College 117 



quire oral facility in languages has led to the develop- 

 ment of new and far more efficient methods of language 

 learning. Some colleges have instituted these in the regular 

 curricula; others offer special intensive summer courses. 

 The future scientist would do well to look into the avail- 

 abihty of such courses in his neighborhood. Often an in- 

 tensive summer course followed by a summer abroad will 

 produce the necessary results while leaving the regular 

 college year free for other interests. 



In any case, the future scientist should not be misled 

 by the deplorable tendency of many graduate schools to 

 loosen up on the language requirement. The members of 

 the committees who make these decisions have undoubt- 

 edly been overinfluenced by the growing use of English 

 in formal scientific communications and by their own guilt 

 and embarrassment at being poor in languages themselves. 



Space does not permit a prolonged and elaborate de- 

 fense of the so-called "humanities" as part of a scientist's 

 education. Detailed analyses will be found elsewhere. Let 

 me merely state my general agreement with the thesis 

 promoted by C. P. Snow ^ that the well-being of our 

 society, perhaps its very existence, depends on a marked 

 increase in understanding and interchange among repre- 

 sentatives of what he calls the two "cultures." As he il- 

 lustrates, it is a matter of some pride to many scientists 

 to know rather more about the humanities than the hu- 

 manities people know about science. This tradition deserves 

 to be cherished and encouraged. 



The case for the humanities rests not only on their 

 undoubted contribution to a richer, fuller, more under- 

 standing personal life. As I will try to show in later chap- 

 ters, the scientist is increasingly called upon to play a part 

 in matters of high policy and in what are often referred 

 to as "value problems." He is simply unquaUfied for such 



