SCIENCE IN INDUSTRY

Hokitika Guardian, 7 September 1928, Page 1

SCIENCE IN INDUSTRY

VIEWS OF SCIENTISTS. — tAustralian Press Assn.—United Service LONDON, Sept. 5. . “Modern craftsmanship, with its ne’se and urgliness, is giving food, clothing, warmth, and interest to- millions who otherwise must die,” de-

clared Sir Wm. Bragg in liis presiden-

tial address to tho British Association at Glasgow. “A new class of workers in England in research \ for associations add forms is springing up throughout the country, bringing the interest and outlook of scientific inquiry into touch both with employers and employees. They arc to some extent a flux, making them run together, because as University men, they can exchange thoughts easily and accurately with employees. Yet they are fellow workers with tho operatives, whom they are inspiring with -an understanding of the purposes, methods, and proper -enrployihen't of scientific research. This is so necessary to national welfare that oven misconceptions cannot lie .allowed to hinder it. Science is not setting forth to destroy the soul of the nation, but to keep its body and spill together. It is a remarkable fuck that the most active industries are those founded on recent scientific research.” Sir Arthur Keith said:—“Scientific men stand out as isolated servants, not only of knowledge but of Empire. Our standard of life no longer depends on acreage hut on the brain capacity of science. That is why business men must back science. The business men constitute tile army in the field, and scientists are men in reserve making ammunition for the business men.

LONDON, Sept. 0. Sir W. Bragg continued: Tho electrical engineering industry might he said to have had its source for a single laboratory experiment, namely, Faraday’s discovery of electromagnetic induction. and to. have grown by the continuous adoption of fresh streams of knowledge. Much of the hone for the future of industry must build upon the work of research organisations. British craftsmen possessed intelligence, skill, and accuracy, which made improvement possible. Therefore their industrial policy should he to take advantage of tho country's qualities by continually seeking new industries and fresh adaptions of the old piles. The latter could he bolstered up by political methods, hut the best protection was knowledge and skill, which would enable- them to produce what others could not make.

Sir W. Bragg made reference to the Bishop of Ibipon’s suggestion at the British Association meeting of 1927, that science might take ten years’ holiday. He said that a holiday was impossible. They could not prevent interested men from making inquiry. No one knew what was over the hill. The vanguard would march on without any thought of what was before it. Therefore, if the march of science was to lie conducted in an effective, orderly way, there must always he a number of laboratories where scientific research had no immediate thought of possible applications. He instanced motor engine problems connected with fuel combustion, which were important examples of dependence on the most intricate problems where intense research was being conducted.