The Faculty in C.P. Snow Land

At its last meeting, the Faculty vigorously debated the metaphysics of knowledge. The Doty Committee had proposed replacing the present division of departments into three fields with a bipartite division, into the Humanities and the Sciences. The proposal elicited a general response of stark horror. Professors of English saw their discipline sliding into the morass of History; Government professors shuddered at their department's being torn asunder and deposited into both of the new areas.

Members of the Doty Committee were astounded. They had proposed a new system, not because they objected to the old one, but simply because they thought a bipartite division the easiest way to increase they science requirement from one to two years. We hope the Faculty will today come back down to earth, and address itself directly to this issue of requirements.

The Doty Plan

It should first be noted that the Doty Report represents a two-year science requirement plus a one year requirement in the so-called "behavioral sciences." A student could meet the demands of the proposed system by taking four terms of a natural science. But most non-science concentrators would confine themselves to one "hard" science course, fulfilling the rest of the requirement with a year of Economics, Social Relations, or Psychology.

These students would know intuitively what the Doty Committee seems unwilling to acknowledge: A behavioral science is not the same--in style of thought or rigor--as a natural science. It is simply inconsistent to call for a stiffer science requirement and then propose a requirement in the behavioral sciences. Of course many of the behavioral sciences are interesting and important, but so are music and philosophy, and no one is asking that every student should take them. To justify its proposals, the Doty Committee would have had to explain the special importance of the behavioral sciences. This, we believe, it cannot do.

Cliches of Concern

But the larger problem remains: Do the natural sciences have a special importance? Everyone seems to think so. Who has not heard the cliches?: "The average citizen loses most of his taxes to the moon project, yet can't comprehend the fundamentals of space flight." "We support cancer research without knowing the rudiments of biology." "There are 'two cultures'."

The cliches imply that everyone should know more about science, but what would that "more" be? Two answers are possible: either more about science as an enterprise and a method of thinking or more about a specific science as a body of knowledge. The first answer doesn't lead logically to a doubled science requirement; surely a student can learn the "scientific method" from a decent one-year Nat Sci course. The second answer doesn't lead to a doubled requirement either, but to one increased a hundred-fold, for there will never be agreement about which science everyone needs more of. Suppose the Faculty requires each student to take two years of biology. Will he then understand the space program? If more science means more scientific knowledge, four terms--indeed 16 terms--of science are clearly not "enough."

The best Harvard, or any liberal arts college, can do is seriously to educate its students to the scientific method and to give them a glimpse of the scientific enterprise. Some undergraduates will build on this foundation; others will not. The former don't need a stiffer requirement than now exists. The latter would only chafe under heavier demands and resent most of what they learned.