Too Small & Too Slow

In Edinburgh for its 113th annual meeting, the British Association for the Advancement of Science heard some frank and challenging criticism of British science and technology. The speaker: the association's president, H.R.H. Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh,* until a month ago skipper of H.M.S. Magpie in the Mediterranean. It was aboard his little frigate that Philip, working on navy signal pads, scrawled out the first draft of his speech.

After paying his respects to British science over the past 100 years, he turned to the other side of the record. "From 1870 to 1890, the high-water mark of British industrial expansion . . . had been reached, and the competition of the United States and Europe was just beginning to be felt. But the lack of serious competition hitherto had bred a feeling of overconfidence and satisfaction . . . The result was a conservative attitude towards technical change and, particularly in the older industries, neglect of scientific research . . . It is significant that the history of production engineering after 1890 is almost entirely confined to the United States."

During two world wars, British science and British industry grew closer together again under the impetus of military necessity. But even now, "the rate at which scientific knowledge is being applied in many industries is too small and too slow . . . The natural conservatism of laymen has acted as a powerful brake to the adoption of new ideas . . . [There is] lack of a coordinated system of scientific and technological education in this country . . . The buying up and suppression of patents and discoveries to protect equipment from becoming obsolete has also been known to happen . . . It is a sad reflection that the urgent demands of modern war can produce advances that might otherwise take many years to develop, especially in the costly and uncertain experimental stages."

Concluded Philip: "Science has stood beside the authors of progress to advise, to help, and sometimes to guide . . . We have evolved a civilization based on the material benefits which science and technology can provide. The nation's wealth and prosperity are governed by the rapid application of science to its industries and commerce . . . [Scientific knowledge] has reached a point where we can set the world free . . . or obliterate life itself . . . It is clearly our duty as citizens to see that science is used for the benefit of mankind. For, of what use is science if man does not survive?"

* Like many another British institution, the B.A.A.S. likes to honor itself by honoring royalty. Other members of the royal family who have presided: Prince Philip's great-great-grandfather Prince Consort Albert (1859), the Duke of Windsor, then Prince of Wales (1926).

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