Science and Human Values [Paperback]

Jacob Bronowski (Author)

Book Description

Release date: March 14, 1990 | ISBN-10: 0060972815 | ISBN-13: 978-0060972813 | Edition: Revised

Thought-provoking essays on science as an integral part of the culture of our age from a leader in the scientific humanism movement. "A profoundly moving, brilliantly perceptive essay by a truly civilized man."--Scientific American

Editorial Reviews

From Scientific American

"A profoundly moving, brilliantly perceptive essay by a truly civilized man."

About the Author

Jacob Bronowski was born in Poland in 1908. At the age of 12 he came to England, and within six years was a brilliant mathematics student at Cambridge. During the war he helped to forecast the economic effects of bombing Germany. After many years working for the National Coal Board, he moved to the Salk Institute in 1964 while developing his career as a broadcaster. In 1973, he presented for the BBC the ambitious 13-part series The Ascent of Man, which made him a household name. He died the following year. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 144 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial; Revised edition (March 14, 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060972815
• ISBN-13: 978-0060972813
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,114,165 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

35 of 36 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Science and Human Values - a call to Holism October 12, 2001

By Michael I. Poutiatine

Format:Paperback

While Bronowski's book, Science and Human Values is often lauded as a critique of logical positivism, I found it to be much more than just that. Bronowski launches a critique on a more pervasive foundation of western philosophy, that of dualism. Bronowski seeks to reduce the dualistic view that somehow science and technology are antithetical to the human spirit. The book is constructed as an extended essay consisting of three distinct, though closely related arguments:

a) The Creative Mind - an argument that the human mind operates creatively whether engaged in logical constructivist activities or in more subjective expressions of thought. In short, Bronowski argues here that the Poet and the Physicist have much more in common than we allow ourselves to believe.

b) The Habit of Truth - an argument that both the right (creative) and left (analytic) sides of the brain are doing the same thing, seeking truth, in the generative process.

c) The Sense of Human Dignity - an argument that the objective exploration of science and technology are just as "human" as the quest for introspective or subjective understanding of the human condition.

Epilogue) The volume also contains an interesting fictional dialogue titled The Abacus and the Rose, held between a public servant, a scientist and a literary figure regarding the nature of their thought processes.

Bronowski emphasizes the notion that the outcomes of science and technology are mere tools and artifacts, it is the spirit and creative energy behind them form the basis for human values and ideals. For Bronowski human values are what drive scientific discovery just as they drive public policy or artistic creativity. We get into trouble when we try and separate these ventures from human values, and thus confuse means and ends. In this way Bronowski offers a compelling argument that is less a critique of positivism than a call for a more holistic vision of human development and the creative spirit.

The essay is well written and easy to follow and provides some solid insight on the ever more difficult task of linking scientific and technological progress with human value systems.

"Whether our work is art or science or the daily work of society, it is only the form in which we explore our experience which is different; the need to explore remains the same." (Bronowski, 1965, p. 72)

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A profound meditation on the human condition May 25, 2007

By Shalom Freedman HALL OF FAMETOP 1000 REVIEWER

Format:Paperback

This is a small but profound work. The three chapters" 'The Creative Mind'
'The Habit of Truth' ' The Sense of Human Dignity' taken together constitute an argument against modern positivistic philosophy and logical analysis regarding the absolute separation of 'is' from 'ought'. As Bronowski understands it the sense of values pervades and in a sense brings together the major realms of creative life. The special values of Science itself are for Bronowski 'independence and originality, dissent and freedom and tolerance; such are the first needs of science; and these are the values, which , of itself, it demands and forms."
Yet Bronowski also strongly emphasizes the evidence- based nature of Science in its search for Truth. And he speaks of the process of its development ," the view that our concepts are built up from experience, and have constantly to be tested and corrected in experience." Here is the great distinguishing feature of Science not only its quest for truth but in its power to transform the world.
What Bronowski does in another sense is cut across the 'Two Cultures' divide posited by C.P. Snow. A person of both literary and scientific background himself he finds that ' the exploration of likenesses' through symbolic concepts define creativity both in literary and in scientific realms.
Bronowski is in a very deep sense a humanist who defines and dignity of mankind in its search to understand and transform the world.
There is much to be thought and said about this very important book.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Rousing manifesto for the pursuit of science and discovery... February 6, 2011

By Paul M. Angileri

Format:Paperback

I became interested in this title by attending a talk that included the likes of Harvard's Steven Pinker, who mentioned it in his address to the audience. Now that I have read it, I am amazed I had never heard of this book. This should be required reading in science classrooms at the high school level (if not even earlier) the world over. Bronowski makes a stirring case for science, as he wrote this in the 1950s when human society was faced with the crossroads, whether to continue down the path of progress aided by science, or to maintain the old society as driven by the mechanics of religion. He comes down firmly on the side of science, and in few cases (perhaps only from Christopher Hitchens of late) has such an impassioned plea for that discipline been put to paper or oratory. Pages of this book are quotable, and given the very anti-science rhetoric being tossed around political circles in the United States lately, are poignant admonishments to defend science against the forces of ignorance that seek to unseat it and place subjectivity and superstition in its stead. The book is a good and short read, and is separated into three parts, the third of which closes Bronowski's advocacy with an impassioned crescendo. The entire text is worthwhile though, and the author references history and philosophy often as he gives his perspective in relation to science.

This book should be on the shelf of every scientist and ardent skeptic. It's the kind of statement that needs to be heard much more often today, particularly when evolution is being attacked as conspiracy in the classroom, and children are falling treacherously behind in math and the sciences nationwide, stricken with disinterest in the type of hard work science requires.