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PARTISAN REVIEW
This primary step in establishing a "new science" was taken by
Galileo in 1609. Using the newly invented telescope, Galileo was able to
demonstrate the similarities between the Earth and the Moon and be–
tween the Earth and the planets. Almost at once, the new astronomy
ceased to be merely a mathematical hypothesis or a computing device but
rather a scientific system, one whose truth and falsity had to be consid–
ered. This transformation of the Copernican system, as the late Derek
Price always stressed, was the effect of a new instrument, the telescope,
the product of the technology of lens-making, the craft of making lenses
for eyeglasses. Another new technology was printing, supplying the re–
quirements of the scientific revolution for accurate, rapid, and reliable
transmission of information.
The great advances in biology in the nineteenth century, leading up
to the germ theory of disease, were made possible by technological ad–
vances in optical technology, leading to better microscopes. The
development of microbiology depended on the new dye technology that
made possible the differential staining of micro-organisms. Anyone who
has studied the history of early twentieth-century atomic and subatomic
physics, or of particle physics in general, knows how this subject was
opened up and advanced by the availability of a technology for producing
near-vacuum, low- pressure atmospheres.
In
our times, the precision
measurements which are a feature of scientific knowledge are as much a
monument to technology as to the creative minds to whom we award the
standard prizes. Whoever reads critically the story of the work of Watson
and Crick will recognize at once the essential role of the technological
tools available to make their discovery possible. There is hardly a branch
of science that does not depend for its very existence on ever new tech–
nologies. An examination of the historical role of technology reveals the
means which mediate between the methods of scientific inquiry and the
external realm of nature.
In
this sense the state of technology is an index
of both the strict limitations and the expansive capacities of any scientist at
the cutting edge of his subject.
Karen Burke:
Thank you. Our next speaker is Professor Mel Schwartz,
who is the
I. I.
Rabi Professor of Physics at Columbia University.
Mel Schwartz:
In
the days of Newton, science was often called natural
philosophy, and most people with a modicum of education could con–
verse with intelligence about the motion of planets as well as about the
philosophy of Aristotle.
In
the three-hundred-odd years since Newton,
the literate world has sundered. Were we now to ask a literate person,
skilled in law or philosophy, history or politics, to explain the meaning of
