382 



NATURE 



[September 15, 1923 



I |( iikmhI 



iffer 



111! 



iiIK- Ml t 111' 'ill. 



Ii niicliir III ilic liriti.sli 



' ■•'■! ■"■irc cxltndcd scale than usual 



These lectures are not intenilnl iir 

 iiu.'Ih1>cis III liu- .\:> .social inn Init Inr tlic Lrcncral pulilic, 

 and the lariii' audiences w'luch attend tliem s1mi\^ ili.ii 

 \(i\ iiian\ [)cople are interested in simple an 

 scientific Work and progress in certain fields. Sucli 

 descriptive lectures, however, do little more tlian 

 titillate the minds of most of the hearers, and notlnn- 

 to impress them with the conviction that science is the 

 greatest social factor in modern civilisation. Wonder 

 may be excited by experiment and exposition, but it 

 needs to be associated with confidence in the guidance 

 which science can give if our social and industrial 

 conditions are to derive the best advantages from pro- 

 gressive knowledge. At least one of these public 

 lectures should be devoted each year to the advocacy 

 of science and scientific methods in national affairs, 

 instead of making them all informative displays of 

 achievements in selected fields. 



Outside the Section rooms (where scientific workers 

 may be permitted to use their own forms of technical 

 expression) and beyond the lecture halls (where ex- 

 perienced speakers successfully hold the attention of 

 assemblies of citizens) is the general public as a whole, 

 reading the daily and weekly newspapers and expecting 

 to be informed in its own language of important 

 scientific developments of all kinds, however intricate 

 they may be — as, for example, the constitution of the 

 atom, the quantum theory, the principle of relativity, 

 or the significance of cell structure. To provide this 

 great group with the pabulum it is capable of digesting 

 is a task which most research workers prefer to leave 

 to others ; and rightly so. Good service is, however, 

 rendered to science by writers who can present difficult 

 subjects in attractive literary form without departing 

 essentially from permissible limits of accuracy — large 

 though these may seem to be to precise investigators. 

 There are such contributors to the general periodical 

 press, and we think that every encouragement and 

 assistance should be given to them. The more that 

 the public is made to understand the fertility and the 

 power of science the greater will be the trust in scientific 

 service, and provision for scientific study and research 

 will be correspondingly increased. 



In the British Isles, httle attempt has been made to 

 secure wide publicity for scientific institutions and 

 work, with the result that they are almost unknown 



NO. 281 I, VOL. 112] 



outside scientific circles. The publications oi 

 National Physical Laboratory, for exam; ' - uii 

 f.'itli(r inadequate to pive even industi. alea 



of the work < at institution. On the oth< r 



' '•"' •'"• ' f Standards issues frequent 



A'ith topics in which practical 

 turn :iii mtercbttd and in which developments hav< 

 ificntl- t ii-'>" {)lace. The T <^ v-.tu.n .1 Reseanl- 

 ( iniiKi! Mishes a num Bulletin 



.siir\c\ niL till- .-tatc of know!'' nous scicntifi' 



snliicclh and briiiL'inu loL't-llx :nt data. N^ 



inM itMtion or society in till- l!r:' 



comparable with these Bulletins ; njo.>t of them htt in, 

 indeed, to be content to hide their li-jht under a In; 1 < 1. 

 so far as the (nit^idf world i> i oi 

 courage any attempts made to r-.; mI ilic zone of 

 illumination. 



We do not suggest that si iiiuita and technical 

 societies should add a publicity service to their func- 

 tions : they are primarily intended for the reception 

 and discussion of new contributions to knowledge, and 

 their concern is the interests of their fellows rather 

 than the attention of the public. The British Associa- 

 tion is on a different footing, in that no technical 

 qualification is required for membership and that it 

 sets out deliberately to create interest in science in the 

 centres where the annual meetings are held, and 

 beyond them by the reports of its proceedings. The 

 presidential addresses, published annually for the 

 Association by Mr. John Murray under the title " The 

 Advancement of Science " (price 65.), though often 

 some^yhat special in' style and scope, constitute the 

 best annual record of the position of scientific subjects 

 of prime importance. Probably few men of science are 

 capable of following intelligently all the sul-jei ts re- 

 viewed in these addresses, and the general public may 

 therefore be pardoned for not comprehending most of 

 them. To students of science, however, whether as a 

 professional occupation or as a leisure hour pursuit, the 

 addresses are invaluable as authoritatiM stat.mcnts of 

 scientific fact and theor)', and the \oli 

 them should be in the library of every one who finds 

 satisfaction in pondcriTi over the great problems with 

 which modem s< ds. 



Though the British Association welcomes member- 

 ship from the general public, it is not too much to say 

 that the presidential addresses, and most of the papers 

 presented to Sections, are intended for audiences of 

 special scientific workers. In the case of a body like 

 the British Medical Association, membership is limited 

 to professionally quahfied men, and in the Sections, 

 therefore, no attempt need be made to deal with 

 scientific subjects in popular terms. With its mixed 

 membership, however, the British Association is in a 



