Narayanasamy, Nandita
(2009)
Journey of science through time.
Learning Curve (12).
pp. 36-38.
Abstract
Scientific methods are now considered to be so
fundamental to modern science that some people,
especially philosophers of science and practicing
scientists, consider earlier inquiries into nature to be
pre-scientific. Traditionally, historians of science
have defined science sufficiently broadly to include
those inquiries.Thus the journey of science that began as an
integrative understanding of nature has deteriorated
into an unhealthy amalgam of 'subjects' that maintain
a parochial disdain for each other. The positive
note is that we have diagnosed the problem and
that is the first step towards treating the malady.
The following words of the great scientist
Albert Einstein should guide us in our pursuit of
knowledge: “A little knowledge is dangerous, so is a
lot of knowledge, but the main thing is never to
stop questioning.”However, today's Science Education, particularly in
India gives scant importance to both observation and
enquiry. In fact, both these necessary capacities are
progressively discouraged in students, reducing them
to a band of unthinking zombies, incapable of any
analytical abilities. Science, unfortunately, has been
reduced to a mere subject, a part of a curriculum that
encourages information retrieval rather than exciting
enquiry. A student of science is expected to be
primarily hardworking , a conformist , non-rebellious
and compliant. A child who is fun-loving or a dreamer,
with revolutionary ideas and who asks uncomfortable
questions is discouraged and thought 'unsuitable
for science'.
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