Approaching the Asymptote? Evolution and Revolution in Immunology

It is a great privilege to introduce this Cold Spring Harbor Symposium on quantitative biology on the subject of immune recognition. My predecessors in this role, Macfarlane Burnet (1967) and Niels Jerne (1976), had a profound effect on the development of ideas in our field, and many of the participants have made great contributions to our understanding of the subject of this symposium and are clearly more qualified than I to introduce it.