A day to embody the true spirit of science

The government is organizing a science week, ‘Vigyan Sarvatra Pujyate’, as a prelude to National Science Day on 28 February, which commemorates Sir CV Raman’s discovery on the scattering of light. The program appears to have been designed to make the youth proud of India’s scientific achievements. It is unfortunate to use this opportunity as a nationalist mission. On the contrary, this event should be used to celebrate the true spirit of science that challenges intellectual deduction of all kinds, thus fostering critical thinking in our academic centers.

Summary

Freeman Dyson, a leading physicist of our time, in his book, scientist as rebelmakes a clear argument about why dissent is the soul of science: “There is no such thing as a unique scientific vision, much more than a unique poetic point of view. Science is a mosaic of partial and conflicting viewpoints. But these philosophies There is a common element in the Arabs and Indians and Japanese and Chinese had a large share in the development of modern science. And what is true of science is also true of poetry. Poetry was not invented by westerners. India has poetry older than Homer… Poetry and science are gifts given to all of humanity. For the Arab mathematician and astronomer Omar Khayyam, science was a rebellion against the intellectual constraints of Islam, a rebellion he described in his incomparable verses. expressed more directly.

Dyson’s main conclusions are: One, science is universal, like music, dance or poetry… There is nothing like Indian, American or Chinese science. Science was initially nurtured through the exchange of ideas that moved like trade between distant places on ancient trade routes. Two, Dyson regarded evidence-based modern science as an intellectual rebellion or dissent against social constraints, as in the Islamic and European renaissance of science of the Middle Ages, or the re-awakening in India around the 19th century. happened as an example. Background of freedom struggle.

then and Now

For Indian scientists of those days, science was a double rebellion against English supremacy as well as the fatalistic ethos of Hinduism. This rebellious spirit led to the revival of science in the pre-independence days in India and Sir C.V. Raman’s discovery cannot be seen as independent of the social reformism of those days. With the ideological shift towards the right wing in recent times, the ghost of conformity that had lingered in our collective consciousness is now back with a vengeance. And, academic freedom is now under more pressure than ever to straddle the official line.

If science is to excel it needs to foster a free spirit, and, as Dyson argues, science is an inherently subversive act—a threat to all kinds of establishment, no matter how long. prolongs an ongoing scientific idea, or questions gained political knowledge or irrationality. He writes: “Science is an alliance of free spirits in all cultures who rebel against the local tyranny that each culture imposes on its children.”

Such ideas must have played in the minds of great physicists like Einstein and others when they overturned the scientific theories of the time. Long ago, Galileo Galilei and Nicolaus Copernicus also took a strong stand against the prevailing wisdom, despite their religiosity. As Dyson quotes the British scientist, JBS Haldane: “Let him beware of that, in which reason has become the greatest and most dreadful obsession”. Haldane moved to India in 1957 and was forever dissatisfied with its organizational values ​​centered on Indian scientific enterprise and hierarchy. He soon began to refer to the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) as the ‘Council for the Suppression of Independent Research’.

The ecology of key conformist traits is tied to group identity that determines our attitudes towards superiors and subordinates. Sudhir Kakkar and Katharina Kakkar in their book, The Indians: Portrait of a People, explore this culture of conformity from our childhood – as a reflection of our obsession with hierarchy that extends to institutional arrangements. The term they use for Indians is Homo hierarchicus – a term originally employed by Louis Dumont in his treatise on the Indian caste system.

A setting for pseudoscience

The Indian family landscape is authoritarian and patriarchal, though liberal in its behavior towards the obedient. Initially, children are sensitized to the collective self. We grow with the loss of ourselves and learn to embrace our worth as individuals. An Indian is thus culturally prepared to uphold the integrity of the family, religion, caste and/or regional identity rather than its individual strength. Therefore, when the party in power in India criticizes opposition parties led by dynasties, what is being sidelined is that the irony of dynastic blood ties for personal advancement is a fundamental part of the Indian cultural ethos. . Such societies with patriarchal anchors automatically create conditions for authoritarian rule, creating an atmosphere of fear that may not be conducive to path-breaking inquiry. Rather, it tends to fill the conceit of rulers by inventing artificial science or pseudoscience.

need a shift

in a guest editorial Science In 2010, RA Mashelkar, former Director General of CSIR, discussed why India is unable to break the barrier of mediocrity. He concluded that tradition bound countries like India need to free themselves from the cultural chains of the past to promote original thinking. In an editorial in 2010 current scienceP. Balaram, former director of the Indian Institute of Science, explains why a well-witted disdain for “perceived knowledge and disregard for authority”, known as ‘disrespect’, is important in science.

It is not easy to meet cultural change, especially in a society bound by tradition. And, scientists have a special duty to foster a free and unfettered intellectual environment by actively engaging in the transformation of values ​​within and outside the workplace. A fundamental challenge, of course, is how to strengthen social democratic norms within institutions, representative of Indian diversity and plurality. Only then will academic centers become a marketplace of ideas. National Science Day should offer such forums where free discussion on such topics is organised, which embodies the true spirit of science, thus highlighting its tremendous transformative power.

CP Rajendran is an assistant professor at the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bengaluru and author of the forthcoming book ‘The Earthquakes of the Indian Subcontinent’. views expressed are personal