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SPECIALISATION IN SCHOOL AND UNIVERSITY: THE INHERENT DANGER TO SOCIETY AND CULTURE
In modern scientific research and technological development, major problems are “broken down” into “elements”, each of which is taken in hand by a special department run by people highly qualified to deal with a certain narrow field of research. Examples of this are now widely known to the public - the most obvious being the work that went to the development of the atomic bomb. It is not fully realised that a similar process is going on in medicine (see broadcast by Prof. Urey). There is a growing tendency to look upon a patient no longer as a whole human being but as a case to be examined and reported upon by a number of specialists each qualified to investigate a certain limited set of conditions.
This general tendency in modern science is inevitable but it makes certain safeguards necessary if our society and our culture are to be saved from disintegration.
The danger to society is in the irresponsibility that this process encourages. This new method in scientific work has been dignified as “team” work, but often it does not deserve such dignity. True team work involves conditions in which every member knows what the whole team is working for and feels equal responsibility for the selection and attainment of the objective. A great deal of large scale research is done under d[c]onditions (sic) that are almost the reverse of this. Technicians and specialists to whom certain isolated fractions have had no part in the selection of the main objective and feel no responsibility for the use that is made either of their own contribution or the final result. The scientist is in danger of becoming not, as H. G. Wells envisaged, the master of the modern world, but its slave.
The pressure to produce men technically qualified to enter the now highly organised system of scientific research, is becoming steadily greater, and the pressure is being felt right down through the universities to the sixth froms (sic) of schools; we see this in the increasing proportion of higher certificate candidates submitting science. The would be scientist sees in his studies a reasonably certain path to economic security. But as the price of that security he has to surrender himself to a machine That is vast and impersonal. The tendency is for the demand to create the conditions in which acquiescence and irresponsibility are encouraged.
Let it be understood that this is no plea for the “ivory tower” conception of research. It is a plea for the recognition of an inevitable process and following that recognition the development of a form of education that will mitigate its evil side.
The irresponsible intellectual is one of the worst dangers to a democracy. Not only does his intellectual prestige continue to deflect attention from true mental maturity, but leaves the way clear for the ignorant and ruthless, who are ready enough to exploit to the full the instruments he puts in their hands. He fits well enough into a Fascist organisation in which each man has his fixed place and must render his pre-deteriment (sic) contribution to the state. Democracy is a living, moving thing in which there must be a continual adjustment between the group and the individual whereas in a Nazi or Fascist organisation relationships are static and to make this possible, each man’s awareness must be severely limited. For the health of a democracy a high proportion of its intelligent people must have a comprehensive view of the activities and needs of the community - and not only a view. There must be a wide sensitiveness that makes possible a steady growth in awareness.
It is precisely this sensitiveness that tends to be destroyed by universe (sic) education, especially by undue or ill conceived specialisation. Many university graduates are so dim. One cannot help feeling that their vision too must be dim. There is a certain disease of the eye in which vision is restricted to the centre of the retina, so that the victim of this disease can see only what is included in a small circular space straight ahead of him. He cannot see anything very far to the left or right without turning his vision towards it. Specialisation tends to create a similar condition in the whole mental outlook. What a great deal of significant things we should miss if we suffered form the disease I have described. Perhaps most of the important things we know and care about were first spotted out of the ”corner” of our eyes. The man whose mental outlook is similarly restricted is terribly impoverished in his knowledge of the world about him, and therefore of so much the less value as a citizen. He cannot act truly because the greater part of the real world is unknown to him.
The effect upon culture used not - indeed cannot truly - be considered apart from the effect upon society. What is culture? To be cultured is not merely to be knowledgeable. The erudite, the well informed, however wide their knowledge, are not necessarily cultured. Your culture is really what you live by: it includes your values and standards of personal, social and political behaviour as well as your knowledge and ideas. Schools and universities have an incalculable amount to contribute to culture in this sense, but they can do it only if they understand and accept the task. The people who remain awake and responsive to their environment and to the needs of a democratic society will also be those whose knowledge becomes unified into genuine culture. Their “philosophy of life” will not be merely a theoretical structure that holds together the bits and pieces of departmental knowledge, but will be something that is inferred from experience and is a guide for present action. The relative failure of the universities - admitted by Sir Richard Livingstone in his lecture Some thoughts on University Education - is in a large measure due to the tradition of scholasticism that pervades their work and which dies only very slowly. In this tradition knowledge and philosophy are ends in themselves. It is sufficient if thought leads to a satisfying theoretical pattern. There is no obligation to make theory a guide for present-day action. Specialisation, with its encouragement to the student to ignore conveniently the living complex of life from which his subject is an abstraction, supports this barren academism. This applies much more specialisation in non-scientific subjects, for no scientist today can afford to neglect the practical of technical demands of society.
Sir Richard Livingstone makes a plea for the study of religion and philosophy as a necessary part of every undergraduate’s education. It is certainly absurd that undergraduates, who working from their own limited field of study are so easily tempted to make crude generalisations about life and the universe, should have little or no knowledge of the facts or disciplines of the two approaches to “things as a whole”, But obviously the study of these subjects if undertaken, must be supported by the cooperation of all faculties, in the attempt to make their studies more real and to open up those very fertile fields that lie in the no-man’s-land between one subject and another.
Archive reference PP/KCB 6/6/2 document 12