6s6 



NATURE 



[July 21, 1921 



interest them in ttie lives of their lounders and 

 chief exponents, and, in favourable cases, in their 

 original writings. In pure science the student 

 should be shown how each discovery was related 

 to the state of intellectual development at the 

 time when it arose ; in technology the opportunity 

 should be taken of bringing discoveries and in- 

 ventions into relation with the events of history 

 and with the condition of society at different 

 periods. The training of a scientific ^man could 

 not, as a rule, include the study of dead lan- 

 guages ; but modern scientific thought has its 

 roots in ancient Greece. 



Prof. Whitehead dealt with the preparation of 

 schoolboys for scientific study at the university. 

 " The main structure of successful education is 

 formed out of the accurate accomplishment of a 

 succession of detailed tasks." This must be ever 

 kept in mind, since the enthusiasm of reformers 

 so naturally dwells on "the rhetoric of education." 

 The cynic is apt to proclaim that it does not make 

 much difference what the detailed tasks may be ; 

 the one important thing is to get children into the 

 habit of concentrating their thoughts and of doing 

 what they are told. On the contrary, the 

 wise selection of the detailed tasks is of 

 prime importance. " Every subject in the 

 preliminary training must be so conceived 

 and shaped as yielding, during that period, 

 general aptitude, general ideas, and knowledge of 

 speciail facts, which, taken in conjunction, form 

 a body of acquirement essential to educated 

 people. Furthermore, it must be shown that the 

 valuable part of that body of acquirement could 

 not be more easily and quickly gained in some 

 other way by some other combination of subjects." 

 The hard element in a scientific curriculum con- 

 sists in the attainment of exact knowledge based 

 on first-hand observation. The soft element com- 

 prises two factors, of which the more important 

 is browsing, with the very slightest external 

 direction, and mainly dependent on the wayward 

 impulses of a student's inward springs of interest. 

 The second factor should consist of descriptive 

 lectures, designed for the purpose of exciting 

 general interest in the various sciences. 



The afternoon session on July 6 was devoted to 

 the consideration of " The Universities and Tech- 

 nological Education." Lord Crewe, the chairman, 

 sounded the keynote of the discussion. No longer 

 is it a question as to whether the universities 

 should or should not provide training of the type 

 defined as technological, but as to how far they 

 should go in promoting studies which lead men 

 and women on to employment in the fields of in- 

 dustry and commerce, or engage them in con- 

 tinued scientific research. "The universities exist 

 because they satisfy the needs of the country — 

 moral, intellectual, and practical — and the nature 

 of the teaching they supply is conditioned by those 

 needs. When, therefore, the conductors of an in- 

 creasing number of industries assert that their 

 methods depend for development and practical 

 success upon scientific knowledge, and that it is 

 only from the appropriate departments of different 

 NO. 2699. VOL. 107] 



universities that such knowledge is forthcoming at 

 Its best, the universities have no choice." Lord 

 Crewe directed attention to the outstanding suc- 

 cess of the schools of agriculture of the two 

 ancient universities. 



Sir Arthur Currie gave an account of the highly 

 organised courses for engineers at McGill. These 

 courses extend over four sessions, and include 

 economics, finance, and industrial law. During 

 the three intervening summers students obtain 

 practical experience in works. In virtue of their 

 superior education, they are fitted, when they go 

 into the active practice of their profession, to rise 

 to positionjs in which they will lead and direct. 

 Advanced courses in which students are taught 

 how to conduct investigations are also arranged, 

 the Canadian Government providing forty-five 

 scholarships for graduates who show aptitude for 

 research. 



In the course of an able paper Prof. 

 Smithells said : "1 have always thought 

 that our difficulties with technology have arisen 

 chiefly from the belated and stinted cultivation of 

 natural science in the ancient universities." "If 

 natural science as it arose had been gathered to 

 the older studies and had flowed in its natural 

 courses, the mechanical arts and those who follow 

 them would surely have been brought long since 

 into a very different relation with the academic 

 world." "It would be excusable, perhaps, to 

 make this the occasion to preach the urgency ot 

 technology. But that is not my intention ; 1 am 

 far more anxious to raise my voice against its 

 unbridled pursuit, to direct attention to the re- 

 straints under which it should be fostered, and 

 to plead for what seems indispensable to its 

 worth." Of the Department of Scientific and In- 

 dustrial Research his experience led him to say : 

 " I hope I exhibit some capability of seeing what 

 is good in this new State Department. Of what 

 appears not good I will only say this, that there 

 seems most room for anxiety in the creation of 

 isolated institutes for technological research, 

 which may detach from universities a most valu- 

 able type of studies and of men that will them- 

 selves suffer from their isolation." 



Mr. J. C. Maxwell Garnett contended that "the 

 provision of the highest technological education 

 by universities, instead of by separate institutions, 

 tends also to benefit the industries by harmonising 

 the ideals and purposes of leaders of the people 

 in many different walks of life, by widening the 

 interests of the future captains of industry, and by 

 accustoming them to an atmosphere of scientific 

 inquiry, so that in due course they will encourage 

 research, well understanding that research is some- 

 thing more than experimental tests — more even 

 than attempts to discover immediate industrial 

 applications of established facts." 



Prof. W. W. Watts, after sketching the pur- 

 pose of technological education and the aims of 

 the universities and other institutions which set 

 themselves to prepare men for industrial life, said : 

 " The scheme of education that will be evolved . . . 

 will not greath' differ in its method from the older 



