Post-Prandial Philosophy

3. Science in Education

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 precarious--it'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

so--just 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

knowledge--the 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 Cucurbitace, 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 sciences--a 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 gymnasiums--very 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 life--knowledge 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!"