Role of the Scientist in Modern Society: The First Three Hundred Years

ROLE OF THE SCIENTIST IN MODERN SOCIETY: THE FIRST THREE HUNDRED YEARS LORD FLOREY* I am conditioned by the pernickety and pedantic outlook of Oxford teachers, locally known as dons, so that when I started to write something on this general theme, I wondered what "modern society" was and, thence, what was "modern." So I asked one of my colleagues, who is an historian, when he considered that "modern" history began. By and large, as far as England is concerned, he thought somewhere about the end ofthe fifteenth century. For the purposes oftoday, I suppose it is legitimate to confine one's remarks to what has happened in Europe and the western hemisphere, and it is generally agreed that modern science began there about the end of the sixteenth century. I thought, therefore, that it might be helpful in assessing our position today to try to get some historical perspective and to see what role, ifany, scientists played at the beginning ofthe modern era, and to try to see how the complex contemporary situation has been reached in which the activities ofscientists have become so important, not only in making and applying new discoveries, but in helping to determine state policy. We have recently been reminded ofthe beginning of the modern era because scientists in many parts of the world have been celebrating the fourth centenary ofthe birth ofGalileo, whose complex and controversial character, I am happy to say, has kept up employment among historians, for they are still trying to unravel the tortuous events of his somewhat stormy life. But it is certain, as Andrade has remarked, that "the essence of Galileo's services to science was that he insisted upon and demonstrated * The Queen's College, Oxford, England. This paper was presented at the Georgetown University Symposium on Science and Society October 28, 1964, and published in the Georgetown Medical Bulletin. It is reprinted here by kind permission. 279 the fundamental importance of experiment and observation, which was against the tradition ofthe time." Francis Bacon, that great philosopher and scientist who lived from 1561 to 1626 and so was a contemporary ofGalileo, sharpened men's appreciation ofscientific method when he put together his views on how the advancement ofknowledge might be utilized to bring about an improvement in man's condition, an endeavor which still greatly occupies our minds. In his Novum Organum he advocated the method ofinduction, the employment oftrained observers, and verification by experiments. Bacon did no experiments himselfand did not apparently realize that a skilled investigator doing his own experiments, and learning from them as his work advanced, was likely to obtain more valuable results than would accrue from the examination ofmaterial brought together by collectors which was then handed over to others to discuss. Nevertheless, his learning, which was much in advance ofthat ofhis time, and the eloquence with which he put forward his views aroused the educated, already prepared for a change, and pointed out to them the road by which a fuller and a sounder knowledge ofnature might be attained. The occurrence ofsuch men ofscience at this time is probably a reflection of the fact that the intellectual climate of the Renaissance was favorable not only to the exploration ofthe literary and artistic possibilities of human activity, but also to the investigation of natural phenomena, the explanation ofwhich had been for so long frozen in rigid dogma. In general, none ofthe few scientists who existed at that time worked in established schools or institutions. They had few or no pupils and they were supported by no organizations with splendid resources. Men like Galileo were patronized by rich and enlightened rulers, the forerunners of those who now put the great resources ofthe state at scientists' disposal, while others patrons were benevolent men with private fortunes such as also, most fortunately, we have today. The questioning oftradition and ofthe pronouncements ofthe classical Greek and Roman philosophers and medical men, particularly Aristotle and Galen, which began in the sixteenth century and increased in the seventeenth, was aided by the formation of scientific societies in which those caught up in the new currents ofinterest in the natural sciences could meet and discuss problems that exercised their...