WHAT IS SCIENCE? 



CHAPTER I 

 THE TWO ASPECTS OF SCIENCE 



F | AHERE are two forms or aspects of science. 



First, science is a body of useful and practical JT 



-*- knowledge and a method of obtaining it. It is 

 science of this form which played so large a part in the 

 destruction of war and, it is claimed, should play an 

 equally large part in the beneficent restoration of peace. 

 It can work for good or for evil. If practical science 

 made possible gas warfare, it was also the means of 

 countering its horrors. If it was largely responsible for 

 the evils of the industrial revolution, it has already cured 

 many of them by decreasing the expenditure of labour 

 and time that are necessary for the satisfaction of our 

 material needs. In its second form or aspect, science 

 has nothing to do with practical life and cannot affecfjS- 

 it, except in the most indirect manner, either for good or 

 for ill. Science of this form is a pure intellectual study. 

 It is akin to painting, sculpture, or literature rather than 

 to the technical arts. Its aim is to satisfy the needs of 

 the mind and not those of the body ; it appeals to nothing 

 but the disinterested curiosity of mankind. 



The two forms, practical and pure science, are probably 

 familiar to everyone ; for the necessity for both of them 

 is often pressed on the public attention. There is some- 

 times opposition between their devotees. Students of 

 pure science denounce those who insist on its practical 

 value as base-minded materialists, blind to all the higher 

 issues of life ; in their turn they are denounced as 



