Abstract
IN the preface of his admirable volume on the history of seventeenth century science, Prof. A. Wolf pleads for a new orientation in humanistic studies. The need for such a re-orientation, repeatedly urged in the columns of NATURE, is becoming more evident daily. On the Continent, reasonable persuasion and confidence in public education are increasingly regarded as exploded liberal superstitions. Blind obedience to leaders with supposedly exceptional gifts is more in keeping with the temper of the times, and if we record with gratitude the fact that Britain and the Scandinavian countries are least swayed by it up to date, it is all the more important to forestall a danger against which we have been amply forewarned. Men of science in Huxley's generation urged the claims of education with an assurance which is rarely voiced to-day. If we ask why this is so, one reason is not far to seek. The old tradition which exacted several years of classical study as the price of scientific education had at least one advantage. At the end of it, scientific worker and statesman had a common realm of discourse. In modern practice there is a complete dichotomy between an education which gives the statesman no prescience of the technical forces shaping the society in which he lives, and one which stimulates in the scientific worker little interest in the social impact of his own activities.
Article PDF
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Scientific Humanism. Nature 136, 965–966 (1935). https://doi.org/10.1038/136965a0
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/136965a0