! Nor could I recall a Jones’s law, or
a White’s law or any other law associated with one of the very common surnames
in Britain.

This struck me as odd. Assuming the brains to be spread equally among
the population, the number of Smith’s laws should simply reflect the proportion
of Smiths. Pick up a telephone directory, however, and a different picture
emerges. Take, for example, my own telephone directory, for Fife, and consider
the case of Boyle. There are about 25 times as many Smiths as Boyles listed,
so perhaps there should be about 25 Smith’s laws to counterbalance the one
Boyle’s law. But there aren’t. Want another example? Try the name Newton.
According to my directory, there are more than 50 Smiths to every Newton,
yet it was Newton who made a name for himself. Similarly, there are 25 Smiths
for every Rutherford, more than 400 Smiths to every Dalton, about 13 Smiths
to every Maxwell; and Faradays and Darwins are so thin on the ground that
they don’t even have an entry.

Now, I haven’t yet fully formulated Bagnall’s hypothesis of scientific
eminence, but I am beginning to suspect that the likelihood of eminence
is inversely related to the frequency of surname. Whether or not there is
an exact mathematical form to the relationship, or whether it is merely
a trend, is unclear at this stage, and would require not only a thorough
investigation of scientists from Britain but also of those from other countries.

How common are the surnames of all the Nobel prizewinners, for example?
How many people have the name Mendeleev in Russia? How many Avogadros are
there in the world? (The answer is not 6.022 52 X 1023.) Is Dirac a common
surname? How many Turings are there? Is the world teeming with van der Waals,
and is the connection between them weak? The list is endless, but the results
may share a common thread.

I must admit that I am at a loss as to how to explain these observations.
However, I cannot imagine that the Smiths or the Jones’s of this world are
any less capable than anyone else. Perhaps, and I offer this only as the
merest suggestion, rarity of surname acts as a subliminal flag when a scientific
paper is read, marking it out as memorable for reasons other than mere excellence.
Then again, perhaps those with the rare surnames feel that they have to
try harder to stop themselves being swamped by the rest.

The relationship may also hold good for other fields of human endeavour.
Perhaps a close investigation of the worlds of politics or business would
reveal a similar trend in relating success with scarcity of surname, though
once again I offer the thought as mere speculation.

I could of course be mistaken in all this. However, if my chance observation
has any substance, then the advice to any Smith, Jones or White aspiring
to the dizzy heights of science is simple. Forget it! The odds are stacked
against you from the start. Your only hope of becoming a scientific superstar
is to change your name by deed poll to the rarest name you can think of.

And what about my own name? In my local telephone directory at least,
it’s even rarer than Newton. By my reckoning, therefore, Bagnall’s hypothesis
stands a reasonable chance of acceptance. Whoever hands out the fame, please
note that I’m sitting here waiting . . .

Bob Bagnall lectures in the Dental School at the University of Edinburgh.