CONTENTS -- LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES -- PREFACE -- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS -- LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS -- PART ONE: Introduction -- 1. A Background to Prematurity and Resistance to "Discovery" -- 2. Prematurity in Scientific Discovery -- PART TWO: Observer and Participant Accounts -- 3. Prematurity, Nuclear Fission, and the Transuranium Actinide Elements -- 4. Resistance to Change and New Ideas in Physics: A Personal Perspective -- 5. The Timeliness of the Discoveries of the Three Modes of Gene Transfer in Bacteria -- 6. Scotoma: Forgetting and Neglect in Science -- PART THREE: Historical Perspectives -- SECTION A: Relatively Unproblematic Examples -- 7. Prematurity and Delay in the Prevention of Scurvy -- 8. A Triptych to Serendip: Prematurity and Resistance to Discovery in the Earth Sciences -- 9. Theories of an Expanding Universe: Implications of Their Reception for the Concept of Scientific Prematurity -- 10. Interdisciplinary Dissonance and Prematurity: Ida Noddack's Suggestion of Nuclear Fission -- SECTION B: Disputable Cases -- 11. Michael Polanyi's Theory of Surface Adsorption: How Premature? -- 12. Prematurity and the Dynamics of Scientific Change -- 13. Barbara McClintock's Controlling Elements: Premature Discovery or Stillborn Theory? -- 14. The Work of Joseph Adams and Archibald Garrod: Possible Examples of Prematurity in Human Genetics -- PART FOUR: Natural Selection and Evolution from the Perspective of Prematurity -- 15. The Prematurity of Darwin's Theory of Natural Selection -- 16. Prematurity, Evolutionary Biology, and the Historical Sciences -- PART FIVE: Perspectives from the Vantage Point of the Social Sciences -- 17. The Prematurity of "Prematurity" in Political Science -- 18. The Impact and Fate of Gunther Stent's Prematurity Thesis -- 19. Premature Discovery Is Failure of Intersection among Social Worlds.

PART SIX: Philosophical Perspectives -- 20. Fleck, Kuhn, and Stent: Loose Reflections on the Notion of Prematurity -- 21. The Concept of Prematurity and the Philosophy of Science -- PART SEVEN: Closing Considerations -- 22. Prematurity and Promise: Why Was Stent's Notion of Prematurity Itself So Premature? -- 23. Reflections on Hull's Remarks -- 24. Comments -- 25. Extensions and Complexities: In Defense of Prematurity in Scientific Discovery -- INDEX -- A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- F -- G -- H -- I -- J -- K -- L -- M -- N -- O -- P -- Q -- R -- S -- T -- U -- V -- W -- X -- Y -- Z.