i 3 o SCIENCE PROGRESS 



thousand full-time day students of technology to compare with the 17,000 students 

 in the German Technical High Schools, not to reckon nearly 60,000 students in 

 the German Universities. We do not want to adopt here the dominating State 

 influence upon education which exists in Germany, but we must acknowledge that 

 the great advance made in that country in the industrial sciences, and the 

 increase of wealth thus obtained, are due to the use made of highly trained 

 technologists. 



These creators of new industries based upon science need, however, intelligent 

 and contented artisans to carry out their developments. Though manual and 

 mental workers are often considered to belong to different classes, and an inde- 

 fensible social distinction is usually made between them, no such separation can be 

 recognised in scientific fields, where fine manipulation, and skill in the use of 

 instruments, are frequently as valuable as fertility in idea and ingenuity in design. 

 Industrial advance seems, indeed, to depend upon three main factors, in all of 

 which brain and hand are related, though in different degrees. First there is the 

 creative investigator whose work reveals new properties and relationships ; then 

 comes the inventor or industrial researcher who seeks to apply knowledge to 

 useful ends ; and when a practical process or machine has been devised, the 

 artisan is needed to make it fulfil its technical purpose. Each of these three 

 classes has an essential place in national polity ; and the correlation of their 

 interests and activities must be the chief aim of all schemes of reconstruction. 



Several recent reports and manifestoes are concerned with the combination 

 of these different groups. The Interim Report on Joint Standing Industrial 

 Councils submitted to the Prime Minister by a sub-committee of the Recon- 

 struction Committee, and referred to as the "Whitley" report, suggests the 

 establishment of district and national councils, which should deal, among other 

 matters, with technical education and training and with industrial research and 

 the full utilisation of its results. The draft constitution of the new Labour Party, 

 submitted to the Nottingham Conference on January 23, has in the forefront of 

 the party objects, "to secure for the producers by hand or by brain the full fruits 

 of their industry"; and the secretary of the party, the Right Hon. Arthur 

 Henderson, in reply to an inquiry from the editor of Nature, has stated that 

 "the term 'producers by hand or by brain' would include scientific workers if 

 they are prepared to accept our constitution and programme." As scientific 

 workers were not invited to co-operate in the production of the new constitution 

 and programme, Mr. Henderson's offer does not amount to much ; for it is 

 obvious that any party would be prepared to accept them on the same terms. 

 Scientific men will certainly not be disposed to support any system of party 

 politics, and they would be more likely to take part in the new programme if it 

 were made clear that the Labour Party signified a federation or organisation in 

 which brain and hand were united for common welfare rather than for the narrow 

 interests of one particular section of the country's life. We do not want a return 

 to the system of party government ; but if all the workers by brain, as well as by 

 hand, combine into one group for the government of the State on efficient lines, 

 party government will practically cease, and the aim of all will be to promote the 

 interests of the organised community and at the same time preserve the freedom 

 of the individual. This— -the essential problem ©f government— should be the 

 object of all legislation : and it needs the closest combination of brain and hand 

 for its solution. 



