Salient. An Organ of Student Opinion at Victoria College, Wellington, N.Z. Vol. 10, No. 10. July 16, 1947
The Case for a Science Society
The Case for a Science Society
This year has seen almost unprecedented activity on the part of the various scientific societies in the College; lectures, films, excursions, field days, etc. These societies, however, are very sectarian and correspondingly narrow in scope. The present university curriculum is most inadequate and instead of the societies supplying what is most lacking, they are mere appendages to the various departments, wrapped up in the same poor system. In industry the research worker finds that while his own specialised field is being constantly narrowed down, he requires at least a nodding acquaintance with what formerly seemed other remotely connected sciences. A deplorable division is growing within the Science Faculty in this College.
The biological students on the one hand and the physical science students on the other, are more and more holding each other in mutual contempt. This artificial division is of course conditioned by the general administration and to no little extent by most of the staff. The stupidity of this is fully realised only when we begin to solve the real problems presented to them by man and nature. Every science is dependent on all the rest for its development; for example. It was the "vulgar" agriculturists and biologists who first put mathematical statistics on a firm footing in the face of ridicule and opposition on the part of the "pure" mathematicians. The thousands of examples of this kind are so well known and pervade every branch of science that it is quite unnecessary to enumerate them here.
A single science society embracing all departments would help to bridge the present gap and would help to give science students an attitude which, if they are to be later of any use in research, they will be eventually forced to take up. In both Auckland and Canterbury there have been such societies for many years. They have prestige amongst the student body and at times amongst the community as a whole, and the healthy influence of science students is felt in those colleges in proportion to their numbers. Such a society at Victoria, with its more democratic student body and its more vigorous student movement is both desirable and necessary.
In N.Z. today science and technique are far ahead of general social development, with the result that scientific advancement is being frustrated. For instance, private enterprise could not possibly handle the tremendous increase in power that an atomic energy power plant would give us, and so research is being diverted from this sphere to that of defence and probably aggression. It is principally the wealthy farmers who benefit from agricultural research and the large manufacturers who benefit from industrial research. Science in N.Z. is not yet organised for the benefit of the people as a whole but is a commodity to be sold at a profit and must produce quick dividends.
Questions such as these and domestic issues such as more research facilities, increased full-time bursaries, student-staff co-operation, etc., as well as important academic questions, could well be taken up by the science students but can only be done so through a healthy vigorous and broad science society embracing both staff and students in all departments. Until this is done science students will continue to go out into industry with an outlook detrimental to themselves, to science and to society.
P.J.A.