Science and the Citizen: The Public Understanding of Science

Abstract

THE Division for the Social and International Relations of Science of the British Association held a conference at the Royal Institution in London during March 20-21 to consider ways and means for increasing the public understanding and appreciation of science. For more than a hundred years the British Association through its annual conferences has endeavoured to introduce science to the citizen, but the fact remains that to-day, in the midst of a scientific age, science and the citizen are still very insufficiently acquainted. As was so frequently stressed during the course of the conference, we are living in an era in which the discoveries of science are becoming an essential constituent of our everyday life, and an understanding of the spirit and service of science is of the utmost importance for the people and its leaders if our civilization is to survive.