Science in Education
Grant Allen
[Chapter III from the book, Post-Prandial
Philosophy, published 1894 in London by Chatto & Windus]
I mean what I say: science in education, not education in science.
It is the last of these that all the scientific men of England have
so long been fighting for. And a very good thing it is in its way, and
I hope they may get as much as they want of it. But compared to the
importance of science in education, education in science is a matter
of very small national moment.
The difference between the two is by no means a case of tweedledum
and tweedledee. Education in science means the systematic teaching of
science so as to train up boys to be scientific men. Now scientific
men are exceedingly useful members of a community; and so are
engineers, and bakers, and blacksmiths, and artists, and
chimney-sweeps. But we can't all be bakers, and we can't all be
painters in water-colours. There is a dim West Country legend to the
effect that the inhabitants of the Scilly Isles eke out a precarious
livelihood by taking in one another's washing. As a matter of
practical political economy, such a source of income is worse than
precariousit's frankly impossible. "It takes all sorts to
make a world." A community entirely composed of scientific men
would fail to feed itself, clothe itself, house itself, and keep
itself supplied with amusing light literature. In one word, education
in science produces specialists; and specialists, though most useful
and valuable persons in their proper place, are no more the staple of
a civilised community than engine-drivers or ballet-dancers.
What the world at large really needs, and will one day get, is not
this, but due recognition of the true value of science in education.
We don't all want to be made into first-class anatomists like Owen,
still less into first-class practical surgeons, like Sir Henry
Thompson. But what we do all want is a competent general knowledge
(amongst other things) of anatomy at large, and especially of human
anatomy; of physiology at large, and especially of human physiology.
We don't all want to be analytical chemists: but what we do all want
is to know as much about oxygen and carbon as will enable us to
understand the commonest phenomena of combustion, of chemical
combination, of animal or vegetable life. We don't all want to be
zoologists, and botanists of the type who put their names after "critical
species:" but what we do all want to know is as much about plants
and animals as will enable us to walk through life intelligently, and
to understand the meaning of the things that surround us. We want, in
one word, a general acquaintance with the results rather than with the
methods of science.
"In short," says the specialist, with his familiar sneer, "you
want a smattering."
Well, yes, dear Sir Smelfungus, if it gives you pleasure to put it sojust
that; a smattering, an all-round smattering. But remember that in this
matter the man of science is always influenced by ideas derived from
his own pursuits as specialist. He is for ever thinking what sort of
education will produce more specialists in future; and as a rule he is
thinking what sort of education will produce men capable in future of
advancing science. Now to advance science, to discover new snails, or
invent new ethyl compounds, is not and cannot be the main object of
the mass of humanity. What the mass wants is just unspecialised
knowledgethe kind of knowledge that enables men to get
comfortably and creditably and profitably through life, to meet
emergencies as they rise, to know their way through the world, to use
their faculties in all circumstances to the best advantage. And for
this purpose what is wanted is, not the methods, but the results of
science.
One science, and one only, is rationally taught in our schools at
present. I mean geography. And the example of geography is so
eminently useful for illustrating the difference I am trying to point
out, that I will venture to dwell upon it for a moment in passing. It
is good for us all to know that the world is round, without its being
necessary for every one of us to follow in detail the intricate
reasoning by which that result has been arrived at. It is good for us
all to know the position of New York and Rio and Calcutta on the map,
without its being necessary for us to understand, far less to work out
for ourselves, the observations and calculations which fixed their
latitude and longitude. Knowledge of the map is a good thing in
itself, though it is a very different thing indeed from the technical
knowledge which enables a man to make a chart of an unknown region, or
to explore and survey it. Furthermore, it is a form of knowledge far
more generally useful. A fair acquaintance with the results embodied
in the atlas, in the gazetteer, in Baedeker, and in Bradshaw, is much
oftener useful to us on our way through the world than a special
acquaintance with the methods of map-making. It would be absurd to say
that because a man is not going to be a Stanley or a Nansen, therefore
it is no good for him to learn geography. It would be absurd to say
that unless he learned geography in accordance with its methods
instead of its results, he could have but a smattering, and that a
little knowledge is a dangerous thing. A little knowledge of the
position of New York is indeed a dangerous thing, if a man uses it to
navigate a Cunard vessel across the Atlantic. But the absence of the
smattering is a much more dangerous and fatal thing if the man wishes
to do business with the Argentine and the Transvaal, or to enter into
practical relations of any sort with anybody outside his own parish.
The results of geography are useful and valuable in themselves, quite
apart from the methods employed in obtaining them.
It is just the same with all the other sciences. There is nothing
occult or mysterious about them. No just cause or impediment exists
why we should insist on being ignorant of the orbits of the planets
because we cannot ourselves make the calculations for determining
them; no reason why we should insist on being ignorant of the
classification of plants and animals because we don't feel able
ourselves to embark on anatomical researches which would justify us in
coming to original conclusions about them. I know the mass of
scientific opinion has always gone the other way; but then scientific
opinion means only the opinion of men of science, who are themselves
specialists, and who think most of the education needed to make men
specialists, not of the education needed to fit them for the general
exigencies and emergencies of life. We don't want authorities on the
Cucurbitaceæ, but well-informed citizens. Professor Huxley is
not our best guide in these matters, but Mr. Herbert Spencer, who long
ago, in his book on Education, sketched out a radical programme of
instruction in that knowledge which is of most worth, such as no
country, no college, no school in Europe has ever yet been bold enough
to put into practice.
What common sense really demands, then, is education in the main
results of all the sciencesa knowledge of what is known, not
necessarily a knowledge of each successive step by which men came to
know it. At present, of course, in all our schools in England there is
no systematic teaching of knowledge at all; what replaces it is a
teaching of the facts of language, and for the most part of useless
facts, or even of exploded fictions. Our public schools, especially
(by which phrase we never mean real public schools like the board
schools at all, but merely schools for the upper and the middle
classes) are in their existing stage primarily great gymnasiumsvery
good things, too, in their way, against which I have not a word of
blame; and, secondarily, places for imparting a sham and imperfect
knowledge of some few philological facts about two extinct languages.
Pupils get a smattering of Homer and Cicero. That is literally all the
equipment for life that the cleverest and most industrious boys can
ever take away from them. The sillier or idler don't take away even
that. As to the "mental training" argument, so often trotted
out, it is childish enough not to be worth answering. Which is most
practically useful to us in lifeknowledge of Latin grammar or
knowledge of ourselves and the world we live in, physical, social,
moral? That is the question.
The truth is, schoolmastering in Britain has become a vast vested
interest in the hands of men who have nothing to teach us. They try to
bolster up their vicious system by such artificial arguments as the "mental
training" fallacy. Forced to admit the utter uselessness of the
pretended knowledge they impart, they fall back upon the plea of its
supposed occult value as intellectual discipline. They say in effect:"This
sawdust we offer you contains no food, we know: but then see how it
strengthens the jaws to chew it!" Besides, look at our results!
The typical John Bull! pig-headed, ignorant, brutal. Are we really
such immense successes ourselves that we must needs perpetuate the
mould that warped us?
The one fatal charge brought against the public school system is that
"after all, it turns out English gentlemen!"
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