782 REPORTS ON THE STATE OF SCIENCE.— 1915, 



Of all the lessons we are likely to learn, the one that so far promises most 

 to affect the life of the nation may be summed up in the word organisation. 

 The fuss made lately about the shortage of munitions; the discovery in the 

 ranks of the Army, and among its officers, of thousands who are only amateur 

 fighters, hut are professionally trained technologists ; the recasting of the Cabi- 

 net ; the introduction, twelve months after the commencement of the war, of 

 legislation to register and classify the technical qualifications of the people ; 

 the repeated occurrence of coal strikes on a large scale, settled only by the inter- 

 vention of Cabinet Ministers, and by an obviously temporary compromise, are 

 all confessions of our shortcomings in national organisation. — shortcomings that 

 have cost the country thousands of lives. 



On the other side of the 'front' we see organisation raised to the level of 

 a national cult — Kvltur — with the result that, while efficiency in action and 

 economy in the utilisation of a country's resources have been raised to a standard 

 hitherto unknown, and by us undreamt of, the human instincts have been drilled 

 out of existence, and C4ermany stands alone as an almost perfect machine in 

 action, but, like a machine, unable to understand the rest of the human race — 

 admired for its mechanical efficiency, but loathed for its degradation of the 

 great human instincts of liberty and toleration. 



But between these extremes there must be a course of maximum wisdom ; 

 for admittedly both the organisation of the community (the feature which is 

 ."supposed to dominate the professional classes) and freedom of the individual 

 (the prerogative of the amateur) are necessary for the progress of what is best 

 in civilisation. 



Every meeting of the British Association reminds us that early in the last 

 century a body of learned men realised that the form of study popularly known 

 as scientific needed organising, required the strengthening influence of a pro- 

 tective guild — the formation of a cult — in order that its value might be forced on 

 the popular mind. Long before the foundation of the British Association, a 

 comparatively small number of men had interested themselves in. scientific 

 problems, and their work had so far progressed as to require specialisation, with 

 the foundation of distinct societies. This specialisation found expression at the 

 first three meetings of the Association by the formation of committees for 

 (1) Mathematics and General Physics, (2) Chemistry and Mineralogy, (3) Geology 

 and Geography, (4) Zoology and Botany, (5) Anatomy and Physiology, and 

 (6) Statistics. 



These six groups have developed into our present twelve i?ections, with extra 

 Sub-Sections; and in practice every Section, by classification of its papers and 

 in the conduct of its discussions, acknowledges a further specialisation that is 

 none the less real because it has not yet been formally recognised in organisation. 



It is difficult for us to realise that, although the collection of scientific data 

 and thought had made such progress eighty-four years ago as to require the 

 sub-division indicated by the first institution of the British Association, the 

 importance of science was still hardly recognised among the so-called learned 

 and the ruling classes. Obvious, if insufficient, progress had been made since 

 the days when it was possible for Dean Swift to issue, as tolerable literature, 

 his satires on ttie Royal Society, or for Robert South to add to his doubtful 

 popularity by describing its members as incapable of admiring anything except 

 'fleas, lice, and themselves.' 



Although science now takes its place on equal terms with literature in the 

 world of academic culture, we have so far succeeded only to a very small extent 

 in getting the professors of pure science to co-operate in unison with the 

 captains of industry who depend entirely, consciously or otherwise, on the 

 application of scientific laws to industrial problems. 



There has hitherto been a ten.dency for scientific and literary men to gather 

 together under one banner, with the motto 'learned,' but a more natural associa- 

 tion should be indicated by the community of interests between scientific men 

 and technical experts. The student of pure science often discovers laws or 

 formulates theories which are but accidentally carried beyond the purely intel- 

 lectual world. On the other hand, technical experts frequently work by empirical 

 methods that are discovered either by accident or as the result of many costly 

 blunders. The growth of science and of commercial technology has been largely 

 independent and unrelated, that is, without organisation. 



