| Popis: |
PACIFIC COAST HISTORIANS whether professional or nonprofessional will continue with their kinsmen all over the country to watch with keen interest the developments in Washington looking to the establishment under federal sponsorship of some type of permanent nation-wide all-inclusive research agency, probably under the name National Science Foundation. And they may possibly desire to do more than merely watch. Events are moving in our present age with such kaleidoscopic swiftness, while at the same time the issues are so far-reaching, that one may well ask again, in an instance like this, whether it actually is true that "he also serves who only stands and waits"? It depends chiefly on one's philosophy of life. In this National Science Foundation picture, now being viewed in the mind's eye by thoughtful people throughout the United States, the natural sciences are of course in the picture-in the front row. This is as it should be. But will they occupy the entire front row? What is to become of the social sciences and the humanities? Is there room-even room in the front row-for them also? Authoritative Congressional committee testimony, the basis of this article, supports the universal testimony that they made their contribution to the winning of the war-as they always do to the winning of what follows. But too often they are not recognized as properly groomed guests when they knock at the door of their host. True, they are extolled in encomiums; but life does not long endure solely on fine phrases. The social sciences and the humanities were as such practically omitted from the main wartime scientific organization; are they to be omitted from the proposed peacetime organization? To be or not to be? That is still the question. Americans with vision, whether they are in public or in private life, have always encouraged research and the promotion of knowledge. Government officials have not been merely tagging along behind. They have been out in front-leading. To go no further back than the national period of our history |
