Scientific revolution

“ This, slowly to be sure, turned the energies of mankind in a new direction, led to the substitution of inquiry and patient experimentation for assumption and disputation, and in time produced a scientific and industrial revolution which has changed the whole nature of the older problems. The scientific spirit has to-day come to dominate all lines of human thinking, and the applications of scientific principles have, in the past century, completely changed almost all the conditions surrounding human life. ”

“ But this levelling, which the man of the new science, with his new apparatus, with his 'globe and his machines,' contrives to exhibit here with so much 'facility,' is a scientific one, designed to answer a scientific purpose merely. The experimenter, in this case, is one who looks with scientific forebodings, and not with hope only, on those storms of violent political revolution that were hanging then on the world's horizon, and threatening to repeat this process, threatening to overwhelm in their wild crash, all the ancient social structures—threatening 'to lay all flat'! ”

“ The theme of the present lecture is that since the growth of science has been clearly the true and ultimate source of the creative impulses making for change, and the basis of man's increasing achievements in control, the fundamental need in the world today is for the wide and thorough diffusion of a knowledge of the nature of the revolution that is taking place and of the scientific method and spirit. ”

“ History reports the existence of such dissident individuals and social groups and movements in one civilization after another.
In a very real sense any invention, discovery or innovation in any field of human thought or action, if widely accepted or adopted automatically, becomes a revolt against the status quo. Our experience with innovation during two centuries of the great revolution gives us every reason to suppose that the flow of scientific and technical invention and discovery will continue for an indefinite period into our future. ”

“ This is especially true in the field of the natural sciences whose technique has become so highly developed that, aside from a few millionaires, the State alone is able to supply the means demanded for the establishment and maintenance of the necessary scientific apparatus. ”

“ All the great discoveries which have made modern science,—the compass, the clock, the watch, printing, the maritime discoveries, gunpowder, the law of gravitation, the law of atmospheric pressure, of which the steam-engine is but a development, the rudiments of chemistry, the scientific method already pointed out by Roger Bacon, and practised in Italian universities,—where does that all come from, if not from the free cities which developed under the shelter of communal liberties? ”

“ Physical science had been revolutionized. People suddenly discovered that what they had held all their lives to be facts were entire misconceptions of the truth. And, if they had been so mistaken about the facts of physical science, might they not be equally mistaken about theology, about law, about politics? Everywhere was doubt and questioning. Revolution was in the air. ”

“ The greatest obstacle to the discovery of new knowledge in this country, lies in a wide spread ignorance of the dependence of human welfare upon scientific research. I propose therefore to show in a brief manner, that the essential starting-point of human progress, lies in scientific discovery ”

“ It is probably not too much to say that the hope of progress--moral and intellectual as well as material--in the future is bound up with the fortunes of science, and that every obstacle placed in the way of scientific discovery is a wrong to humanity. ”

“ So far has scientific discovery, and its practical applications to human benefit by invention, now progressed, that every one considers this to be, par excellence, the scientific age. And as discovery and invention continue to progress with accelerated speed, we are encouraged to hope, not only that scientific principles will ultimately be universally recognised as the regulators of all technical industry, but also as a fundamental basis of morality. ”

“ But in another way science has been an elevating and inspiring power. Its discoveries have stimulated men’s minds, and have done more than anything else to rouse them from the lethargy consequent upon the apparent failure of the Revolution. ”

“ The vast amount of intellect that had been hitherto wasted on these branches of learning was then wholly concentrated on the study of Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Mathematics, and Engineering, as being the only subjects that gave an adequate return for the labour spent upon them. The result was beyond the dreams of the most sanguine of the pioneers of science. Every day the world was astonished by the news of some marvellous scientific discovery. ”

“ What does the history of science show? The cumulative character of scientific discovery, the unity of its method or inquiry the common problems that are set for it by previous investigators, and the intimate relations between science, industry, and war seem to make extremely unplausible the hypothesis that scientific development owes most of its achievements to the activities of its leading figures. ”

“ In the subjects of heat, light, electricity, magnetism, chemistry, vegetable and animal physiology, psychology and morality, and the more concrete subjects depending upon them, such as politics, trade, commerce, government, &c., our ideas have equally advanced, in consequence of scientific research; and to fully describe the mental progress resulting from discovery in nearly all branches of human knowledge would require a series of books to be written on the History of all the Sciences. ”

“ But at any rate they do for science that which nations can do, and individuals cannot; and they seek for scientific truths in a manner suitable to the respect now professed for science and to the progress which its methods have made. ”

“ Scientists start from hunches, examine available data, advance tentative conclusions, test them in the light of wider observations, and round out their research by formulating general principles or "laws." This scientific approach has been used in many fields of observation and study. I am applying the formula to one aspect of social history: the appearance, development, maturity, decline and disappearance of the vast co-ordinations of collective, experimental human effort called civilizations. ”

“ While it is true that there is but a small circle of people interested in what is called physical science, yet that science now rules the world and is nearly as despotic as nature herself. Human progress is almost entirely scientific and even our industrial progress is based on applied science. ”

“ Does this mean that his penetration in the sciences of man exceeded so greatly his grasp of natural science, or does it mean that the progress of mankind in the scientific knowledge and regulation of human affairs has remained almost stationary for over two thousand years? ”

“ The first consequence of the government of these men would be to render science inaccessible to the people, and such a government would necessarily be aristocratic, because the existing scientific institutions are essentially aristocratic. An aristocracy of learning! from the practical point of view the most implacable, and from the social point of view the most haughty and insulting—such would be the power established in the name of science. ”

“ This projection of new possibilities leads to search for new means of execution, and progress takes place; while the discovery of objects not already used leads to suggestion of new ends.
That science is the chief means of perfecting control of means of action is witnessed by the great crop of inventions which followed intellectual command of the secrets of nature. The wonderful transformation of production and distribution known as the industrial revolution is the fruit of experimental science. ”

“ In our universities and centers of learning he will find the exponents of the science still discussing whether it can ever have any laws, and even whether it should be founded on fact or romance. Let him take down any volume of history from its shelf, and endeavor to find any scientific clue therein to the natural laws underlying and controlling the majestic process of life which has unfolded itself in our western civilization, or to the natural laws that have directed the development of other social systems contemporaneous with it, or anterior to it. ”

“ Its objects are:—To give a stronger impulse and a more systematic direction to scientific inquiry—to promote the intercourse of those, who cultivate science in different parts of the British Empire, with one another and with foreign philosophers—to obtain a more general attention to the objects of science, and a removal of any disadvantages of a public kind which impede its progress. ”

“ Science has been recognized as a powerful instrument of civilization.—Through scientific discoveries there has been a wonderful accession to material wealth, invention has been stimulated, and progress has been made in all directions. The spirit of investigation has been fostered, old theories and superstitions have been abandoned, and truth has been established upon their ruins. In this direction more has been done by science during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries than during the whole previous history of the world. ”

“ Nowadays, we believe that science is at once the legitimate means and the proper goal of the progress of the race, and we fill our school curricula with scientific studies. But this spirit is essentially modern: it owes its chief stimulus to important achievements in the sixteenth century and the first half of the seventeenth. ”

“ Meanwhile, new sciences spring up, and old sciences take new shape, and, as a matter of fact, so large has become the scientific domain, that no one man can master it. Division of labour has become as necessary here as in the manual crafts. ”

“ THE progress of science does not consist merely in the discovery of new facts and the enlargement of our knowledge, or even in the ingenious conclusions thence drawn, and which, from their universality, acquire the character of laws; its mightiest work is the change it brings about in our fundamental conceptions, and the consequent revolution in science itself. As science advances, it gains new principles, new arguments ”

“ The foundation of the Royal Institution at the end of the eighteenth century marks, perhaps, the point at which the importance of physical science began to impress the popular imagination. But great thinkers had long recognised the necessity of applying scientific method in the sphere of social and political investigation. ”

“ You lovers of pure science, if you are imbued with the principles of Socialism, if you have understood the real meaning of the revolution which is even now knocking at the door, do you not see that all science has to be recast in order to place it in harmony with the new principles; that it is your business to accomplish in this field a revolution far greater than that which was accomplished in every branch of science during the eighteenth century? ”

“ But most or all of these reasons have been seen to be of a kind which hold out a good promise for the future, and thereby afford an ample encouragement to the use of a strictly logical method in political investigations, and to the attempt to create a scientific structure of ever-increasing completeness in this region, as well as in others more familiarly associated with the name of Science. ”

“ To us, however, the most distressing aspect of the situation is, that the social acceleration is progressive in proportion to the activity of the scientific mind which makes mechanical discoveries, and it is, therefore, a triumphant science which produces those ever more rapidly recurring changes in environment to which men must adapt themselves at their peril. ”

“ As there exists at the present time in this country a considerable degree of uneasiness in the public mind respecting our ability to maintain our position in the race of progress, and as our future success as a nation depends largely upon science, it is desirable to call attention to the great public importance of new scientific knowledge, and to the means of promoting its development. ”

“ Immediately a discovery is effected it is made public, and is afterwards incorporated in the ordinary text books of science, ready for the use of inventors; and in this way such books have become filled with valuable knowledge acquired by researches in past times. All this knowledge (which has cost millions of pounds and a vast amount of intellect and labour) has been given by its discoverers freely to the nation. ”

“ Men to-day enter scientific pursuits for the same reason that they formerly entered the military service—because every emphasis is laid on scientific endeavor. The nineteenth century scientist is the logical outcome of the nineteenth century desires for scientific progress. ”

“ It is only indirectly, through invention, that scientific knowledge touches our lives on every hand, modifying our environment, altering our daily habits, dislocating the anciently established order, and imposing the burden of constant adaptation on even the most ignorant and lethargic.
Unlike a great part of man's earlier thought, modern scientific knowledge and theory have not remained matter merely for academic discourse and learned books, but have provoked the invention of innumerable practical devices which surround us on every hand, and from which we can now scarce escape by land or sea. ”

“ The forward march of science has now become inevitable, like that of civilization itself. This vast army of workers are engaged, with no stake in the outcome, with no concern for the influence of their work upon church or state or any other human institution or interest, according to known and tried and proved rules, by description, measurement, experiment, and mathematical analysis, in multiplying our reliable, positive knowledge of the world around us. ”