On the necessity for a permanent commission on state scientific questions : [a paper read at the Royal United Service Institution] / by A. Strange.

  • Strange, Alexander.
Date:
[1871]
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the necessity for a permanent commission on state scientific questions : [a paper read at the Royal United Service Institution] / by A. Strange. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    every precaution should be taken against corruption in so important a body, and the rest must be left to that sense of honour to be found in all other professions, and of which even men of science are perhaps not entirely devoid. The third objection, undue costliness, is, in my opinion, as invalid as the other two. My proposal has two main objects—to increase efficiency, and to diminish blunders. Both are in the strictest sense economical objects. If it does not seem calculated to attain these objects, it should on no account be adopted. If it gives satisfactory promise of their attainment, no expenditure that it is likely to occasion will be too great in order to secure them. Let any one who is terrified by the cost, visit our ports, dockyards, and arsenals, and there see the ships that have been built which should not have been built, the can- nons made that should never have existed, and the useless arms and equipments of the pre-scientific ages. Let him count the cost of these and compare it with the probable cost of substituting for the reign of haphazard ignorance, a reign of systematic intelligence. To take one example—that of Her Majesty's ship Captain. This vessel, with her armament and stores, probably cost the nation three or four hun- dred thousand pounds. Who shall assess in money the value of the 500 noble lives that perished with her ? Woidd not the nation willingly give a million to have them back ? If so, we have as the cost of one single blunder committed by one Department something like a million and a half of money, a sum that would go a long way to permanently endow a body which, had it existed a year ago, must have prevented that blunder. But if I dwelt on the preservation, prolonga- tion, and increased comfort of civil life which such a Councd would certainly tend materially to secure, the cost of its maintenance would appear absolutely insignificant in comparison with the blessings it would shower on the nation. Against the cry of costliness I oppose the assertion, easily established, that nothing is so ruinous as disregard of the laws of nature, and nothing so profitable as intelligent obedience to them. Science, looked at in the dryest commercial spirit, must, in the long run, pay. I must guard myself against the supposition that the proposal I have here advocated comprises all that is necessary for the efficient administration of scientific State affairs. It is only one part of a great S3rstem that has to be created. Other parts of the system will, no doubt, receive due attention from the Royal Commission now consider- ing them. But there is one part so important that I feel called on to name it; I mean the appointment of a Minister of Science. He need not necessarily be exclusively devoted to science; he might, perhaps, with advantage, have charge of education and the fine arts also; but some one in Parliament directly representing the scientific branches of the national services has become absolutely indispensable. Another urgent want which, as its scientific character is not purely physical, will probably not be dealt with by the Royal Commission on Science, is that of a High War Council—a Council of Naval and Military Officers of the greatest professional attainments and distinction, con- stituted for the purpose of advising the Government on the highest c 2