422 SECTIONAL TRANSACTIONS.— L. 



3. Prof. C. H. Desch, F.R.S. — The History of Science as a Link between 



the Sciences and Humanities. 



It is not advisable that separate classes in the history of science should be intro- 

 duced into the courses of instruction for students, whether pass or honours, although 

 special courses may well be provided at a few selected centres. For the ordinary 

 student of science instruction in the history of his subject is best given as a part of 

 the normal course, the historical order of development being adopted by the teacher 

 in his introduction, whilst the higher portions are illustrated by biographical matter 

 and by the reading of original memoirs. By relating each important discovery as 

 it is dealt with to the state of thought at the time, the importance of science in human 

 history may be made clear. In the teaching of applied science, the connection between 

 great discoveries and inventions and social and economic conditions affords many 

 themes for an enthusiastic teacher, and furnishes a means of directing the attention 

 of the student to social studies, which are so apt to be neglected by the scientific 

 specialist. On the other hand, the student of history and literature may be brought 

 into contact with the facts and conceptions of science by a similar approach. The 

 link can only be completed by the recognition of sociology as a science, and this ' 

 recognition is maintained to be the only true means of bridging the gulf between the 

 sciences and the humanities which is too characteristic of modem education. 



4. Prof. D'Arcy Thompson, C.B., F.R.S. — Schoolboy Science. 



5. Visit to the Lewis Evans Collection at the Old Ashmolean Building. 



6. Joint Discussion with Section M on Educational Training for Over- 



seas Life in the hall of the Union Society. 



Sir Thomas Holland, F.R.S. ; Sir A. Daniel Hall ; Hon. W. 

 Ormsby-Gore, M.P. ; Miss Gladys Pott ; Sir Alfred Yarrow, 

 F.R.S. ; Sir John Russell, F.R.S. ; Mr. T. S. Dymond ; Mr. 

 G. W. Olive ; Mr. H. W. Cousins. 



(See Report in extenso, p. 450.) 



Friday, August 6. 



7. Presidential Address by Sir Thomas Holland, K.C.I.E., K.C.S.I., 



F.R.S. (See p. 246.) 



8. Discussion on Scholarships. 



(a) Mr. William Hamilton Fyfe. — Methods of Selections, and 

 Influence on Present System of Education. 



The function of a University is to assist the development of those who have the 

 capacity for mental growth. 



Ideally all other candidates would be excluded, and those who seem to have th» 

 capacity would be admitted regardless of their means. 



At present, tests are needed to assure the presence of this capacity in those who 

 receive financial aid. ' Intelligence tests ' are at present inadequate for this 

 purpose. The only existing method is that of the scholarship examination. 



This shares the educational disadvantages common to all written examinations, 

 which demand the appearance, not the reality, of knowledge, encourage reproduction 

 instead of original effort, rate acquisitiveness above the faculty of enquiry, and belittle 

 the value of the individual search for truth. 



It is important to devise — or at least to proclaim the need for — some test less 

 hostile to the objects of education. 



A disadvantage peculiar to these scholarship examinations is their specialised 

 nature, which requires a boy to narrow his curriculum before he has acquired a good 



