Abstract
PROF. EBWIN SCHRODINGER, in an article entitled “Science, Art and Play” (Philosopher, 13, No. 1), maintains that the present-day spirit which challenges all authority and allows nothing to be immune from criticism, manifests itself in the ‘crisis' now existing in most of the sciences. Science, at any rate research work, together with art and play, provides an outlet for that surplus store of energy which men usually have to spare after satisfying their primary needs. It might be argued that science gives far greater practical benefits than art or play, or that the intellectual joy of the research worker is as nothing to the material value of the results obtained. But the advances of applied science, as exemplified in greater facilities for travel and communication, give not only material benefits but also pleasure for their own sake. Prof. Schrodinger admits that science can rarely give direct joy to the community, but what matters is that the greatest possible number of people should have the opportunity of approach to intellectual pleasures. It is not accidental that at the present moment the sciences are being forced to a complete reassessment of values, for the ideas forming the background of the individual sciences are connected with the ideas of the age, and the dominant spirit will accept nothing on authority. This should not be feared, for what is worth preserving preserves itself, and requires no protection.
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Value of Criticism. Nature 135, 614 (1935). https://doi.org/10.1038/135614a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/135614a0