4-page booklet made from a larger sheet of paper folded. Matte paper, off-white. Transcription of a paper presented at the fifteenth annual meeting of the Southeastern Section of the American Physical Society, April 1949. Goldowski argues for the importance of scientific studies to all humanities students destined for a wide range of professions.
BLACK MOUNTAIN COLLEGE BULLETIN
BLACK MOUNTAIN, NORTH CAROLINA
PHYSICS FOR LIBERAL ARTS STUDENTS
by Natasha Goldowski
A paper presented on the fifteenth annual meeting of the Southeastern Section of the American Physical Society, April 1949
It has become apparent during recent years that there is a growing tendency to include physics in the curriculum of the liberal arts. But, although a general agreement seems to exist upon the necessity of teaching physics, two main questions still remain unsettled. First, what is the reason for introducing this science subject into the field of humanities? Second, how should the subject be approached?
The purpose of this paper is to search for answers to these two concomitant questions in connection with the preparation of a physics textbook. Actually, the number of textbooks in physics is, according to the publishers, larger than in any other branch of science, yet apparently too few of these books are suitable for liberal arts students. Why is this? Can it be because the approach to physics, and the reason for teaching it at all, are not clear?
The teaching of physics within a curriculum of a definite scientific training for a definite purpose follows a definite pattern. This pattern reflects two requirements: transference of definite data to the mind of the student, and development in the student of a scientific method of approach to the subject. By scientific method one means the ability to form a logical development of thought within given limits.
Premedical or engineering preparation stresses the first of these requirements- that of transferring data to the student’s mind; for graduate level, the second prevails- that of developing a scientific method of approach.
This pattern disappears when physics enters other curricula. If physics is not to be taught for the sake of physics one has to define the reason for the sake of which it is to be taught. The many possible answers to this question can be divided into three main categories according to whether the answer stems from the technical, the philosophical, or the psychological point of view.
From the technical point of view, one may assume that physics should be taught to everyone in order to enable him to learn the functioning and repair of the various “automata” in use in any household, farm, office, or plant. Consequently, the teaching of physics will consist of the study of progressively complicated mechanisms of all kinds so as to unravel for the student the multiple automatic or semi-automatic devices. In short, it will be a “technical” study of a number of mechanisms whose selection will be determined by the relative importance given to the various necessities of life.
If one approaches the subject from the philosophical point of view, then emphasis falls on the role science has played and is playing in our civilization. The method of teaching relevant here has been described by James B. Conant in an illuminating article(1) where he states that “the understanding of science by a layman can be best achieved through a few relatively simple case histories in which the four following points would be illustrated:
The influence of new techniques of experimentation and their connection with practical arts.
The evolution of new concepts from experiment.
The difficulties of experimentation and the significance of controlled experiment.
The development of science as an organized social activity.”
From the standpoint of the third category, the “psychological” point of view, physics becomes not the goal but a means of learning, leading to the development of scientific method of approach to all types of human activities. The point of view- in which I am interested- is substantiated by two considerations. First, the present interest of scientific investigation seems to center upon the study of “man” and his relations with the surrounding media, a study, I may say, undertaken by means of scientific method. The second consideration is the appearance of the “borderline” sciences which have been developing along with the present tendency to revert to “universality.”
As a matter of fact, we seem to have progressed very far in our knowledge of the physical world consisting of “periodic crystals,” but we seem very far behind in understanding the living organisms formed essentially by “aperiodic crystals.”(2) The study of the functioning of cells remained for a long time in the purely descriptive or cataloging stage. It is only within recent decades that some progress has been made- for which we are mainly indebted to the physicists, chemists, and mathematicians who migrated into the fields of biology, physiology, and neurology.
The results of the “transference” of scientific technique brought about by the invasion of one field with the technique of another are quite surprising. Before this transference, certain separate mechanisms underwent exhaustive investigation and were thoroughly understood. Then it became clear that the understanding of a phenomenon as a whole could not be carried out by specialists in the field. Finally there began to take place a mergence of the work of different specialists, each offering the interpretation of some aspect of the multifold manifestations of the same mechanism. This tendency grew more and more apparent as the mechanism under consideration increased
Black Mountain College Bulletin Volume 7 Number 3 May 1949
Issued four times a year, in March, April, May, and November. Entered as second-class matter November 4, 1942, at the Post Office at Black Mountain, North Carolina under the Act of August 24, 1912.
In complexity, an reached its preeminent position when the phenomenon of “man” became the object of study. Thus were born the “borderline” sciences, whose history and implications are set forth with great clarity by Norbert Wiener in his book on Cybernetics.(3)
This mergence of sciences implies quite clearly that humanity, emerging from the era of specialization, is moving toward the “universality of knowledge” which characterized the human tendency of say a century ago. The universality we are approaching now is, however, infinitely more complex than the universality of a hundred years ago. One hundred years ago it was possible for a scientist to know all the information available at that time in all branches of knowledge. Earlier still, a “physicist” need to know only the three basic elements- water, air, and fire- in order to “understand” the whole universe. Now, in order to grasp what is known of the ten or so elementary particles of the nucleus one has to spend ten years in sustained and highly specialized study.
In light of this situation it becomes clear that discrete domains of physics can be enlarged only by a gifted and privileged few because the subject is already so far advanced and involved. Most of us may hope to understand only a fraction of a branch of science. Consequently, it is not only impossible to be universal in all sciences, one cannot be universal even in one science. The borderline sciences, however, can be advanced by common effort on the part of different specialists who speak a common language.
To participate in the borderline sciences demands on the one hand a profound knowledge of a particular field and on the other hand some understanding of other fields or at least of the language of the others. If this is so in the realm of science, it is still more so in the domain of the social sciences.
If this outline of the present situation is valid, if the factors I have mentioned grow more and more dominant in the development of human knowledge, then teaching physics to students of the humanities acquires a definite reason. In the future the student will, as a matter of course, encounter the scientific approach to, and scientific interpretation of, various data and therefore will have to carry with him a training enabling him to understand and to perform these processes.
Of what does this training consist, aside from accumulating positive data which can be acquired from any textbook? In my opinion it consists mainly in the development of the capacity of systematic analysis of data- any data- followed by equally strict and systematic synthesis.
To acquire this capacity the mind has to be trained to a mental discipline. So far as I know, this discipline can be acquired best and most broadly through the study of the precise sciences, among which physics represents a particularly adequate operational medium because it requires one or more strictly logical sequences of ideas within definite limits. Furthermore, the knowledge of physics, which is the root of several branches of human knowledge, will allow the student to approach, understand, and correlate a great many borderline subjects.
Thus physics as a subject of the “Humanities” curriculum becomes primarily not a goal but a means of developing the mind so that it is able to pursue a logical trend of thought within the limits of the material under consideration.
Given this approach to the teaching of physics, the next important point is the selection of the material to be presented. The choice must, it seems, be guided by two independent considerations: the mathematical background of the student, and the important of the material in relation to other fields.
The mathematical background of the average college student is rather limited, which in itself limits the scope of the material to be presented. Fortunately, however, and in the words of Albert Einstein and Leopold Infeld,(4) “most fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple and may, as a result, be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone. So long as we are concerned with fundamental ideas, we may avoid the language of mathematics. The price which has to be paid for abandoning the language of mathematics is a loss in precision and the necessity of quoting results without showing how they were reached.” For instance, some fundamental formulae derived by Einstein can be understood without mathematical background, while to follow their mathematical development demands considerable knowledge of mathematics.
In other words, the material to be presented to the student can cover all the fundamental ideas and principles of physics whose final formulation can be expressed in simple mathematical language. But this material is rather extensive and the problem of its presentation becomes a very difficult one.
Since the main object of teaching physics falls into two categories- training in logical thinking, and correlation of data obtained in one field with data obtained in other fields- any part of the material has to be presented with the two goals in mind. The first can be achieved by emphasizing the step=by-step process and the second by taking the fundamental results and correlating them with social science, literature, etc.
For example, notions such as the kinetic theory of gases (introducing the importance of probability), entropy (pointing out the role of dissymmetry), the law of gravitation, etc., are particularly suitable for general interpretation. It is, however, important to point out that physical laws do not explain- they demonstrate.
Each branch of physics can be explored from the dual point of view- rigorous analysis and synthesis, and relationship to the branches of different areas of human activities.
If contemporary thought is to be dominated by the notions of universality, of the interpenetration of highly complex fields, and of the scientific approach to the exploration of the phenomenon- man- then scientific training such as I have described should be highly valuable, indeed almost essential, to all students, whether they are destined to become artists, businessmen, farmers, housewives, or scientists.
1 James B Conant: ‘On Understanding of Science”- American Scientist (1947) p33
2 Erwin Schrodinger: WHAT IS LIFE?-MacMillan 1947 p3
3 Norbert Wiener: CYBERNETICS- Wiley 1948
4 Alfred Einstein and Leopold Infeld: THE EVOLUTION OF PHYSICS- Simon and Schuster 1942 p29
