Harold G. Cassidy Yale University New Haven, Connecticut 06520
Physical Science for the Nonscientist and the Antiscientist
T h e necd for a course in science (e.g., physics and chemistry) for t,he nonscientist and even t,he antiscientist is supported by a survey of the generally poor hcaldh of science in college. An approach to sat,isfyingthis necd is outlined. This is a report of experiments I have been conducting a t Yale for several years. By way of introduction I state why it seemed desirable t,o carry out, t.hcse experiments which led to a break with couvent,ional approaches to teaching science. I wish to emphasize that, as a member of the Division of Chemical Educat,ion, I have been aware of t,he heroic efforts that have been and are being made by ~ommit~ted bodies of teachers and ot,hersto improve science teaching. hly own reports to colleagues have been limit,ed because until recently I have had lit,tle t o contribute that seemed well based. Agit,at,ion for beginning to st,udy the problems of t,eaching science to nonscientists began at Yale in the late nineteen-forties (long before Sputnik and C. P. Snow). I t required ten or so years of commit,tee meetings to get a course under way. My first class was held in the fall of 1958 with the support of Professor Harned, Dean William C. DeVane, and a generous prompt grant from Carnegie Corporat:ion ( 1 ) . Since t,hen I have prescnt,ed interim reports, a t first more or less locally (Z), more recently, in THIS JOURNAL (5). Since the course has not explicitly prepared people t,o major in chemistry, it has always been given outside of the Chemist,ry Department (4),which is why t,he Carnegie support was so providential. These few remarks are by way of background. They arc meant, to encourage those who are trying to innovate, to experiment in education in the presence of constraints. I t can be done, but requires patience and the time sense of a geologist. It also requires luck, such as a Sputnik; a C. P. Snow lecture that touched sensitive areas. But luck works both Tvays, and unluckily now student unrest poses added challenges to us. The reasons for embarking on this long course of experiments in content, at,titude, and context of a course for students not intending to major in science were many. Among the earliest \yere t,he evidences that "Science," hitherto one of the most secure of our cultural achievements, was being t,hreatened actively and passively from within the body of sciences itself, and also from without. Threats from within arise in part because of unsolved problems of communication between and within particular sciences; failure to educate scientists broadly enough, leading to cultural illiteracy and naivete; and Presented at, the Chicago Meeting of the ACS, September 16, 1970.
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dogmatic attitudes that erect barriers between sciences and within the culture. Active t,hreats from within arise from the information explosion; from the corrupting influence of power; and from failure to understand the importance of ideas and the moral effects of action. Threats from without include the scientific illiteracy of the majority of policy-makers; failure to answer questions that ordinary laymen think import,ant, leaving them to turn to magic; the act,ive efforts of anarchistic thinkers and of extremc existentialists; confusion of science with scientific technology and failure to recognize the operations of humanistic technologies (4). This is an incomplete hill of particulars but perhaps it is suggestive. The reason for being concerned about teaching science to our increasing crop of scientifically illiterat,e students is of course partly based on the threats to science that may he posed by this body of ill-educated citizens with votes, especially under the influence of demagogs; of obscene clowns with their minstrels and camp-following drug-pushers; or of well-meaning scientists who are themselves illiterate, and easily misled by logical reasoning from cultural premises that are dubious-as, for example, the resonances we hear in much talk of theories of Rousseau and others: discredited, though attractive in their basic premise of the inevitability of progress ever upward. This makes it really unnecessary to work a t it, and also sets one free to do as he pleases, since either everything works automatically for the good or the course of events is purely chance. The replacement of personal discipline with a permissive attitude is part of the picture. (Scientific facts are not permissive; intransigent matter is not permissive.) As I said, science is threatened from within and from without. This is, of course, not a new situation, but it has taken on new dimensions because of the prevalence of violence as a way of dealing with problems. Since this is the context of our course, and since we must take cognizance of the habitat if we are to be relevant, I shall further sketch the situation as I see it. I shall be concerned with internal threats to science because these affect what we shall teach; and eztemal threats because these affect what and how we shall teach. Active threats to science from within the ranks of scientists arise from the pressures upon scientists. Back in 1931, in an essay on the scientific out,look, Bertrand Russell wrote that a t the same time that '< science as the pursuit of power becomes increasingly triumphant, science as the pursuit of truth is being killed by a skepticism which the skill of the men of science has generated" (6). It seems to me that as prizes multiply, and attendant monetary reward and
power, we have to be more than ever vigilant that our precious heritage not be used irresponsibly. I am thinking of the attitude conveyed by Watson's "The Double Helix" of clever taking of advantage of the work of others, as though science should be a competitive, even a predatory, operation (6). Another source of threat to science from within is the extraordinary accumulation of information that we are busily multiplying. This must, of course, continue, even though much of it may be redundant. Two approaches are presently in train. To make a better broom for the sorcerer's apprentices to sweep the threatening accumulation with: extraordinarily ingenious computer programs for filing and retrieval. This can only be a stop-gap. At the same time there are people and groups working at the sorcerer's role of subduing the increasing complexity-much as Mendeleev did one hundred years ago with his remarkable Table (7). The important point here is that such comprehensive, unifying schemes may counteract the fragmenting effect of specialization-necessary as it is, but devisive as it is. There are other active threats, but this is enough. Passive threats from within are a kind of smugness that comes from cultural illiteracy. If what you don't know doesn't worry you, and if what you don't know is the history of the trials that scientists have gone through to raise science to its present moral level, then on this ignorance can thrive the culturally prevalent sloppiness of expression and laxity of stance. For we have certainly seen a trend of general decay of reason, so that one has had the feeling that many scientists have lost their nerve: it is as though they didn't believe in reason any more. I am reminded of a ringing phrase of Joseph Needham's. He was concerned with another (but related) question, that of maintaining religion in an irreligious age. "The tyranny of one form of experience over the others, in any given age," he said, "can only be softened by t,he unyielding witness of those few persons who are not overborne by the prevalent spirit . . . . Man xas not born to be hypertrophied in one special direction (S)." In this context, I see also active and passive threats to science from its habitat. One of the most prevalent is the "Science is evil" syndrome. Science is widely misunderstood: it seems to be thought of as something tangible-and evil. I need hardly pursue this here, but I recall an ACS lecture tour some years ago when in the discussion period someone got up arid shouted at me that science was evil because it had made an atom bomb. I had enough presence of mind to call his attention to how evil art arid literat,ure were by his apparent criteria because propaganda use was made of t,hem to pervert peoples' minds arid to lead t,hem to their deaths. I then said that knoxledge of all kinds is cognitive, and cannot do anything; that it may be used by people for good or evil; that the human act has moral implications, and that. the knowledge itself is only a tool. Today, I think, I would perhaps not. have used the ~veak"and you're one too" argument, but have given somc examples. We scientists need to be alert to t,his kind of misuriderstatiding, and to talk science and to educate people in all subtle and other ways possible about what science is. This misunderstanding gives support to the movement to polit,icize science (and the universities), for if
science is evil, then it should be brought under control. We must resist this movement with all our strength. For science is outside of politics. The moment it becomes a tool of a party, or an ideology, that moment will mark the beginning of the fatal illness of science. Copious data supporting this point have been provided in Russia and China; infective agents are not absent from among us. But the greatest threat of all to science is a prevalent ignorance of science in two full generations; a certain fear born of ignorance; an envy, the origins of which are probably quite deep; and, I seem to sense, a cert,ainlack of trust in the search for ~varrantedbeliefs (9). One can sympathize with the problems of these scientifically illiterate people. They know, as do lve, that Nature is incomparably richer than our constructs. Moreover, Nature can be experienced while our const,ructs are cold and withdrawn, and intellectual (like literary and art criticism, and history and philosophy, though these are hardly ever mentioned in this breath). What they do not understand is why it. is that science has its power; and \vhat science is; and why we insist that even modern science gives us only a partial viex of the \vorld. I shall not pursue the matter further (4) but turn now to the studies in "Physical Science for the Non-Scientist" XI-hichcame painfully out of these considerations. I may add that I have spent years reading in areas outside of science in order to prepare myself, and I must take this opportunity to thank for their patience and support all my graduate students who suffereda certain degree of scientific neglect, though I t,ried to bring them other benefits to compensate. Having decided after several years of teaching and learning and experimenting to set off to one side the conventional approaches to science, I wrote down what the overall goals of the course should be (1) The most basic consideration in this approach to teaching science is that it and d l of his college experiences, and the knowledge acquired, are part of the studat's life. I mean this in the deepest Sense. Not a course that he "takes" along with other courses in order to fulfill requirements, but an integral part of his maturation, of hi3 expanding understanding of the world view and personal philosophy he is building, and is helped to build; a door-opening experience -opening doom to his mind as well as windows to his developing self. ( 2 ) Science is s. human activity, with d l the limitations and noble implications that implies. (3) Science is an attempt to find a. certain kind of order in the chaos of appearances. This attempt is carried out in the cognitive realm by the construction of sbstract, and in fact in some respects absolute concepts; the discovery of invariant relatiaships between these concepts-which we call lam-and the use of these to subdue the relative aspects of Nature, while always turning to empirical tests to validate the concepts and their relations. (4) Since science is cognitive, and an intellectual tool, science cannot act. Men may use science, and they may use i t for good or evil. I n this sense, the sciences partake of the problems of literature, the arts, philosophies, and history by being s t the mercy of persons. ( 5 ) Science is only part of the cultured person's world-view.
These fundamental goals of the course are taught explicitly and intentiorially through substantive physics and chemistry. Here a great temptation must be resisted, xvhich is to let the Instructor's fascination with his field lead him to overload the course. This has Volume 48, Number 4, April
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killed many attempts a t solving our problems. I know one case where the teacher, in all desire not to let his charges-for whom he truly wished the best and most. exciting course--miss anything important, overloaded his offering with what became in the eyes of many students superficial and irrelevant stuff. (Elections fell almost to zero in two years.) So one has to practice that well-known maxim, that the essence of education i s the ability to discriminate. One must make that difficult effort to decide on a few important subjects. My criterion was to decide what would be most important to my students during the next t,wenty years. I feel that twenty is probably close to the limit anyone can foresee, and moreover if by that time they are not thoroughly on their own intellectually then perhaps there was not much more I could have done a t the time. For it is quite clear to me as I look at those faces out there, that my class contains such a wide distribution of temperaments that the chances are goodthat there are some students I can never reach. Given this decision, I finally settled, after contemplation and discussion, on a rather limited group of subjects for a year course: electromagnetic radiation, relativity, quanta and photoelectric theory, atomic, nuclear, and molecular structure, and a set of larger issues. This sounds very familiar-the table of contents of many texts of physical science. Quite understandably so, of course, since we can surely all agree on basic subjects. The problem does not lie so much a t the level of substantive content as a t the level of attitude in presentation, and holistic approach. Obviously, this list has omitted a great deal of physics and chemistry. And clearly some classical material has to be included by way of introduction. My premises include that the student need have had no high school chemistry and physics, or may have forgotten all he did take; that he may be essentially mat'hematically illiterate, or in any event have forgotten his algebra and trigonometry. And that although I avoid explicit use of calculus nevertheless, since science is a human activity, and the students are reasonably intelligent human beings, if one can show them why it is import,ant to them they will rise to the challenge of doing the necessary math. I have strictly omitted an historical approach for many reasons, amongthe more cogent of which is that it would take time away from the very substantive physics and chemistry that I have felt it obligatory to include as part of the conceptual and factual framework of the course. It is interesting how much classical material can be omitted without permanent damage provided subsequent material is chosen with care. Let me sketch what I try to do. All science begins with perception. It is essential to get this across to the student, since it immediately connects science with everything else he does (but you have to tell him this!). Moreover, he needs to have brought home to him the limits and fallibility of perception, and the efforts that have to be made to ensure that the perceiver is not being led astray by appearances or by his own prejudices. I consider this introduction quite critical, especially for people who do not tend to think abstractly. You can, if you wish, present illusions of various k i n d s t h e psychology laboratory may be helpful here-to show how easy it is to make them 214
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see or not see. Two periods spent on this introduction is not too much, for it leads into an area which I have found to be a source of serious difficulty for students, both scientifically inclined and not. This is the problem of transferring what they see "out there" into some form of symbolic representation in their minds which they can then transfer to paper. This is so serious a barrier (often subliminal) that it needs our attention a t the very beginning of the course. This is why I spend time, starting with putting names on perceptions, constructing these into propositions, developing truth-tables, then going to Venn diagrams, with their gestalt aspect, and from there to embodiment in the hardware of switching circuits. That is to say, we complete a journey from the thing or process or demonstration perceived as "out there": to mental constructs by a process of symboIic transformation: and then back "out there" again in re-coded form for validation against the way the world is. This can have tremendously enlightening effect on the perceptive and imaginative student. Suddenly he says, "Oh! is that what you're doing in sciehce!" Of course, this is far from all there is, but it's enough of a beginning. Sufficient unto the day is the insight thereof. In this connection I introduce some scientific philosophy based on Henry Margenau (10). I use this as the philosophzcal framework of the course. The pedagogical framework is a metaphor of the structure of experience, knowledge, and action which enables the student to grasp the whole intellectual structure of the university or college a t a glance (4). This allows him to connect all his courses into a preliminary world view. The scientzfic framework is made up of the solutions to problems of perception-to-mental construct-to symbolic representation. The central theme of the course is light, the phenomenon to which we owe life on this earth. I continually, sometimes explicitly, sometimes by indirection, weave these themes and frameworks together with substantive, factual science (11). For example, after discussing electricity and magnetism it becomes possible to develop the equations for the cyclotron. Thus close to the beginning of the course the student can understand something about atom smashers. We then review the geometry of light beams, interference, and the interferometer. This concludes the classical introduction. We take up the special theory of relativity very thoroughly, since quite simple algebra is involved. We follow closely Einstein's original approach. The students enjoy this very much, particularly when they see how from the premises, with a little faith to make up for matter not yet studied, out falls the famous E = m2. Then when we show how the relativistic approach unites electricity and magnetism: each a result of the frame of reference taken to the common phenomenon; they are charmed, and right with us. This leads us then, as part of the discussion of the fruit of discontent that brought about the development of modern science, to photoelectric theory: Planck's work and Einstein's equation. This is probably the high point of the course for many students. One nearly jumped out of his seat: "Do you mean that that is the explanation for the ionization potential series they made us memorize in high school?" No problems with him from then on. A large portion of the rest of the course is a rational
approach to the structure of matter, starting with at,omic structure because it is most familiar, then going on to nuclear and molecular structure, In the lat,ter, as a kind of grand summary, we do a complete proof of the structure of the acetic acid molecule, relating conceptual models to observed behavior, thus recapitulat'ing the earlier epistemological discussion. This seems to be very convincing to the students and to answer many of their questions. Finally, we end the course by tying it in to the larger issues that face the layman today: probability and statistics, with a discussion of limitations and powers of the methods; cybernetics as a unifying science of processes in general; particles and fields; the second law of thermodynamics and time's arrow as approached through a careful examination of a Carnot cycle, and a final discussion of natural philosophy as part of the student's world view. Finally, a few summarizing remarks. I have not given a detailed syllabus of the course since it can he found in reference (11). What I have tried to do here is to provide some valid reasons why the nonscience student should be taught science: it is essential if we are to remain world cultural leaders. We cannot play parlor games with this, or reverently rearrange the old-time pre-professional course topics and pretend we have made progress. I t won't do. Students today will turn away. What we can do is to show them what science has to offer them. Perhaps the most effective approach is to show them that science is our most comprehensive bearer of rational meaning (4, 1.9). Nearly everything fit,s together and is validated against the way the world is. The tough, operational attitude that a trained scientist can take is radically conservative. It does not discard something imperfect unbil something better is in hand; it relies on reason as an instrument in the search for certain kinds of truth; it is revisable, indeed ideally revision is welcomed. Because of the mutual fittingness of scientific facts and theories they have
ever-increasing meaning. Also the scientist creates meaning for and of himself w h m he connects himself to this pattern and to his colleagues (international included) through his work in science. It is difficultfor a scientist to become alienated in this sense ("people-alien* tion" is another matter), connected as he is to this great international body of knowledge and company of colleagues. Let us never forget this, and let us teach it and help rescue our floundering students. We must remember that students (I don't say "all" in any of this essay) searching for honesty of expression in life need examples of adults who have achieved competence in an area; who display integrity; who demand discipline toward the meeting of standards; who are friends. Professor Sherman Burson has reminded me to emphasize this point because of our great responsibility to the future of science: we should exemplify what we teach. Students will turn away if what we do does not jibe with what we say. Literature Cited (1) Sea C*asror. H. G., The Superior Studant. 2. (No. 7) November. 1959. PP. 9 5. A h another report in Stianec Education Nawa, December 1959. P. 3. (2) C~aamu,H. G., Yale Scienti* Mwogn'ne, 37 (No. 2) November, 1962, P P 12-15: Yolc Ahmni Magotine. February 1965, pp. 12-15. 13) C A ~ ~ I D H.TG.. . J. C X ~ EDUC. M 46.84 119RQl. -.. (4. I h a w diecuaafd r l e rmpl.cdonr o f 11.11 a m t u d ~in my ..Knodnlar. Fxvenenee an1 A r t i o n . A n Eaaay on L'iueerrun." Teachers College I'rrsr ('olumlm Cnrverairs. N e w York 1969, Chsprer 5. ( 5 ) Q U L L~Y U R I A V . \i'.I... .'\%'are of F a m i ! ~ eoi ~ > l d r S ' Yale Cni~ e r s i t yPress. New Haven. 1940, P. 81. (6) Wmsor*. JAM^ D . . "The Double Helix. A Personal Account of the Disoovew of the Structure of DNA." Atheneum, New York, 1968. See espeoiaily the Book Review by C n * ~ a m r ,ERWIN, Science 159, 1448 (1968). (7) For example; the AAAS-Symposium. Section L 3. Daoember 27. 1869 (Boaton Meeting) on the generalisation of Mendelaav's Table. (8) NEEDRAM, J a s m a , "The Great Amphibium." SCM Press. London, 1931,~.41. (9) Cf. the maeniEoant esssy "The Citadel of Learning," by Jam- Bryant Conant, YaleUniveraity Press, New Haven, 1956. (10) M I R O E N ~HENRY. , "The Nature of Physioal Reality." McGraw-Hill. New York, 1950. (11) CAssmr, H. G. "Soience Restated. Physioa and Chsmiatry for the Non-Eicientiat." Freeman, Cooper 61 Company, San Francisco.
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