The Two Cultures
C.P. Snow
I read this book a couple of decades ago, but recently realized I could only remember a bit of it. So I decided to read it again. Only The Rede Lecture (1963) has been read and reviewed; not the second part of the book writen in 1963: The two cultures, a second look.
I. The Rede Lecture (1959)
Under the catching concept that a divorce has happened between the arts and the sciences, Snow puts his finger on critical failures of UK's educational system of the time. He contends that the closing of the gap lying between these two cultures is necessary both in practical and intellectual senses (p. 50). Going beyond the topic of the two cultures, The Rede Lecture tries to identify where the current educational system was failing: In leading to the intellectual oportunity loss directly attributable to the divide between arts and sciences (the two cultures), in the inability to properly invest on productive industry, and in the inability to educate a workforce needed to help reduce the gap between poor and rich countries.
1. The two cultures
Summary: Snow declares the existence of "a gulf of mutual incomprehension" between literary intellectuals and scientists, particularly, the physicists. The former do not appreciate the fact that scientific culture is a culture in both intellectual and antropological sense. As examples of the intellectual impoverishment he mentions that the litearary intellectuals can not describe the second law of thermodynamics, which he defines as "about the scientific equivalent of: Have you read a work of Shakespeare's?". For the science camp, he mentions that most scientists his team had interviewed (about 30-40 thousand, about 1 in 4 in the UK, most aged under 40) confessed not having read much but "a bit of Dickens". He blames for this situation the specialization in the UK school education system, perhaps dictated by the Oxford and Cambridge scholarship examinations (p. 19). And warns that "All the lessons of our education history suggests we are only capable of increasing specialisation, not decreasing it." (p. 19)
2. Intellectuals as natural ludites
Summary: Intellectuals have not yet (in 1959) begun to comprehend the industrial revolution. The industrial-scientific revolution, and the agricultural revolution "are the only qualitative changes in social living that men have ever known." Neither the traditional culture nor the scientists listenend to the needs to train people in science, particularly applied science. In fact, he accuses both of them of snobism. And harshly scolds such snobs with sentences of the kind: "The industrial revolution looked very different accourding to whether one saw it from above or below."
3. The scientific revolution
Summary: The scientific revolution is the application of science to industry (p. 29). He has realized to his surprise that in the USA (where there is a wider acquaintance with industry) no novelist has ever assumed his readership to be acquainted with industry. Pure scientists have been ignorant of productive industry (p. 31). Yet, educating in "productive industry" (PI) is essential to "coming out on top of the scientific revolution" (p. 37). Compares UK to USA and USSR. The Russians have a deeper understanding of the PI than the American or the English. Then outlines his specification for coming on top of the industrial revolution, in terms of how many men and women are to be educated at university level in each of 4 categories (pp. 37-8). Among the advanced countries, he thinks that the UK has the most "precarious position" (p. 38) because their ancestors had invested too little talent in the industrial revolution and too much in the Indian empire (p. 39). He then warns that the UK must make changes and educate themselves "or watch a steep decline in our own lifetime".
4. The Rich and the Poor
Summary: Snow identifies the "gap" between rich and poor nations as the main issue caused by the scientific revolution, and makes a plea for the West to help in reducing such gap. Its "divided culture", he says, is a "trouble" to this (p.42), as it incapacitates the West to grasp the size of the problem and the acceleration required to fix it. The example set by China (p. 45), which had transformed its society and education system in just 10 years, proves that lack of industrial tradition is not an impediment to industrialization, and therefore only "will" is needed (p.45). It is therefore possible to carry out the scientific revolution in India, Africa, South East Asia, Latin America, the Middle East within 50 years. Aside from will, capital is needed (p.46), in fact trained human capital. Snow proposes that enough scientists (armies of them) be educated by the West and sent to these countries to develop them. The qualitites of the scientist are glorified as being ideal for the task (p. 46). Reducing the gap between the rich and poor countries is an imperious need, and participating is needed to avoid that the West becomes an "enclave", and the UK and "enclave of an enclave".
Criticism on chapter 4: This chapter leaves me with the feeling that Snow is aiming at an incredibly complex problem which requires much deeper analysis. Of course, it is easy to see this in 2016, about the time he predicted was needed to fix the problem. In hindsight, his strategy seems simplistic at best. I wonder if Snow's vision can be termed as "postocolonial" in the sense that (1) he is in possession of truth (he knows what needs to be done, with little analysis to back his views up), and (2) he ignores any forces of transformation that are borne within those countries. The fate of the poor world is viewed as dependent exclusively on the will of the West. He fails to recognize the need for local empreneurship to be the leading force in the development of poor countries. In his vision, intervention by the West, rather than collaboration, will fix the problem.