THE SCIENCE CONGRESS

Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 107, 30 January 1935, Page 8

THE SCIENCE CONGRESS

New Zealand delegates returning from the Science Congress at Melbourne bear unanimous testimony to the success of an event which is .attracting increasing interest ,011 the part of the general public. It is to be hoped every effort will be made here to ensure that rhe next meeting, which is to be held at Auckland in two years time, will be as successful and fruitful.

The New Zealand and Australian Association for the Advancement of Science, though an offspring of the British association, is most favourably placed for the specialised study of scientific, questions peculiar to that part of the Southern Hemisphere which is confusingly mapped as “Australasia.” Both the Dominion and the Commonwealth have in their aboriginal peoples subjects for anthropological investigation of profound interest and importance, as is evident from the summarised versions of the papers read at the congress. They also have their own special meteorological problems to the investigation of which the advance of aviation has given a new and valuable stimulus. In these and other departments of research and discussion the association is not only doing good work in fostering public interest in the pursuit of knowledge, but is also seconding.Dy its contributions of local scientific data to -the vast store now being collected by the parent body. These meetings also offer stimulating encouragement to the younger scientists in New Zealand and Australia, who in the past have had no forum for the enunciation of their theories, no means of checking up” their conclusions by discussions with fellow research woikers, and hence no satisfactory means of evaluating their own achievements. Finally, the fact that the congress is ambulatory enables the scientists to make contacts with the public at widely separated centres, and so the, leaven of the higher learning has a more extended area 01 permeation.