SCIENCE, ART, AND EDUCATION — GIBSON 197 



modern thought. The disciplines of the pure sciences are ideal 

 vehicles for this type of education, but the teaching of these disciplines 

 will become effective only when professors of the pure sciences take 

 stock of the essentials of their subjects and devise courses which bring 

 to students the spirit as well as the results of basic scientijBc research. 



COMMUNICATIONS WITH SOCIETY— COMMON SENSE 



A very disturbing symptom of the postwar era, resplendent as it is 

 with spectacular technological advances, is the evident ignorance 

 among even educated people concerning the attitudes of mind and 

 the disciplines of thought that underlie these advances. The impact 

 on the general public of guided missiles, rockets, radar, television, 

 and, above all, the large-scale release of atomic energy has been one 

 of inducing paralysis in the centers of higher thought and discrimina- 

 tion. There has been an abandonment of all restraints on imagination 

 and credulity. After these spectacular advances, people are willing 

 to believe anything and unwilling to accept any of the discipline which 

 established scientific theory or sound engineering practice must impose 

 on the trained mind. This is becoming an age of unbridled fantasy 

 and superstition, an age devoid of critical discrimination. 



Thus, we have "flying saucers." I shall not venture any opinion or 

 possible explanation of these alleged phenomena, but I can state 

 that the credence placed on so-called "reliable observers," who from 

 one visual observation can give the size, speed, and the distance of an 

 unknown and remote object, implies a complete disregard for the most 

 elementary principles upon which scientists and engineers have built 

 so surely and successfully for hundreds of years. This is but one 

 example of the tendency to accept any story, however improbable, 

 without critical review or reference to some standards of credulity. 

 It points up a region where communications between the scientist and 

 society at large are woefully inadequate, a situation fraught with 

 considerable danger. The scientist is running the risk of becoming 

 separated from society, misunderstood as to his motives, and distrusted 

 as to his intent. 



Earlier I directed your attention to the place of satisfying patterns 

 of valid experiences, of qualitative and quantitative communications, 

 and of common viewpoints or common standards of validity in art, 

 science, and technology. These ideas are, of course, not confined to 

 these sophisticated human activities but are to be found in the mental 

 equipment of every rational man or woman. From infancy, the nor- 

 mal human being attempts to order his experiences into rational pat- 

 terns which he conjures up to orient himself in encounters with new 

 and strange phenomena or events. This is referred to colloquially as 

 "making sense" of something new. Since the experiences of large 



