SECTION D: CARDIFF, 1920. 



ADDRESS 



TO THE 



ZOOLOGICAL SECTION 



BY 



Pbofessok J. STANLEY GARDINER, M.A., F.R.S., 



PRESIDENT OF THE SKCTION. 



Where do toe stand? 



The public has the right to consider and pass judgment on all that 

 affects its civilisation and advancement, and both of these largely 

 depend on the position and advance of science. I ask its congideration 

 of the science of Zoology, whether or not it justifies its existence as 

 such, and, if it does, what are its needs'.' It is at the pai'ting of the 

 ways. It eitlier has to justify itself as a science or be altogether starved 

 out by the new-found enthusiasm for chemistry and physics, due to the 

 belief in their immediate application to industries. 



It is a truism to point out that the recent developments in chemistry 

 and physics depend, in the main, on the researches of men whose 

 names are scarcely known to the public : this is equally true for all 

 sciences. A list of past Presidents of the Pioyal Society conveys 

 nothing to the pubUc compared with a list of Captains of Industry who, 

 to do them justice, are the first to recognise that they owe their position 

 and wealth to these scientists. These men of science are unknown to 

 the public, not on account of the smallness of their discoveries, but 

 rather on account of their magnitude, which makes them meaningless 

 to the mass. 



Great as have been the results in physical sciences applied to 

 industry, the study of animal life can claim discoveries just as great. 

 Their gi'eatest value, however, lies not in the production of wealth, but 

 rather in their broad applicability to human Hfe. Man is an animal and 

 he is subject to the same laws as otlier animals. He learns by the 

 experience of his forebears, but he learns, also, by the consideration of 

 other animals in relationship to their fellows and to the world at large. 

 The whole idea of evolution, for instance, is of indescribable value; it 

 permeates all hfe to-day ; and yet Charles Darwin, whose researches did 

 mor^ than any others to establish its facts, is too often only known to 

 the public as ' the man who said we came from monkeys.' 



