66 The N.Z. Journal of Science and Technology. [Mar. 
While expressing no opinion on these or other specific proposals, we 
consider it useful to set forth some general considerations on the subject. 
The secondary place given to science in British education appears to be 
due to a fear on the part of those trained in literary and philosophical 
subjects that the study of science has in itself no educational value, and 
leads to mechanistic theories of life and to materialism, and is thus unfitted 
to be a means of training in character and citizenship. It has even been 
claimed that the devotion of the Germans to science is the prime cause of 
their national retrogression in morals. It becomes of importance, therefore, 
to present the opposite side. This has been well expressed in a leading 
article in Nature (21st December, 1915), as follows :—- 
“ Devotion to research does not necessarily inhibit interest in other 
notes with which a well-balanced mind should be in resonance. Direct 
contact with Nature and inquiry into her laws do, however, produce a 
habit of mind which cannot be acquired in literary fields, and they are 
associated with a wide outlook on life more often than is popularly 
supposed. Science is able not only to increase the comforts of life and 
add to material welfare, but also to inspire the highest ethical thought 
and action ; and a prominent place should be given to it in all stages of 
educational work as much on account of its ennobling influence as because 
it is a creator of riches.” 
The ideas contained in the above extract are not new, but were clearly 
enunciated after a closely reasoned argument by Professor Karl Pearson 
in 1900.* He concludes that “ modern science, as training the mind to 
an exact and impartial analysis of facts, is an education especially fitted 
to promote sound citizenship. . . . It is because the so-called philo¬ 
sophical method does not, when different individuals approach the same 
range of facts, lead, like the scientific, to practical unanimity of judg¬ 
ment that science rather than philosophy offers the better training for 
modern citizenship ” ; and, further, that “ the scientific interpretation of 
phenomena, the scientific account of the universe, is the only one which 
can permanently satisfy the aesthetic judgment, for it is the only one which 
can never be entirely contradicted by our observation and experience.” 
An interesting and beautifully illustrated article on “ The Eskimos of 
Northern Alaska : a Study in the Effect of Civilization,” by Diamond 
Jenness, appears in the February (1918) number of the Geographical 
Review, published by the American Geographical Society of New York. 
Dr. Jenness, who is a native of Wellington and a graduate of Victoria 
College and Oxford University, was ethnologist to the Southern Party of 
the Canadian Arctic Expedition of 1913-16. During this period he was 
able to make an intimate study of the life of the Eskimos living in the 
region visited by the expedition The paper here referred to is the 
second of two in the. Geographical Revieiv dealing with the two separate 
groups into which they fall : the Copper Eskimos of the Coronation Gulf 
region, and the Eskimos of Northern Alaska. 
* K. Pearson, The Grammar of Science, London, 1900. 
