In the 1990s I found myself increasingly concerned to get the history of science in the Irish context recognised as important, as a resource for the education of humanities and business studies people. Teachers and decision-makers increasingly exposed themselves as having little insight into the importance of science in the culture. The issue has global relevance in the analysis of colonial to post-colonial transitions, science being seen by liberation movements as an imperial tool rather than as a development resource....

The Need for a History of Science Centre

Prof G Wrixon / NMRC / The Maltings / Cork

11/5/91 / re: history of S&T etc

Dear Gerry / Further to our recent conversation, let me try to formulate the problem of S&T in the Irish national cultural context in a manner which might make it possible to address it constructively.

The enclosed review which I did for Books Ireland hints at part of the problem, which is that the Academy, for all its good intentions in publishing 'People and Places', seems to lack a sense of historical perspective in the political sense. Mollan went to Bradford for his section on the British Association meetings, and got an article from a specialist in the history of science which took simply the BA angle, and totally missed out on the Irish significance. He went to Bradford because there is no centre in Ireland specialising in the history of 'science in the Irish context'. (There was a history of science unit in Queens, but I think it got cut by Mrs Thatcher. The sometime holder, Allan Gabbey, was an expert on Copernicus, if my memory serves me right.)

The partial treatment of the Dublin Institute of Advanced Studies suggests a failure on the part of Mollan to appreciate how this constituted de Valera's attempt to address the problem, according to his lights. A full treatment of the history of foundation of the DIAS and its significance in the national context has yet to be done.

Finally, on the Academy: they ran a bicentenary conference, at which some papers were presented from various scientific historians, mostly from abroad. I have the abstracts; the full proceedings were never published. I took this up with them, and was told that they felt no need to publish, as most of the authors had their papers published in journals abroad anyway. In other words, there was no perception of the Academy bicentenary as an event of national significance. If there had been such a perception, the papers might have been more invited than contributed, and related to the theme of the role of S&T in an emerging nation, as the key to economic and cultural viability in the post- imperial situation. I don't think however that this could have occurred to them.

Why is this a problem? Because the Irish culture appears to be blind to its potential S&T component. People celebrate emigrant writers like Joyce and Shaw, and even some writers who manage to survive as home, like WB Yeats and Austin Clark. Take analogous big names in the scientific culture, like Tyndall and Bernal for the emigrants, or Hamilton and Fitzgerald for those who stay at home. Few scientists abroad would know them as Irish, and few Irish at home or abroad would appreciate their significance as scientists. Contrast the French, who name streets after their greats, and every schoolboy knows etc.

I surmise that de Valera was alive to this problem, and the DIAS was his gesture towards its solution. It is, I believe, on record that he approached the Academy for advice, and they rebuffed him. So he set it up without dynamic linkage with what already existed of scientific tradition, a quasi apartheid situation.

The fact that in his generation there were so few (if any) among the post-Treaty politicians who were alive to the importance of S&T in the process of national viability must be attributed, principally, to the role of Cardinal Cullen in blocking access for Catholics to the new university colleges in the 1840s. This effectively left science and engineering right through the 19th century as a Protestant monopoly, and, I suggest, gave the first generation of post-treaty politicians an image that S&T was part of the colonial heritage that could be done without. Tony Farrington (who figures in 'People and Places' vol 2) I remember in the 50s being scathing about the way the ESB in the 30s when planning Poulaphouca was simply not aware of all the glacial geology work that he and others had done, with the result that they made costly planning errors in the civil works.

It took until the late 1960s for the government to get around to giving any recognition to S&T, with O h-Eocha and the National Science Council. We are just about now beginning to get around to having a scientific community in which the colonial and native tradition are beginning to integrate, but shreds of the old apartheid situation remain; there is a pervasive sense of skeletons in the cupboard which must not be talked about.

I detect however a new national sense of wanting to take on board the colonial scientific tradition. The rehabilitation of Tyndall in his native Carlow, thanks to the dedicated work of Norman McMillan for a decade or so, is a pointer. There is a Boyle tercentenary coming up, and there is a local committee; they have written to the President etc. What should she say? There is no doubt that Boyle was as Irish as the Duke of Wellington was, and it would amuse him to be celebrated in the Irish context. Yet there is a sense in which he sowed the seeds of the colonial scientific technology in Ireland, and started the road which led to Ferguson (of tractor fame) who built the first aircraft in Ireland and exhibited it in 1911 in the Mansion House at the Sinn Fein trade exhibition. So we must celebrate Boyle in the Irish context, and not leave the whole story to the Royal Society.

If we do in the end succeed in identifying the essential factors in the dynamic of integration of native and settler traditions, to the extent that we develop an all-round technically competent national culture, I feel we will have a lot to say to other emerging post-colonial nations, including especially South Africa, where S&T currently is a white preserve. Will the emerging black SA politicians have an appreciation of the need to keep S&T going and encourage their white scientific establishment to stay on and help build the new nation? I have discussed this point with Kader Asmal, and he acknowledges the problem. Can we help them with the solution? Maybe we can.

I have spent long enough trying to define the problem. Let me now quickly suggest some initial steps towards a solution.

Let me first suggest terms of reference for a new foundation. It should not be labelled 'history of science', but should have some name which conveys its full scope, which would be to identify, chronicle and understand the processes at work whereby scientific discoveries take place, and scientific knowledge is transformed into technological knowhow of economic significance in the specific Irish nation-building process, and to relate this to other post-colonial situations.

(This was a key field of interest of Bernal, and he wrote extensively on the problem, initially in the British and European, but later in the third world context. He originated the term 'brain drain' for movement of gifted people from developing countries under the pull of the metropolitan flesh-pots. It would be appropriate to label the foundation with his name.)

Such a foundation would need a location, and appropriate funding. It should be feasible to target international funding once it becomes apparent that the problems addressed and the models developed are of key significance for understanding the 3rd world development problem in general.

The first step towards setting up such a foundation might be some quite modest funding, on a project basis, with a co-ordinator who understood the terms of reference, and acted as extern sponsor of a number of projects in various university departments. Some projects might involve postgraduate students, others marginal-time work by motivated individuals, such as exist in all branches of science and are interested in the history of their discipline. There is also a fund of expertise and goodwill among retired people with scientific knowledge and background, but who are currently in isolation.

The first act of the co-ordinator would be develop a feel for whom to ask to do what, in the context of which key historical situations, and what he or she should take on as a personal task.

I would judge it might take a year before it was possible to begin to work the project sponsorship process, then 2 years for it to run, and then a further year to write or edit the book which would form the bridge between Irish political/economic history and the history of S&T. There might be several conferences in the interim, some of which might be given an international flavour, as the project developed contacts abroad.

We are talking of basically a collaborative interdisciplinary project, which might bring in the historians (Joe Lee in UCC is the first political historian who has recognised the importance of S&T in the nation-building process), business schools studying the innovative entrepreneurship process, social and behavioural scientists as well as the scientific disciplines themselves. It should span the older and newer universities and colleges, and enable the isolated individuals who have pioneered this field to develop a sense of a community network dedicated to a purpose.

In other words, we are talking of an initial one-year project for someone who understands the terms of reference to come up with a plan, and then a 3 year project to implement the plan, with long-term renewal dependent on getting some ongoing international foundation funding.

I have gone on perhaps longer that I should have, but please regard this as a first shot at defining the problem and suggesting a solution. Feel free to take it as is, warts and all, to the Minister if you think it is sufficient as it stands. If however you feel I have 'rattled the skeletons' too noisily, please throw it back at me with your marginal comments, and I'll have another go.

Thank you for taking the time to consider this issue. I always enjoy a trip to Cork, and I found the discussion with yourself and Joe Lee stimulating.

Yours sincerely / Roy H W Johnston / cc Joe Lee

This was an early shot in what has become an ongoing campaign, of which we shall hear more. At about the same time I had met with Mary Robinson, and arising from our meeting I wrote to her as follows:

Mary Robinson / President / Aras an Uachtarain

11/5/91 / re: Science in Irish Culture etc

Dear President Robinson / Further to our encounter on Wednesday last, I have looked into some of the matters we discussed.

The Tyndall book, a collection edited by McMillan, Brock and Mollan, was published by the RDS in 1981; it may well still be available, as publications like that tend to move slowly. A phone-call from Bride to Dr Charles Mollan at the RDS would find out. It is No 3 in a series which includes books on Richard Griffith ( of geological survey fame), the Dunsink Observatory and one or two others scattered over somewhat random topics in the history of science in Ireland. The most recent is a book on scientific instrumentation, which I have recently reviewed, along with the second book on 'People and Places in Irish S&T', edited by Mollan.

I enclose a copy of my review; as you will see, while it says 'buy the book' it is somewhat critical, though not primarily of his editing. He may be touchy. So I would rather Bride rang him than I did. Some of the critical points in the review however are I think germane to our discussion.

Regarding Robert Boyle: I find that neither the first nor the second volume of 'People and Places' includes him. The nearest they get is William Molyneux (1656-1698) who founded the Dublin Philosophical Society in 1684, under the influence of Boyle and the Royal Society founded in 1660. My feeling is that the editors have favoured scientists who worked here, and discounted those who made their careers abroad. Boyle however is promised for Volume 3, which will specialise in the emigrants.

Bernal in 'Science in History' credits his father Richard the first Earl of Cork with being 'a ferocious and successful land-grabber of Elizabethan times'. Robert was the 7th son and the 13th child. So he would not have had much interest in the estate, and was sent abroad at an early age to make his mark. He went to Geneva, where according to Bernal he 'underwent a religious conversion', presumably to Calvinism. Bernal is on the whole weak on Irish connections; he depends on a biography of Boyle by F Masson, published in London in 1914. So there is no insight given on how his early background in Lismore might have encouraged him to take to science. The influence of the critical intellectual atmosphere of Geneva is more likely to have been crucial. I don't know of anyone who has looked into Boyle's early life, from the point of view of Irish influences. I rather suspect that we have a 'Duke of Wellington' situation.

The Boyle link with Ireland would therefore have to be developed on a secondary basis, via the Baconian tradition as expressed in the RS and then picked up by Molyneux.

I am not aware of anyone in Ireland who has done any work on Boyle, but it is difficult to be certain. I would of course look into this if you want me to develop it further; there are several possible sources.

I feel that perhaps the angle to take is to recognise the essentially predatory role of Renaissance science as applied in the Irish context (Cromwell's artillery etc), trace the 'apostolic succession' from Boyle and the RS via the DPS to the RIA, the RDS, Eolas etc and indicate how science, originally a predatory imperial preserve, can be tamed and put to good use under peaceful conditions of economic development, in an independent post-imperial State. All credit to the people of Lismore for taking Boyle into their local pantheon; science itself is politically neutral and serves impartially whoever applies it etc.

There remains the question of how this type of enquiry is to be put on a professional basis. Eolas is the key resource centre. There are people around who take an interest in historical aspects at the margin of their mainstream activity, as indeed I do. Brendan Finucane is one of the editors of 'People and Places', and he runs one of the Eolas programmes.

There is a case for Eolas setting up a 'Science Heritage' programme to try to collate and service such voluntary activity as is going on, and perhaps fund some on a professional basis. If there were such a programme, it would service your needs for occasions such as that in Lismore. I have been talking to Gerry Wrixon along these lines, but it is too early to say if anything will come of it. I can just suggest that you watch for indications that Eolas may be moving, and if you see any signs, try it out as a source of briefing.

In the meantime, I will do what I can to produce briefings, given terms of reference. May I ask is there a budget available for this purpose? If so, we should agree a price on a project basis. If not, I am prepared to do what I can on a voluntary basis, in the prospect that a budget will sooner or later become available from one source or another.

Yours sincerely / Roy H W Johnston

World Federation of Scientific Workers

Dr Con Russell / 38 Market Field / Steyning / West Sussex BN44 3SU

3/01/93 / re: WFSW etc

Dear Dr Russell I am stimulated by receipt of the 1992 3/4 issue of SW to put some thoughts on paper regarding the task you have taken on.

Some notes first on the background. I was originally a physicist, in the high-energy nuclear area, with Powell, Burhop and others, in the 50s; I was in the Dublin Institute of Advanced Studies with O Ceallaigh. As a result of the work done then I achieved, and have retained, the status of Fellow of the Institute of Physics.

I had been a disciple of Bernal from as early as the mid-40s; we read his stuff as students, and attempted to interpret the Bernal paradigm in the context of Ireland viewed as a developing country. There emerged others in the 50s, unknown to us, working for State recognition of science and technology as a key component in the 'post-imperial national development kit', like Paddy Lynch and Dusty Miller; they got their opportunity with the 1964 OECD report 'Science and Irish Economic Development', which they had a hand in writing. They now admit to having been influenced by Bernal, and were instrumental in organising a 'posthumous rehabilitation' session in the Royal Irish Academy, in or about 1982, in which Dorothy Hodgkin FRS outlined the life and times of Bernal, and was responded to by Tom Hardiman the Chairman of the National Board for Science and Technology, in very positive terms.

So it can perhaps be said that the Bernal model is alive and living in Ireland, where it has survived in healthy form, unlike Eastern Europe, where its operation was crippled by the lack of open democracy and lack of mobility of people between science and industry.

To return to my personal background: when I dropped out of physics in 1960, I worked for a while with Guinness in London, on process control systems, which were then beginning to impinge on brewing. When there I was a member of the West London branch of the AScW. I returned to Ireland in 1963, and went into what turned out to be Operations Research, another Bernal area, modelling innovative systems in the context of decisions to invest. I have been in that area ever since; currently I am contracted with a software firm producing high added-value PC-based systems for specialist niche markets.

In the 70s I joined the ASTMS, which has a Scientific Staffs Branch involving most of the State agency applied-scientists, a group with which I can empathise. I stuck with it when it became MSF. I was aware of the WFSW via ASTMS; the SW used to appear at branch meetings and I would pick it up. I got to go to the Moscow assembly in 1986, and there established my status as a corresponding member, in my own right. This status I think persists; I have paid a sub from time to time when reminded; perhaps I owe one now; I don't know.

I observed the scene in Moscow regarding the elections; it was obvious that the Soviet participants had no idea how to run a democratic election. I think Stan was very perturbed by the proceedings, but took it on all the same.

On my initiative a small international WFSW event was run in Ireland shortly after, with some papers on Bernal, whose Irish roots I was attempting to bring to the attention of the international community. I think it was done on the network of the WFSW Disarmament Committee. I don't think it had the impact it deserved, but at least we tried.

I exercised my corresponding membership by engaging in an ongoing correspondence with Legay, stimulated by the content of the SW when it appeared. I was sort of seeking for a role for the WFSW, in servicing the politics of science and technology in Ireland (increasingly under quasi-Thatcherite threat), and relating the S&T problem in Ireland to that in the 3rd world generally (my assessment of Ireland is as the pioneer post-imperial country which should be a testing-ground for 3rd-world development models). And I was seeking for a way in which I as a corresponding member of WFSW could help that process along. I don't think I can report much success, but I feel I should keep the door open, and perhaps something will turn up.

Now I see a new-model WFSW emerging, with a new leadership. Whence this letter, with these thoughts.

So far background, and some analytical thoughts, but what synthesis, what actions?

I can think of two possible developments:

1. To get significant international funding into a Bernal Institute, to study problems related to the realisation of the Peace Dividend, conversion of arms industry to civil needs etc, and to study also the question of technology uptake by the 3rd world, the 'appropriate technology' question for various stages of economic development; these were all key Bernal interests.

The natural place for such an Institute is Limerick University, which is 20 miles from Bernal's home town, Nenagh. I have sussed out this concept and have established positive preliminary contacts. I floated an outline specification in the form of a paper at a conference which took place at Imperial College a few years ago, on 'alternatives to the arms race'; this was published in the proceedings, but I got no feedback.

2. To enhance the WFSW and the SW with the aid of electronic mail and electronic conferencing. I am a subscriber to 2 electronic networks, Eurokom for professional work in the EC, and APC (GreenNet) for fringe exploratory quasi-political stuff. For example I have a network of e-mail contacts in the context of marketing high added-value software, and sourcing inputs to it; this would be on Eurokom. On APC I have several networks developing, mostly around peace movement issues, for the Quakers and for the Greens. There is also an OR network developing in the IFORS context.

It seems obvious to me that an organisation like WFSW ought to be into wide-area electronic networking. Do you think it might be possible for this to be explored?

I can envision a situation in which SW is published electronically, and is accessible to a wide public via an APC read-only conference, giving for each issue a screen-size abstract for each article, and the article in full if wanted. The read-only conference would be managed by the editor, who would upload each issue at publication-time. Contact-points would be given, encouraging direct feedback from readers to editor and where possible with authors.

The printed version could then be edited and published on paper locally in various centres, from downloaded copy.

I can also envision a situation in which the WFSW business is pre-processed in a private electronic conference, accessed by all international committee members, so that policy documents etc when considered at physical meetings have already gone through several drafts quite quickly.

There is also the possibility of a wider circle of corresponding members, and activists in affiliated organisations, participating in an ongoing forum in which issues having an international dimension are discussed, in such a way as to support problem-solving action at the focus of the problem. Perhaps a rescue operation for post-Soviet science might constitute one possible focus. There is evidence that at least some CIS scientists have access to e-mail via APC; you can pick this up fro looking at the current APC conferences.

Some time ago I took this up with Prof Legay, but he rejected it, on the grounds of non-standardisation of communications protocols. This is indeed a problem, but perhaps not so much so now; maybe the time has come.

Perhaps as the first step, you might consider putting a little note into the next SW issue, in which you ask any reader with an electronic address to contact me at: rjtechne@gn.apc.org

and I will try to develop an e-mail panel, in which some of the above ideas can perhaps be elaborated.

Another change that you might consider is to give with each article a contact address, enabling the author to receive feedback. There was in a recent issue of SW an article by Abdus Salam on 3rd-world science. I wrote to him a response, and sent it to him at his e-mail address, discovered from the APC members list. Unfortunately he never got it, because his membership of APC had lapsed. I can see what happened: he must have taken up APC networking as a 'good idea' in the abstract, not realising that you have to work at it to make the networking meaningful.

I think I have given you enough to go on with. I look forward to your response.

Yours sincerely / RoyJ

Notes Towards an Academy-based Sponsored Project, 28/03/93

Background

The Irish experience of this process, which spans several centuries, with ebbs and flows, is on balance positive, and we now have a situation in which the colonial and native S&T streams are merged, with a government which shows signs of understanding the importance of S&T in national development, with some degree of internal and international respect for Irish scientific work.

It took long enough: it was 1970 before the National Science Council was set up, and a further decade before the NBST emerged; the immediate post-independence period was black. Need it have been so long? The writer has discussed this with Kader Asmal, who could end up in a future SA Government. How will the emerging black leadership deal with the white SA S&T elite? Are there lessons to be learned from the experience of Fitzgerald with Parnellite Home Rule, or Walton with de Valera?

The proposer feels he has a unique background for analysing, with both political and scientific insights, the Irish experience, and drawing the conclusions that will be of use to emerging 3rd-world countries. However to do it sponsorship, time and resources are needed.

The proposer has had preliminary discussions on this theme with the following people, in one form or another, and in all cases received positive signals:

1. Joe Lee (who cited my 1982 Crane Bag article in his recent book, and is the first historian to recognise the importance of S&T in the nation-building process);

2. Gerry Wrixon, whom I met in the company of Joe Lee in Cork, on a visit specifically targeted at this topic;

3. Mary Robinson, whom I briefed during her presidential campaign, and whom I met subsequently; she put to me the problem of her visit to Lismore in the context of the Boyle commemoration, and I gave her some briefing, which she used, and which had a bearing on precisely this problem.

4. Maurice Wilkins FRS, who was the referee of my paper in the RS Notes and Records on the early Irish roots of Bernal (copy enclosed). We corresponded about Bernal, and he picked up on how I had identified the influence of the landed-gentry Protestant scientific amateur tradition on Bernal in the Nenagh environment; he wanted me to do another paper on this, but I declined, taking the opportunity to unveil for him the larger project, in which this would be embedded.

5. Norman McMillan (in Carlow RTC) and I have interacted over the years on several aspects of the project, and I regard his work as being an important source.

6. The IEI Heritage Committee is also an important contact-point, and I am in touch with its current Chairman Jock McEvoy, and its previous one Robert Jacob. I am also aware of the work done by John Byrne, Garrett Scaife and Ron Cox on the history of TCD engineering, and I attended the IEI meeting where they read their paper. I am in touch with JB about the early history of computing in Ireland, and the role of the Aer Lingus real-time project, which I modelled on the first TCD computer in 1964. (I had made a rudimentary on-line computer of my own in 1959 in the DIAS, for processing microscopic readings in the context of multiple Coulomb scattering.)

The foregoing is the extent of my tentative supportive networking. I feel the time has come for me to try to pull it all together into a proposal for adequate and total funding from some source. The target source would of course dictate how the proposal would be slanted.

During the course of this networking development I was asked to contribute to the Blackwell Companion to Irish Studies, edited by Bill McCormack, on 'Technology' and 'Industrial Revolutions'. This I agreed to do and have done, noting with interest the fact that the Irish Studies people had (at last!) become aware of S&T as an important dimension.

Scope

The initial delimitation of the project remains to be decided, but I am inclined towards the period 1900 to 1970, the latter date being that of the formation of the National Science Council, under the influence of the 1964 OECD report, and the former date being a good starting-point for looking at the relationship between those who subsequently became the Government and those who were the custodians of the colonial scientific heritage of the 19th century. (For example, de Valera participated in the 1908 meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science in Dublin, but no-one else did who was subsequently of national significance.)

This period is similar to that covered by Joe Lee's book; I have noted the latter's awareness of the significance of the lack of S&T in Ireland as one of the factors differentiating our progress from that of Denmark and other comparable States, and feel the need to explore this further.

It should be feasible to select a key S&T episode in each decade, and go into the politics of it in some depth. Some of the episodes identified might suggest themselves as postgraduate projects, and in such cases I would be pleased to help with the supervision, and where appropriate incorporate the results, with acknowledgment, into the main work. I have already prepared some adumbrations of such a structure, which can serve as a first draft plan, once the principle has been accepted.

Some Piloting Pointers

The interesting thing about this period is the fact that the action seems mostly to have been in the Proc RDS rather than in the Proc RIA; also the high status of the RDS proceedings then, awash with inputs from FRSs.

Also the content of the RDS material would seem to have some relevance to perceived opportunities for economic development under Home Rule.

The first-generation UCD research material, with McClelland and the Nolan brothers, however, was presented in the Academy.

There does not seem to be a 'basic/applied' split between the RDS and RIA material; you get both in both.

My feeling is that in tracing the decline of the RDS as a centre for scientific publication post 1920 there is probably something to be learned, if we can get at the factors motivating people where to publish. There is also the trend into publication of scientific results in global specialist journals. (I wonder has anyone monitored this? It probably began in the 50s.)

Key names in the Academy for this period, apart from the ones mentioned, are AW Conway and MWJ Fry.

Key names in the RDS are Joly, Grubb, Stoney, Dixon, Pollok, Wilson. Barrett, Brown, Johnson, Preston, Fitzgerald.

The Fitzgerald papers are archived in the RDS and have been subjected to some professional classification; I know Professor Weaire is into the analysis of his scientific papers; perhaps the political material is also available here. According to O Buachalla he was influential in the educational debates around the 'godless' / catholic / royal / NUI process, but I find no trace of him in TJ Morrissey's life of William Delany 'Towards a National University', which traces this process from the angle of the Jesuits. Indeed, in this book there are suggestions of some degree of ignorance of what was going on in the Protestant colonial culture, and indeed in the scientific culture generally.

An example: Delany went to school under one Lyons in Bagenalstown, who also claimed Tyndall 'the Trinity Professor'. Presumably Lyons had lost track of Tyndall and presumed he was in Trinity, and Morrissey was not enough aware of the scientific culture to have picked up this error. Tyndall's route was the Ordnance Survey, Marburg University in Germany and then the Royal Institution in London. He never went near Trinity.

I am therefore picking up the feeling that I am going to have to dig into the politics leading to the formation of the NUI if I am to make sense of the RDS/Academy scene from 1900 onwards. Surely this has been done, ad nauseam? or perhaps has it been done, but its significance missed for the development of science and scientific technology in the national context? Perhaps someone can advise me here.

Sponsorship

The EC has an interest in researching all aspects of the nation-building process, with a view to understanding and pre-empting the current destructive wave of ethnic nationalist violence which is emerging all over Europe. The Irish experience has enough positive aspects to be worth drawing conclusions from, especially in the key area of knowhow leading to scientific discovery and conversion to knowledge to utility.

The integrated FUE/CII successor body has a direct interest in enhancing the innovative aspect of Irish business culture, and linking it with the available roots in the history of S&T in Ireland.

The ESB, and indeed Eolas, the IDA and other State bodies, are interested in exporting services with a high sci-tech knowledge content, and consequently in projecting an image abroad of Ireland as a source of exportable sci-tech culture.

There should be available between all the above sources substantial opportunities for sponsorship, with the possibility of 75% enhancement from the EC. So it would appear not unreasonable to budget for a full-time position, with overheads, and supplementary student research-project funding; some œ100K per annum for 3 to 5 years would appear to be called for.

Outline

Title: 'The Role of the Science and Engineering Communities in the Transition from Colony to Independent Statehood: Insights from the Irish Experience'.

It would be appropriate to begin with Parnellite Home Rule, and take the study on through the post-1916 period up the end of the 1960s and the influence of the OECD Report.

Milestones in this period might be:

* the steps leading to the formation of the NUI, with particular reference to the consequences of the 'godless colleges' controversy;

* the British Association meeting in Dublin in 1908 (which de Valera attended);

* the co-ops and the Dept of Agriculture; the question of scientific quality control in food exports, in response to hardening Danish competition;

* technical education and the College of Science;

* the role of McLaughlin and the Shannon Scheme in the 1920s;

* the Drumm Battery episode;

* de Valera and the foundation at the end of the 1930s of the Institute for Advanced Studies (where by the way I worked in the 50s);

* the Emergency Scientific Committee during the war (on which Walton served);

* protection, quality control in industry, and the formation of the IIRS;

* the founding of the Agricultural Institute with Marshall Plan money in the 50s, and the proposed US gift of a research reactor.

* the emergence of the Regional Colleges.

Each of the above 'milestones' is a source of insight into the process of interaction between the old-established 'colonial' and emerging 'national' scientific elites, and between both and the Government.

Regarding publication technology: the writer has recent experience of interactive multimedia product development, and some attention should perhaps be devoted to the the use of innovative publication technologies, such as CDI (compact-disk interactive), with a view to maximising the impact of the research on the cultural formation of the nation.

While the prime output would be one or more books, of appropriate scholarly standard, it would appear appropriate to devote some time also to the production of 'the movie of the book(s)', to help with the widespread projection, both inside Ireland and abroad, of a positive national image in regard to scientific, technological and technical competence.

The following article was sent to the Editor of the then new Belfast publication 'Causeway' on May 11 1993, I think as a result of an encounter. It was published in the first issue, which appeared shortly after.

The Practical Arts in Irish Culture

Roy Johnston (1)

Consider now names like Hamilton and Tyndall; also, to complete the analogous quartet, Callan and Fitzgerald. All four are of world stature, known abroad for their contributions to physical science, their names embedded in university texts in all languages which support university physics teaching. Few scientists, outside Ireland, would however know them as Irish, and few people in Ireland outside the scientific discipline would know them as Irish scientists of world stature.

Hamilton (1805-1865)(2) was the great generaliser and integrator of Newtonian dynamics, as refined by the Enlightenment French (Laplace, Lagrange); he built a bridge into optics via the Least Action principle; he generalised complex numbers to 4 dimensions with his 'quaternions', the first algebra for which the commutative law (x*y = y*x) was not obeyed, opening up a whole new area of mathematics; he was Astronomer Royal for Ireland in the 1830s. He bestrode the scientific world of the 1840s with status analogous to that of Einstein in the 1920s.

De Valera, being a mathematician, knew about him, and promoted him somewhat; there was a commemorative stamp issue in the late 1950s, and an unveiling of a plaque on Brougham Bridge on the Royal Canal (now marked on the map as H S Reilly Bridge; Hamilton remains uncelebrated), at the spot where Hamilton had had the flash of insight leading to quaternions, while walking from Dunsink Observatory in to the Academy. I attended the ceremony, and took a photo, which I parted with in the context of an article which I subsequently wrote for the Irish Times, somewhat on the theme of this current article, in or about 1968. (This was a precursor of my weekly Science and Technology column, which ran from 1970 to 1976.)

When the National Institute of Higher Education in Dublin was elevated to university status, a couple of years ago, the proposal came up to name it Hamilton University, which would have been appropriate, as Dunsink is practically on the campus.

The response from the assembled Irish academic elite was 'who was Hamilton?', and the idea was dropped. Hamilton has become a non-person, despite the best efforts of de Valera, and indeed the present writer.

Now consider Tyndall (1820-1893)(3), whose route from his Carlow origin to the Royal Institution in London led via the Ordnance Survey in Ireland, the railway boom in England, a spell at teaching in a school with Quaker and Owenite background, and the University of Marburg in Germany (with Bunsen). He contributed articles from Germany to the Carlow Sentinel, covering the 1848 events.

From his final position in the Royal Institution (which was, and still is, an applied research laboratory with a popularising remit; his public lecture-demonstrations were famous) he ran a sort of conspiracy known as the 'X-club', the objective of which was to further the interests of science; this included Huxley, Spenser, Frankland and others. From this base he influenced the British Association and the Royal Society, and through them the general public and government. He was the consummate scientific politician. He is perhaps best remembered, outside science itself, for his Belfast Address to the 1874 meeting of the British Association, in which he drove the last nail into the coffin of the opposition to Darwinism from the religious establishment. Within science, he is remembered for the Tyndall effect (which explains why the sky is blue), for 'Tyndallisation' (which is what Pasteurisation is known as in France), for infra-red spectro-photometry and numerous other contributions to basic instrumentation. He is also revered among alpinists as a founder of the art.

Tyndall kept in touch with Ireland and contributed to the work of the Royal Irish Academy, often controversially. He was put off by political developments in Ireland, which appeared to be dominated by the O'Connellite tradition, and opposed Parnellite Home Rule, somewhat vehemently (he is said to have originated the 'Home Rule is Rome Rule' slogan).

Tyndall was for a long time a non-person in Ireland, due perhaps to the aftermath of the 1874 Belfast Address. He has, however, been 'posthumously rehabilitated' quite decisively, thanks to the work of Norman McMillan and others in the Carlow Regional Technical College. Technical education in Carlow goes back to the 1850s, with the Mechanics Institutes, and Tyndall had a hand in its beginnings. Carlow was among the first towns to have public electric lighting, which was inaugurated by Parnell in 1881. So it is appropriate that Carlow should pick up this tradition, rediscover Tyndall, and popularise him; the first Tyndall Summer School takes place there this year, on Sept 11-19.

Thus far I have been discussing the emigrants, the Shaw/Joyce analogues. Consider now the Synge/Yeats analogues, those who made their careers at home. (There are of course many in both categories, I am not going to list them; I have had to make a somewhat arbitrary selection for this illustrative purpose, influenced by the ready availability of referencable material.)

Nicholas Callan (1799-1864) is of particular interest in this context, as he proves definitively that there is nothing intrinsic in the culture of Roman Catholicism to prevent people contributing significantly to the practical arts, which negative view is widely held among certain types of Protestant bigot. He was professor of Natural Philosophy in Maynooth College from 1826 to his death in 1864. He picked up his interest in magnetism from his predecessor in the Maynooth chair Cornelius Denvir (later Bishop of Down and Connor), and his electrical interests from Galvani and Volta whom he encountered in Rome.

Callan was the inventor of the induction coil; this however was widely attributed to Ruhmkorff up to as late as the 60s of this century, Callan's work having been forgotten. He did the work in the 1830s and 40s, publishing in Sturgeon's Annals of Electricity and in the Philosophical Magazine; he gave a paper to the 1857 meeting of the British Association in Dublin in which he referred to the work he had done 20 years earlier. Reading the abstract of the paper in the BA report, one gets the impression that he was not credited much by the then solidly Protestant scientific establishment. It was 1957 before Callan's priority was finally and generally recognised, on foot of a paper by J D Gallivan at the Dublin BA meeting which took place in that year; this was subsequently reprinted in Nature. The need for recognition of Callan was for many years a 'cause celebre' among the Irish scientific and engineering fraternity. The definitive paper on Callan by Rev M T Casey was published in the IEE Proceedings in December 1985.

The induction coil was the focus, but the general thrust was into the need for a cheap supply of electricity for industrial purposes. One of his earliest inventions was an electromagnet on an industrial scale, which would lift two tons. He also had a prototype electric motor. The limiting factor was of course the supply source; this was before the dynamo was invented. So he worked to improve the performance of batteries, coming up with an iron-zinc cell, which was manufactured and marketed by E M Clarke in the Strand in London.

The 1837 induction coil is preserved in Maynooth, and is worth a look; it was working up to the 1890s and produced a 15 inch spark. Callan realised that the voltage depended on the speed of the break. He probably would have come up with the dynamo concept, had he had the resources and the contacts in his later years; this was the lateral leap waiting to be made, from the platform he had built. There is a limit to what you can do working in relative isolation, with material from the village blacksmith.

One can only conjecture what might have happened had the Maynooth work been taken on board, as part of the Irish university system, in the context of the new Queens Colleges in the 1840s. Callan would have contributed substantially, along with Boole, Andrews, Larmor, Kane and numerous others to an Irish university system with a recognised place in the European scientific mainstream.

Instead, Cardinal Cullen blocked Catholics from going to the 'Godless colleges', and access to scientific technology for the sons of the rising Catholic bourgeoisie was severely restricted for the next 50 years, until the NUI was set up. The choice was effectively limited to the priesthood (ie science in Maynooth) or the Mechanics Institutes. Protestant predominance in 19th century Irish science must be attributed to Cardinal Cullen. Callan showed what the potential was, and it was strangled at birth.

Now consider George Francis Fitzgerald (1851-1901) who was Professor of Natural Philosophy in Trinity College from 1881. There was an international correspondence between Fitzgerald, Hertz and Maxwell in the 1870s and 80s about developments in electromagnetic theory. Some light was thrown on the role of Fitzgerald in this context at the Royal Irish Academy bicentenary symposium in 1985, with contributions from B J Hunt of the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, and by James O'Hara from Hamburg.

(It is shameful that the proceedings of this Academy event were never published, as it could have been an important landmark in Irish scientific historiography. Most of the contributions were from abroad. I enquired about publication, and was told that the consensus among the authors was that their papers would be published elsewhere one way or another, and they saw no need for a published proceedings. If they had been published, it would have exposed the weakness of the Irish participation in the celebration of this aspect of Irish culture, and the lack of strategic planning of the content of the symposium itself; we had a rag-bag of what academics here and there, mostly outside Ireland, happened to be working on, rather than a celebration worthy of the bicentenary of a key national institution.)

Fitzgerald is perhaps best known internationally for his explanation of the null result of the Michelson-Morley experiment, which was supposed to show the drift of the earth through the 'ether'. The path from this led directly to Einstein's Relativity.

He introduced the practical teaching of physics, and build a flying machine. He was instrumental in founding the College of Technology in Kevin St in 1887; he did for Dublin what Tyndall helped to do for Carlow half a century earlier. Fitzgerald is revered as a founding father of what is now the Dublin Institute of Technology. This was in the context of the politicking leading up to the foundation of the NUI, in which Fitzgerald also played a part, though without success. He saw more of a future in educating the Dublin artisans, on a basis which was 'laique' and non-sectarian, than in going along with a national university system which was visibly shaping up as the inheritor of the O'Connellite Rome Rule tradition.. The harm done by Cardinal Cullen has left us with a university system divided along sectarian lines up to recent times, even (it could be argued) to this day.

Like Tyndall, Fitzgerald was Unionist, being reinforced in that position by the 'Home Rule Rome Rule' threat, as evidenced by the 'Godless Colleges' episode, and the ensuing 'Catholic University' campaign. One wonders how people like Fitzgerald and Tyndall would have evolved had the Irish separatist tradition developed along the lines laid down by Davis, rather than O'Connell; in this context, the political philosophy being secular and liberal-democratic, in the European tradition, the Queens Colleges would have become the National University, with Maynooth College as a constituent, Callan's work being taken on board. And if Parnellite Home Rule had broken through, the Protestant Parnell would have had no trouble in winning the support of the (initially Protestant) scientific elite for a policy of enrichment by recruitment from the Catholic intellectuals, via a non-sectarian 'laique' national educational system.

The analogous problem currently faces South Africa; it is topical and non-trivial.

Without a strong scientific component in the national high culture, the nation does not exist, except as rhetoric and sentiment.

Notes and References:

(2) Sir William Rowan Hamilton; T L Hankins; Johns Hopkins UP (Baltimore & London, 1980)

(3) John Tyndall; ed W H Brock, N D McMillan & R C Mollan; (RDS 1981)

The 'History of Science in Ireland' Project

TECHNE ASSOCIATES / Techno-Economic, Socio-Technical, Socio-Linguistic and Environmental Consultancy

P O Box 1881 / Rathmines / Dublin 6

Norman McMillan / Carlow / 2/10/93

Dear Norman / I am turning over in my mind various approaches to the history project, and what follows is one possible one, which I would like to try out first on you, to see if you think it might work. For example, I am considering writing to Dervilla Donnelly, at the suggestion of various people with whom I have at one time or another discussed the project (Aidan Clarke, Seamus O Buachalla, Charles Mollan etc), along the lines that it constitutes an attempt to make sense of the history of science and its relationship with the uptake of technology, and the socio-economic development process, in the specific context of a small post-colonial country like Ireland, with implications for currently emerging African countries, the role of the Civil Service, education policy etc.

Dervilla Donnelly is connected with the RDS Science Committee and with the European Science Foundation, and O Buachalla seems to think that this could constitute a lever for funding. However I am not sure how far to trust these people; they could simply be setting a trap. Someone (a 'favourite son') may already in that area carving a niche.

It has occurred to me that I might be able to adapt my existing full-time professional interest in such a way as devote prime time. I should explain that I am working currently on the development of an interactive knowledge-base, which is dedicated to helping to understand the innovation process involved in the adaptation of an organisation to the existence of information technology, and to remove the uptake blockages.

The structure of this knowledge-base is something like a set of review-articles of the relevant research results, in several distinct domains, connected in a hypertext-like jump-network; each review-article is itself a hypertext-like sub-structure. We are currently engaged in developing procedures for using this in industrial training departments. The eventual idea is to make this available on a CD-ROM.

If people such as Dervlla Donnelly are potential allies, rather than enemies, and are interested in the proposal which follows, I would be pleased to demonstrate the system to them, in its capacity as a pilot for the history project, of which an outline follows.

What I have in mind for the history project is still very fluid, but I can see aspects of it emerging in my current struggle with trying to express the complexity of the science / technology / economics / politics interactions in linear text, as I am currently trying to do, for the first chapter of the projected book, which if I am in luck might double as an article for Studies or somewhere (where? it is I think too long for Studies, at 10K words). I keep finding myself thinking in hypertext, and wishing I was doing it that way.

It strikes me that if the output of this were to be a CD-ROM encyclopedia-like system, for the European university and college science and technology education market, and the industrial R&D training market, it should be possible to get together a consortium of expert centres in various European countries to contribute to doing it, and the firm I am working with could provide the development system and knowhow, making possible the eventual commercialisation of the product.

I can, from having read some of the current mainstream literature, identify some people who might be good collaborators; we can discuss this. The idea would be to do the science aspect within discipline, but cross-linking between disciplines at key points; then you would do the technology aspects within technology, or groups of related technologies, cross-linking between the technologies, and with the key points in the science mesh.

In both the science and the technology meshes you would down-link into the people, who would be treated at biographical review level if heavies, with key source papers and abstracts below again. If they were not heavies you would go straight into the source-paper or abstract level.

You would do the socio-economic development environments for each State (possibly bearing in mind aspects of the Crawford / Ben-David model), cross-linking to the technologies and sciences, and to other States where appropriate, and down-linking into the people. Thus you could get to the people either via their roles as contributors to knowledge on the science mesh, or as inventors / innovators within the technology mesh, or via their national roles in the national State mesh, in all cases being made aware of the other roles, and being free to pursue them via the hypertext structure.

A difficulty in this approach comes from the historical development of political boundaries (think of Ireland vs the UK); it would be necessary to modularise the treatment, having (for example) pre- and post- independence modules for Ireland, Norway, Finland etc.

What I hope might come out of this might be a dynamic model for identifying and generalising the social, economic, cultural and technical factors underlying the national development process. This would perhaps be of use in third-world development, both for the education of expatriate development project people and for educating local people in the emerging 3rd-level system.

This may look ambitious, but it seems to me to be within intellectual reach and technically possible, if the scope is restricted to one hypertext review-article per topic.

[How do you scope a topic? In the case of electrical technology (which I have assumed below might be a pilot), I think you would make it relate to a key invention, like the dynamo, and have one topic covering the lead-up to this (which would include a down-links to Callan and Faraday, for example), and another topic covering the consequences, which would a down-link to people like Edison and, in the Irish context, McLaughlin, and cross-links into communications technology and instrumentation technology, and into thermodynamic technology via the turbine, from which a down-link into Parsons etc.

In fact the scope of the basic review-module might be at the level of an Encyclopedia Britannica article, and the jumps might be analogous to the cross-references. However we need to think more about this.]

The interest and the complexity would be in the cross-linking. The key papers reviewed in each topic would need to be available in the form of an electronic reprint library, for immediate access in printed form, should a user want specified ones. This we have also piloted in the current information technology project. Other papers would be available at abstract level, and could be found in the ordinary way via the library system.

It should be possible to pilot the project taking, say, electrical technology, its underlying science (mostly physics), and a selected set of countries, exhibiting core / fringe aspects: Ireland, Britain, Denmark, Germany, Finland; it would also perhaps be necessary to bring in India so as to get a lever on the 3rd world.

It should be possible to set up a procedure for this, pulling in the experts on one technology after another, and one country after another, according perhaps to some political priorities.

Norman: the foregoing has been adapted from a draft letter which I have not yet sent, and I am wondering whether to send it. I am wondering if the RDS gang will feel threatened and defensive, if what I see as an exercise in core-fringe analysis, in the context of an IT knowledge-base application, they interpret as some sort of attack. I have already made a somewhat naive approach to the Academy gang, and been sent packing. At the same time I need some level of co-operation; I don't want to be totally frozen out.

The Chapter 1 (European and Third-World Background) I have just this week completed, having taken a week in Annaghmakerrig; I can bring it down with me if I come to Carlow, and also an outline approach to subsequent chapters.

However I don't want to commit myself to a traditional book until I have exhausted all possibilities of doing it as a proper Europe-wide funded project in hypertext, or possibly even interactive multimedia, with a top level in the form of a multi-ending interactive drama about a key invention of innovation, and access to the knowledge-base at the key decision-points; this is the formula we have adopted in the IT uptake system.

The firm I am working with is well placed to pull in Euro-funding for projects like this, and has a broad-based international contact network.

If I come down to Carlow, which on current thinking might be the weekend of Oct 17, on the Sunday. I ran into Gerry Wardell, and he expressed interest in what you were doing on the instrumentation front, and muttered something about the importance of the user-interface usually being underestimated by the physicists who invent the principle. He would have some practical feel for that, having developed and marketed stuff himself. And much of my current work in the IT area is with the user interface. So perhaps if we were to converge on you on a weekend we could cover some ground on several fronts.

On the other hand you might prefer to keep the history project in a separate box, in which case, maybe Gerry should get in contact in his own time.

I must say I think it is most important that you concentrate on the instrumentation enterprise and get it out of the valley of death ASAP. I would certainly be pleased to be able to build on what you have done on the history area, letting you off that hook with due credit, so as to liberate you to work in enterprise mode, where you are obviously more at the cutting edge than I am. I would like to be able to discuss with you in detail how best to do the history project, and get it effectively published.

Yours sincerely / RoyJ

Science and Government

The increased public interest shown in the scientific component of Irish culture is demonstrated by the amount of coverage given to the Summer School organised in Carlow, in commemoration on his home ground of the scientist John Tyndall.

The potential strength of the scientific component in Irish culture is shown by the continued success of the Aer Lingus Young Scientist exhibition, and the increasing international recognition of the quality of this event, whose winners usually go on to win international awards. This process usually gets some notice, and official approbation, yet no-one (except the present writer) appears to be asking the question 'is this simply seed-corn for export?'.

I had been promoting this analogy in the previous decades; see my January 1987 Irish Times article.

It is perhaps because of the implicit official acceptance of this seed-corn analogy that it is possible for the State to forget the existence of science, in its current reorganisation of the State sector.

This neglect has been remarked on in the prestigious international journal of science, Nature, in an article on Aug 19, headed 'Irish Government Turns its Back on Science'. Funding for Eolas has been cut back, to the extent that no new projects are being funded this year. Eolas is in process of being blended off into a new agency along with the IDA, and the message has been conveyed to the Heads of Universities from the Ministry of Employment and Enterprise that no future funding for basic research need be expected, such money as there is being directed toward applied research.

What I want to do is take a step backwards into history, with a view to trying to understand the processes at work. Science has formed a key component of the European nation-building process from the start. The philosophical basis was laid by Francis Bacon in the 1600s, and the organisation of science to influence government goes back to the foundation of the Royal Society, which was consciously set up on Baconian principles. The scientific network spread over all Europe, transcending national boundaries. National Academies were set up, modelled more or less on the Royal Society; these received State recognition and support, mostly because of the existence of perceived military threats or imperial ambitions, and States were quick to realise that 'knowledge is power'.

Thus it could be said that the Baconian scientific enterprise, as it developed in Europe, was dominated by military and imperial requirements. However much scientists, with their international networking, wanted their findings to benefit humanity as a whole, in practice the main stream of development was dominated by the military and imperial needs of England, France, Germany, Austria and Russia, leading to the clash of the 19th century imperial giants and the disaster of World War 1.

The 18th century 'Scientific Academy' movement extended into Ireland, with the foundation of the Royal Dublin Society in 1731 and the Royal Irish Academy in 1785. These bodies thrived under Grattan's Parliament, and were able to provide foci for the efforts of an Irish colonial scientific elite during the 19th century, with a slowly increasing admixture of native stock as education became more widely available.

The 'indigenous stream' however only got going somewhat late in the century, however, thanks largely to Cardinal Cullen's blocking access for Catholics to the Queens Colleges in Cork and Galway. At the time when the current wave of national ideology was formed, about the 1900s, few of the people concerned were aware of the potential role of science and its applications in the resolution of the problems of a new State in a post-imperial situation. Science remained in colonial hands; it had a Protestant image; the people who staffed the Civil Service in the 1920s and 1930s had little time for it. Yet the machinery of the Baconian revolution was all there, in the same form as was valued by most European States, though in the Irish case it was an empty shell, waiting to be taken up by the State, once the latter realised that science was to be cultivated as part of the national survival strategy.

During the 1950s some Marshall Plan money became available; this went largely towards the setting up of the Agricultural Institute; there was some talk of a nuclear research reactor, but when it was realised what the scale of the cost would be to maintain the 'free gift', it was declined. We were right to decline it, as it was not related to our real research priority needs, being a spin-off from the military-industrial complex of the major powers. The episode where it was considered however was the beginning of the realisation on the part of the Civil Service how little it knew.

The turning-point came with the 1964 OECD Report, which in the end persuaded the Government that they needed to recognise and fund science, so that the National Science Council was set up in 1969, under the chairmanship of Colm O h-Eocha.

This was an appointed part-time body, serviced by a small staff in the Civil Service, headed by Dr Stan Nielsen, drafted in from the UK with a track-record in applied physics research. Money started to trickle in to fund various college-based research projects; the present writer, with his weekly Irish Times column, was in a position to shadow the activity of the NSC, and some public awareness was created.

The setting of an artificial distinction between 'science' and 'technology', or between 'pure' and 'applied' science, is part of the problem. It is a peculiarity of the way science developed in England, as a gentleman-amateur pursuit. The engineers who made the Industrial Revolution usually had worked with their hands, and learned by apprenticeship. Tyndall, whose Carlow origin is the basis for the International Tyndall School, was one of the first professional scientists in Britain; he recognised no such distinction; he had served his time on the Ordnance Survey; he made his own instruments. Tyndall's philosophy was typical of the continent and the US, where the science/technology dichotomy is unknown.

However in setting up a 'National Science Council' in 1969, we ignored our own Irish tradition, as exemplified by Tyndall, and allowed ourselves to be influenced by English gentleman amateurism, with 'science' being put on a pedestal. It took us 10 years to learn that science is not a stand-alone concept; it thrives on its linkages into technology and economic utility. So we set up the National Board for Science and Technology.

The NBST perhaps was the pinnacle of the development initiated by the 1964 OECD Report. It coincided with European Community accession; the NBST did good work in helping to pull in European funding for work in Ireland, some of which became world-class as a result, especially in the molecular biology, solid-state physics and special-purpose software areas.

Then came the debt crisis; State agencies were cut back; the NBST was blended off with the IIRS to form Eolas; science remained in the name; the ghost of the NBST continued to fund strategic research areas. There was however increasingly visible tension between a State science funding body and a State industrial applied research body in the one organisation. Eolas is now blended off with the IDA into 'Forfas' (a word which no longer has any linguistic validity). Funding for science as such from Forfas is no longer policy, and this was the target of the Nature articles.

While all this has been going on, the Academy and the RDS have continued to cultivate their scientific roles, supported by the largely voluntary efforts of the people who are actually doing the work, and understand its implications. The Academy sets up representative national committees for all branches of scientific effort, with nominees from a whole range of outer fringe scientific voluntary bodies. There is the shell of a system there, derived from the mainstream Baconian scientific tradition, which should be quite capable of uncoupling science from its imperial Baconian image, and making science in Ireland work effectively towards some sort of post-Baconian goal, like sustainable development for small-nation economic survival. All it needs is recognition of this role by the State, and the allocation of the necessary funding.

It does not make sense to expect a body whose prime role is development of native enterprise with existing technology, and the encouragement of some imported technological innovations, also to fund basic science in Ireland. Most Research and Development (R&D) funding; usually 90%, is in the D rather than the R. But for the D to be done with insight, it is necessary for the R to be going on, and for people to be coming out who are in a position to participate in the D process with R insights.

To allow the D people to control the R is a recipe which can lead to Lysenkoism where the central State controls all funding. (Lysenko was an applied scientist who got the ear of Stalin and had basic genetics suppressed, in the 40s and 50s. We now owe the economic opportunities presented by molecular biology to genetics as it developed as a pure science in the 60s and 70s.)

If Forfas is to abandon funding for university-based research, then an opportunity presents itself for the Academy, the RDS, and their associated outer fringe of voluntary bodies to become associated with the funding of science, by a process of administration of a block grant, equal to say 10% of the total R&D budget.

Such an approach would enable a new dimension to develop in the politics of science in Ireland, in which scientists who were members of scientific voluntary bodies would actually have some say in the development of funding policies. It would certainly make their AGMs more interesting.

I seem to remember saying this in the 1960s when the politics of setting up the NSC was in gestation, and later in the 70s when I was writing the Irish Times column. It was of course dismissed as dangerous subversive heresy. Perhaps however we have here an idea whose time has come?

The 1995 Green 'Science and Government' Policy Notes

Introduction

The potential strength of the scientific component in Irish culture is also shown by the continued success of the Aer Lingus Young Scientist exhibition, and the increasing international recognition of the quality of this event, whose winners usually go on to win international awards. This process usually gets some notice, and official approbation, yet no-one appears to be asking the question 'is this simply seed-corn for export?'.

It is perhaps because of the implicit official acceptance of this seed-corn analogy that it was possible for the State to forget the existence of science, in its 1993 reorganisation of the State sector.

This neglect was remarked on in the prestigious international journal of science, Nature, in an article on Aug 19 1993, headed 'Irish Government Turns its Back on Science'. Funding for Eolas had been cut back, to the extent that no new projects were funded in that year. Eolas was in process of being blended off into a new agency along with the IDA, and the message was conveyed to the Heads of Universities from the Ministry of Employment and Enterprise that no future funding for basic research need be expected, such money as there is being directed toward applied research.

Historical Background

Science has formed a key component of the European nation-building process from Renaissance times. The philosophical basis was laid by Francis Bacon in the 1600s, and the organisation of science to influence government goes back to the foundation of the Royal Society, which was consciously set up on Baconian principles.

The scientific network spread over all Europe, transcending national boundaries. National Academies were set up, modelled more or less on the Royal Society; these received State recognition and support, mostly because of the existence of perceived military threats or imperial ambitions, and States were quick to realise that 'knowledge is power'.

Thus it could be said that the Baconian scientific enterprise, as it developed in Europe, was dominated by military and imperial requirements. However much scientists, with their international networking, wanted their findings to benefit humanity as a whole, in practice the main stream of development was dominated by the military and imperial needs of England, France, Germany, Austria and Russia, leading to the clash of the 19th century imperial giants and the disaster of World War 1.

The 18th century 'Scientific Academy' movement extended into Ireland, with the foundation of the Royal Dublin Society in 1731 and the Royal Irish Academy in 1785. These bodies thrived under Grattan's Parliament, and were able to provide support for the First Industrial Revolution (primarily via the Ulster linen industry), going on to act as foci for the efforts of an Irish colonial scientific elite during the 19th century, with a slowly increasing admixture of native stock as education became more widely available.

The 'indigenous stream' however only got going somewhat late in the century, however, thanks largely to Cardinal Cullen's blocking access for Catholics to the Queens Colleges in Cork and Galway. At the time when the current wave of national ideology was formed, about the 1900s, few of the people concerned were aware of the potential role of science and its applications in the resolution of the problems of a new State in a post-imperial situation. Science remained in colonial hands; it had a Protestant image; the people who staffed the Civil Service in the 1920s and 1930s had little time for it. Yet the machinery of the Baconian revolution was all there, in the same form as was valued by most European States, though in the Irish case it was an empty shell, waiting to be taken up by the State, once the latter realised that science was to be cultivated as part of the national survival strategy.

During the 1950s some Marshall Plan money became available; this went largely towards the setting up of the Agricultural Institute. There also a proposal that a nuclear research reactor would be donated, but when it was realised what the scale of the cost would be to maintain the 'free gift', it was declined. We were right to decline it, as it was not related to our real research priority needs, being a spin-off from the military-industrial complex of the major powers. The episode where it was considered however was the beginning of the realisation on the part of the Civil Service how little it knew.

The turning-point came with the 1964 OECD Report, which in the end persuaded the Government that they needed to recognise and fund science, so that the National Science Council was set up in 1969, under the chairmanship of Colm O h-Eocha.

This was an appointed part-time body, serviced by a small staff in the Civil Service, headed by Dr Stan Nielsen, who had been drafted in from the UK with a track-record in applied physics research. Money started to trickle in to fund various college-based research projects. The present writer, with his weekly Irish Times column, was in a position to shadow the activity of the NSC, and some public awareness was created.

The setting of an artificial distinction between 'science' and 'technology', or between 'pure' and 'applied' science, is part of the problem. It is a peculiarity of the way science developed in England, as a gentleman-amateur pursuit. The engineers who made the Industrial Revolution usually had worked with their hands, and learned by apprenticeship. Tyndall, whose Carlow origin is the basis for the International Tyndall School, was one of the first professional scientists in Britain; he recognised no such distinction; he had served his time on the Ordnance Survey; he made his own instruments. Tyndall's philosophy was typical of the continent and the US, where the science/technology dichotomy is less pronounced.

However in setting up a 'National Science Council' in 1969, we ignored our own Irish tradition, as exemplified by Tyndall, and allowed ourselves to be influenced by English gentleman amateurism, with 'science' being put on a pedestal. It took us 10 years to learn that science is not a stand-alone concept; it thrives on its linkages into technology and economic utility. So we then set up the National Board for Science and Technology.

Science Criticism

It is appropriate perhaps now, in the context of the development of Green science policy, to touch on some of the issues which were analysed during the life of the Irish Times column. It is convenient to consider them under themes, such as human systems, interfaces, productive systems, devices and people.

Human systems included the State, the Royal Irish Academy, the Institute of Industrial Research and Standards (IIRS, now embedded in Forbairt), the Agricultural Institute (AFT, now Teagasc), the Dublin Institute of Advanced Studies (DIAS), the universities and colleges, and the second-level system, primarily via the Aer Lingus Young Scientists.

As the Government response to the 1964 OECD Report 'Science in Irish Economic Development', the National Science Council (NSC) was set up in 1969, under the chairmanship of Colm O h-Eocha.

In 1974 the then Minister, Justin Keating, announced its replacement by the National Board for Science and Technology (NBST). The NBST did not in the end get set up until 1978. The lag-times in this process are noteworthy; they suggest chronic Civil Service lethargy and lack of interest.

In 1976 (Sept 14) I remarked on the delay since the Keating announcement, and I ventured to suggest how the new Board might be structured in such a way as to give meaning to the Science Budget concept, which was embedded in the Bill. I gave some examples which indicated the need for a political feedback loop, and urged that the loop should not have a long lag-time, as it would if it had to wait for an annual Dail debate. I was critical of the procedure whereby the Minister simply nominated individuals to the Board, and suggested a procedure whereby the Board might be constituted with an appropriate mix of suppliers, consumers and workers, including working scientists and technologists with industrial experience.

On Nov 14 1973 I had ventured to suggest how the Academy might be constituted into a representative Senate-like system to look after the interests of the research community. This could be done by decoupling the membership function from the honorific function; this latter could easily be re-labelled 'Fellow', leaving the title 'Member' for the run-of-the-mill researcher. I mentioned in passing the Japanese 'Parliament of Science' structure as perhaps worth investigating. This would have provided an electoral college for the scientific research community to be represented directly on the NBST, instead of depending on a Ministerial nominee.

On June 29 and again on Aug 3 1976 I devoted space to the Report by Professor Tom Allen, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, on the IIRS, which I critically supported. I pointed out the anomaly of the one body being expected to act for consumers and for industry, and urged autonomous sectoral divisions, with the Standards hived off.

I had not devoted much time to the DIAS, but on May 2 1973 I reported on an event which took place under DIAS auspices, involving Prof Casimir, who was then head of the Philips Research Laboratory at Eindhoven, which should have been seminal, but wasn't, as it was poorly attended. The NSC apparently were not aware of the DIAS; it did not occur to them that a DIAS seminar might have national policy significance; or perhaps just the DIAS did not feel it necessary to tell them. Some quotes:

'Industry does not know enough to guide basic science; the boilermakers should not be expected to finance the Curies...' (the implied reference here is to nuclear power generation)

'In all cases it is necessary to put the final phase of development close to production..' '..going from research to development you have to transfer people..' '..the essence of civilisation is when man embellishes his tools..'

On April 13 1976 I came back to the question of the role of the NUI in the allocation of NIHE Limerick degrees, having been critical of it previously on Feb 17. I questioned the relevance of the role of UCC in this process; science people do not necessarily understand the technology which spins off from their science. I was supportive of the co-operative scheme whereby people spend time in industry during their degree; I have encountered this system since from the industry angle, and have nothing but praise for it. I promoted the concept of a university of technology with prestigious status. I think we are moving in that direction, and Limerick, along with its analogue in Dublin, the City University (DCU), can be counted on the positive side of the balance-sheet.

(Incidentally, when DCU was looking for a name, I understand that 'Hamilton University' was proposed, from the science side; there is a local link, in that the Dunsink observatory, where Hamilton did his monumental work in the 1830s and 40s, in in walking distance of the campus. The response of the assembled academics, who were making the decision, was, I understand, at the level 'who was Hamilton?'. So it is evident that the culture-gap is still with us, even among the elect. I wonder if a proposal to name the University of Zurich after Einstein would have had the same reaction? This has not to my knowledge been proposed, but perhaps it will be, and we shall see.)

With the Aer Lingus Young Scientists I had succeeded in getting the group projects accepted, despite initial opposition from the judging fraternity (Jan 20 1975; Jan 24 1976). The first attempt at this procedure however had made it look like a B-stream, instead of the norm in scientific work. I was critical of the constraints, which subsequently were removed, and group projects went on to win the highest awards in later years.

I have only space to touch briefly on the other main sections: Interfaces I assessed as disappointing, identifying the concept as being the weak point in the overall system. Under Productive Systems I touched on the emergence of a Materials Science group, corn syrup via an enzyme process, pig slurry as an energy source and source of concentrated dried fertiliser for the urban gardener market, the neglect of the agricultural engineering potential etc. Devices were also thin on the ground; I was keen on the opportunities presented by the dedicated microcomputer.

Under People, there was a report of an encounter with Tom Jones of the US National Science Foundation (April 27 1976). Echoing Casimir, as above, though independently, he urged moving the person rather than the hardware or the idea from the basic discovery to the application and the development. Our career structures do not facilitate this process. The present writer, who has tried to pioneer this process in the Irish context, lost pension rights on 3 occasions as a result. The problem is still with us.

The Current Crisis

Then came the 'national debt' crisis; State agencies were cut back; the NBST was blended off with the IIRS to form Eolas; science remained in the name; the ghost of the NBST continued to fund strategic research areas. There was however increasingly visible tension between a State science funding body and a State industrial applied research body in the one organisation. Eolas has since been further blended off with the IDA into 'Forfas' (a word which no longer has any linguistic validity). Funding for science as such from Forfas is no longer policy, and this was the target of the Nature articles.

While all this was going on, the Academy and the RDS continued to cultivate their scientific roles, supported by the largely voluntary efforts of the people who are actually doing the work, and understand its implications. The Academy sets up representative national committees for all branches of scientific effort, with nominees from a whole range of outer fringe scientific voluntary bodies. There is the shell of a system there, derived from the mainstream Baconian scientific tradition, which should be quite capable of uncoupling science from its imperial Baconian image, and making science in Ireland work effectively towards some sort of post-Baconian goal, like sustainable development for small-nation economic survival. All it needs is recognition of this role by the State, and the allocation of the necessary funding.

It does not make sense to expect a body such as 'Forfas' whose prime role is development of native enterprise with existing technology, and the encouragement of some imported technological innovations, also to fund basic science in Ireland. Most Research and Development (R&D) funding; usually 90%, is in the development rather than the research. But for the development to be done with insight, it is necessary for the research to be going on, and for people to be coming out who are in a position to participate in the development process with insights derived from research.

To allow the 'development' people to control research is a recipe which can lead to what we may call 'Lysenkoism', particularly where, as in Ireland, the central State controls a high proportion of the funding. Lysenko was an applied scientist who got the ear of Stalin, and had basic research in genetics suppressed, in the 40s and 50s. We now owe the economic opportunities (and indeed the environmental threats; this is another question, which we address below) presented by molecular biology to genetics as it developed as a basic science in the 60s and 70s.

If the Irish State is to abandon direct funding for university-based research, then an opportunity presents itself for the Academy, the RDS, and their associated outer fringe of voluntary bodies to become associated with the funding of science, by a process of administration of a block grant, equal to say 10% of the total R&D budget. They would however need to lobby for such a block grant to be made available.

Such an approach would enable a new dimension to develop in the politics of science in Ireland, in which scientists who were members of scientific voluntary bodies would actually have some say in the development of funding policies. It would certainly make their AGMs more interesting.

The Science Lobby

What follows is perhaps not untypical of the type of submissions that came in; they have been selected on the basis that they seem to provide raw material from which a Green S&T policy might be generated.

.....The indications are that S&T policies are very far from serving Ireland well. We are producing plenty of good graduates; too many leave; too few are absorbed into innovative productive enterprise. Value for money from State expenditure is difficult to measure or to optimise......

... all staff in teaching organisations should have as of right a research budget, to do what they like with. This would imply a separate budget head for research, distinct from salaries and overheads......the total amount should be a policy-determined % of the overall State R&D budget, and the amount so allocated should not be the total funding available for basic research; simply a floor value.

...an additional policy-determined % should be available in a lump, for allocation to supplement the pooled resources of collaborative groups who get together to put a reasoned proposal to an appropriate peer-review group.

....the composition of such a resource-allocating group has been regarded by the bureaucracy as a 'problem'. Up to now it has always been State nominees serving on some committee. There seems to be a basic distrust of the democratic process....

....It would be better if the researchers themselves, via their voluntary organisations, had an input to the composition of the resource-allocating group. In other words, the political process needs to be recognised, understood and brought into the open. The AGMs of the voluntary bodies would then become occasions of interesting an impassioned policy-generating debates.

...the current state of our largest State scientific enterprise, what was the Agricultural Institute, now Teagasc, is in a sad state of decline, in what should be a vibrant growth area, stimulated by the need to go for up-market quality and away from bulk commodity disposal operations. One negative factor was the way it was founded with a large initial recruitment of a single-age cohort, now all near retirement. The current decline was totally predictable given the initial establishment policy..... It is necessary to plan for a creative age-mix at all times. The key investment policy is in people, and in appropriate structures to enable people of differing ages to interact creatively.

...it is necessary to encourage cross-linking between disciplines, and formation of teams from the bottom up, by rewarding the process when it happens.

...the less 'planning in detail' from the State the better...the role of the State is to provide the support and the structures, and let the people do the planning. Don't change the support system or the structures except in response to perceived demand from below.

....institutional structures are too centralised and too State-dominated. The voluntary sector needs to be upgraded and given a recognised influential resourced role. The following would be a good structure:

1. Construct a State S&T policy group out of appropriate panels of a reformed Senate, such that the revised electoral procedures reflected the suppliers of S&T personnel (ie the universities and colleges), the existing working S&T personnel (via their voluntary organisations) and the principal S&T users (industry, agriculture, services). Let this lay down the policy ground-rules for the S&T section of the budget.

2. Bring applied S&T delivery as near as possible to the end-user; in other words, encourage S&T graduate recruitment by firms and organisations, and support the recruited graduates with R&D services nearby. This reconstruction would involve the existing centralist State R&D services being devolved into regional autonomous units, each closely associated with a 3rd-level education centre (RTC or university). Replace central hierarchical systems with networked autonomous units, linked by means of state-of-the-art communications; a 'post-industrial' type of organisation. The association of the source of R&D and consultancy with the source of the graduates would itself reinforce graduate recruitment, thus enhancing the uptake of innovative ideas in firms by people who understood their implications.

3. Encourage basic research with college staff unconditionally funded for this purpose at a basic level, and with supplementary funding available for collaborative groups who propose projects for funding .....

......the measure of the innovative capacity of a firm would also be an interesting research project; ...there is however no good generally-accepted measure. The work of W Kingston in TCD and J Cogan in UCD may be relevant here. There would be several dimensions in such a measure: graduate count, role of graduates in organisation; type of organisational structure, links with college-based R&D groups, uptake of EC-funded projects, uptake of projects funded under the old NBST university-industry schemes (these need to be analysed now in historic mode, as 'cases' in a case-file, generators of corporate experience).

..... There are deep historical reasons for our relative lack of national success, compared to other States such as Denmark and Finland. For example, distrust of innovation is embedded in the national business culture. A large and successful firm which saturates the Irish market profitably and has cash for expansion will usually head off abroad and do the same thing: this was been the case with Guinness and Jacob in the 30s and is currently the case with CRH and Smurfit. The tax environment must here be an important factor. The result is that it is very difficult for an innovative start-up firm to get early seed capital, such as to enable a prototype to be engineered and brought to the market. There needs to be the maximum possible tax incentive in this area, with the minimum of bureaucratic constraints.

There are other more subjective factors, like in the education system the emphasis on conformity and looking for a 'P&P job'. This is all part of our inherited fringe-imperial role in the British Empire. Those who generated modern Irish national identity in the early 1900s seem to have been largely unaware of this as a problem, and were consequently unaware of the important need to divert the objectives of the then Irish scientific Establishment (which was quite formidable by European standards, and certainly no less evolved than the Danish) away from the Empire and towards building the independent nation. This also is a research area, to which I am trying to give some attention in marginal time.

There was little or no explicit recognition by the Government of the role of S&T in economic life until as late as the 1960s, in the aftermath of the 1964 OECD ('Lynch-Miller') Report, by which time much erosion had taken place. The role of Government prior to the OECD Report needs analysis. Bradley in DCU has looked at the Emergency Science Committee which was active during the 1939-45 war. The role of de Valera and the foundation of the DIAS needs to be analysed in relation to science thinking as it was then; although this at the time was a relatively important investment by the State in science; its impact was largely sterile in the national context.

....There are signs that the ANC in South Africa is not making the same mistake; they have set up an S&T Policy Group, and are aware of the need to win over the largely white scientific human resources towards building the new integrated nation. I can claim to have helped to point them in this direction.

....We appear to be good at pulling in EC-funded R&D money, but not so good at the follow-through. In some cases this is because the commercial component of the R&D consortium is abroad. Where the commercial firms in the consortium is here, and is small, the development of the results of the R&D into a marketable product is fraught with problems, mostly due to the underestimation of the amount of further money that has to go into the downstream development, and the difficulty in marketing innovative products from a source which may lack market credibility abroad.

Where the Irish component of the consortium is research-oriented, there appears to be a cultural block, based on negative experience, against dealing with an Irish firm in the exploitation; I have heard people say that they prefer to deal with firms abroad than with Irish firms. This must be a reflection of the lack of graduate uptake and innovation culture in Irish firms.

'Critical mass' in the S&T base is not necessarily a problem; the important factors are the quality of the team and its linkages.

....There should be strategic networking when putting in EC proposals, if some means could be found for doing it which was not bureaucratic. If there were systematic use made of Internet, and an accessible knowledge-base of current activity and credible expertise, it would be helpful. Who knows how to do what, and where are they. If a particular scientist, technologist or innovator wanted to put together a proposal, they could then see who else might be in the field, and ask them, with a view to joining forces.

....we can't legislate for future marketability of basic science. Let it just happen. Those with an eye to marketability will pick it up when it is ripe. It is important that such people should be around, and in intellectual contact with the basic science people.

....the biggest obstacle to development of linkages between industry and college-based research is dependence on bureaucratic hurdles. If a firm puts money into a college-based research centre, there should be an automatic multiplier, and the money should be tax-deductible. It should be as routine as a headage-grant. It should not have to have committees looking at it, and should not have a failure rate such as to cause people to lose heart.

....the industry contact-point for a college should be an accessible location looking outwards, and should have someone in it who knows the research scene both in the college and in industry.....

......a good start would be to reflect 'awareness of R&D' into tax concessions; use the IMI conference and similar events to promote R&D and innovation in the new friendly tax environment; make it easy for small firms to start up with R&D-minded leadership and become bigger firms, etc

...there is also scope for the development of some sort of award system, on the Nobel Prize principle, such as to draw public attention to achievements of national significance. The RDS has tried various schemes in this direction, such as the Boyle Medal, instituted in 1898, but this has been under-resourced, and the awards have lacked impact; nor does the philosophy of the award appear at first sight to have been consciously linked to any national cultural objective......

....the annual Aer Lingus Young Scientists Award would appear to have achieved a high prestige value, and there is a trend into regarding this event as a generator of innovative enterprise ideas, although in this age-group such an emphasis is premature....

....there needs to be an active policy for encouraging research scientists not to stay on in colleges as 'post-docs' but to get into downstream research, via some sort of industrial fellowship scheme, encouraging mobility leading to career change. Career changes need to be made easy and normal; people should be able to move upstream and downstream without barriers.

..... the outstanding international results of the winners of the Aer Lingus Young Scientists....suggest the existence of excellent seed corn. The danger is that it becomes regarded in the culture as 'something for the kids to play at'. There is need for upgrading science in the national culture. ......there is no university-based research group looking in this area. It could evolve out of historical studies...... McQuade).

......the Irish bureaucracy can't pick winners. By facilitating people who know their fields they can however encourage Irish S&T people to position themselves so as to be associated with winning international teams, and sometimes lead them.....

.....the less we have to do with current UK official thinking the better; the UK shows signs of terminal decline; we should rather look to the Continent and to the USA for role-models. We should perhaps look at the areas of damage, and see if some good people from Britain, who might otherwise go to the US, might be picked up. Where research systems that are needed are in crisis, we should perhaps see if we could supply the need from here, via a local redeployment process........

....there needs to be a systematic approach developed to the establishment of a 'corporate memory' in the State system of all 'cases' where State money has been used in support of a research project in science, or a development project in technology, or a transition from one to the other. Such a case file could place a query-able abstract of each project file on record, including an assessment of its long-term outcome ...enabling policies systematically to be developed.

STIAC Seminar (September 1994)

The Minister stayed and listened, an event which probably was unprecedented in this context. He must have picked up an interesting impression of communication channel problems. Despite the Chairman's admonitions to people to ask questions such as to draw out the expertise of the guests from abroad, people resolutely ground their own axes, under the perfectly valid impression that direct channels to the Minister in this context were rare events and to be taken advantage of to the full when they occurred.

In fact, it was practically impossible for anyone in the audience to formulate a question to any of the guest gurus that would be likely to elicit a meaningful reply at the level of overview and abstraction appropriate to the presentations.

It is possible to suggest a model for a 'win-win' solution to the perceived problem of how to get industry and academia interacting creatively. It is a development and a focusing of ideas already submitted earlier....which are of particular relevance to Irish-owned high-tech small firms which is interested in recruiting good graduates and in bringing state-of-the-art developments to the marketplace.

What such firms need is a relationship with academia that would enable them to cover a wide range of long-shot feasibility studies, in various developmental market-oriented areas. Firms are often rich in product-concepts that we want to try out, but lack the time to try them in-house. These concepts often have emerged from EU-funded project experience, or from other products already on the market.....

Independent Irish high-tech firms need a relationship with the academic system that would involve an in-house expert interacting with the academic research community, at the level of the order of a day or two per month, in a role equivalent to the supervisor of an MSc project. In other words, the firm should be in a position to influence the goal of the MSc project, and monitor it. At the end of the project, the firm would in many cases want to take on the student, to engineer the ensuing product for the market, with in-house development support, thus contributing to the expansion of the firm.

If £6K is regarded as a reasonable student stipend, and £500 per diem is a reasonable industrial high-tech consultancy rate, then the one day per month from the firm and £6K from the State would appear to be a reasonably balanced approach to industrial project support funding. Needing to watch the cash flow, most expanding small firms prefer to put in time rather than money.

This procedure is analogous to the 'small business' scheme in the US, as described by the guest speaker Joe Clarke; there is no money required from the firm, only ideas and dedication. It can perhaps be regarded as the model unit-case of the university-industry interaction in the applied sciences.

To get the unit-case for basic science, let us build on the ratio proposed by Harry Becker (another guest speaker): one scientist per 3 inventors. For each 3 industry MSc projects in the total system, let the state be prepared to put up funding for 1 PhD student. Thus the academics if they want PhD students will have to cultivate industry MSc sponsors along the lines suggested, and keep them happy with recruitable students.

The PhD-oriented funding would not go automatically to an MSc-producing department; it would go in a block to an analogue of the UK Research Council system, and would be allocated so as to help build up centres of research excellence. It would however be surprising if they did not end up in or near to the MSc-producing departments, giving depth to their research potential.

This funding would of course need to be supplemented with 'basic tool money' such as to enable the academic staff to pursue its own marginal time research, attend the conferences, maintain the basic research infrastructure, etc. This infrastructural money should go via the basic institutional funding, as of right.

There exists the shell of a UK-type Research Council system, in the form of the Academy National Committees. These are constructed of Academy members (whose work has gained peer-recognition) and nominees of the various voluntary specialist bodies. This system, if resourced, should be in a position to allocate PhD-type funding with some degree of scientific insight.

There is a need for industry-oriented awareness programmes. The natural foci for such programmes are events such as occur regularly at the RDS, in the form of conferences and exhibitions. The RDS conference which took place last year on October 20-21, looking scientifically at the post-2000 scene is one such focus. The Aer Lingus Young Scientists is another.

If the latter is the seed corn (which we are largely exporting, to our discredit), what is the analogous event for the seedlings, prior to planting out? We need however here to be careful. The specific seedlings will have been nurtured by specific firms, who will want the option of taking them on board. They will not want them head-hunted by competitors. The type of exhibition we need is one of seedbed technology; ie the R&D potential of the good academic MSc and PhD producers, so as to attract sponsors. The RDS has organised such events from time to time in the past.

There appear to be re-emerging specific roles for the Academy and the RDS, supplementary to the State, for which classically they were designed centuries ago, and for which they are still eminently suitable. State-appointed top-down bodies for this purpose are redolent of the ci-devant Eastern European states.

This model needs to be supported by a knowledge-base (KB). Joe Clark stressed the importance of a skills KB: who knows how to do what and where are they, and to what extent are they to be believed. Such a system could usefully be specified, developed and implemented, and this task needs to be given high priority.

The unit-module of such a knowledge-base is the person rather than the paper or the location; .....we need access to knowledge about the performance and track-record of individual academic consultants. The KB should therefore contain a CV and a publications list for each. If firms had access to this, they would know with some precision where to place their marketable concepts for elaboration in sponsored MSc mode. At present it is hit and miss, by personal contact.

In this context another role for the RDS presents itself: the award of the Boyle Medal. This could be resourced and upgraded, with relatively modest State funding, to the status of a sort of mini-national Nobel Prize.

If it was given out that the knowledge-base, as outlined above, was an important channel into consideration for this award, and the award was both valuable and prestigious, then there would be a motivation for people to contribute to the KB, and the KB would have some chance of being comprehensive.

To summarise: what we need to oil the wheels Irish science delivery system are:

1. unconditional funding for all academic staff to enable them to attend conferences and do basic marginal-time research themselves;

2. unconditional funding for basic research infrastructure via the educational institution, with research viewed as part of the teaching overhead;

3. sponsored MSc projects with the student funded at a reasonable level, and with industry input in the form of expert time and dedication, support to be automatic once the project is specified by negotiation between the firm and the academic supervisor, and the input from the firm defined;

4. PhD projects in due proportion focused in areas of excellence, identified by Research Council-type bodies developed out of the Academy National Committees;

5. a knowledge-base enabling firms to find out who knows how to do what, where, and to assess them with a view to MSc sponsorship and access to expert consultancy;

6. an award system (developed from the Boyle Medal) such as to motivate people to keep the KB updated.

Science Centres Conference 1996

To Pat Rabbitte TD / Minister for S&T / Leinster House / D2 / 25/6/96

re: Science Centres Conference

Dear Minister

I am writing under the stimulus of last week's 'Science Centres' conference, in order to help convey some aspects of the IRSA (Irish Research Scientists Association) message, from the perspective of my role as an R&D broker working in association with an Irish high-tech small firm.

I see three main budget-heads, all of which have high priority:

1. The need that the basic-research labour-force (ie the postgraduate students), on which depends the continuation of the existence of the internationally recognised 'centres of excellence' in Ireland, should be funded, at a level at least comparable with the Scholars of the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies. There is academic comparability, and comparability of international recognition; why should there not be financial comparability?

There is a multiplier effect, in that a world-class centre will often attract industrial funding, for work in fringe applications areas, generating recruitable postgraduate students good at high-tech problem-solving. A typical good centre should have a PhD / MSc ratio of about 1 / 3 and there should be much interaction. Industrial sponsorship for this type of operation should be 'payable in kind', and encouraged by tax-concessions, with the expert time of the students' external industrial supervisors chargeable against claim, and State funding for the student.

2. The interface between industry and the academic scientific research community needs to be strengthened and made more transparent. The firm I am working with finds it quite difficult to identify good research centres in Ireland with which to collaborate in EU research consortia. We need a 'one-stop' shop Web-site, for access to the all-Ireland research system via a well-engineered and architecturally friendly knowledge-base.

Such a site could typically be initiated and maintained by the Royal Irish Academy, which has an all-Ireland structure of historic standing. I have put the Academy an outline proposal in which I have indicated how such a concept might best be implemented. It will not happen if the initiative is left to rival institutional Web-sites. A national overview is needed.

This would come under a 'university-industry' budget head.

3. The 'public awareness' budget is the target of last week's meeting. There are several aspects, one being the historic heritage which is beginning to be taken care of via initiatives such as Birr Castle and Dunsink. This type of thing on its own however is fragile, without an academic underpinning in a university-based 'history of science' department. There is none such in the Republic; there is one in Queens, but it does not have an Irish-oriented remit.

Therefore somewhere in the budget you need to find the funding for a university-based unitwhich would provide courses:

* to teach to scientists the socio-economic and political implications of their discoveries,in a specific Irish as well as European and global context; also

* to teach the role of science, scientific technology and innovation in history and in socio-economic and political development, to students of business and humanities.

I know they have been trying to develop such a course in Limerick, but I think it may have stalled. It could be developed with strong links into the Birr Castle centre, but should not be restricted to deal with only the Birr legacy.

This however is not enough on its own. The 'Science Centre' concept, where the public, young people, science teachers etc can get hands-on experience of the discovery process, both the principles and the historic aspect, is also of crucial importance. But the science centre on its own, without the strong academic and historical underpinning, could easily degenerate into a sort of fun-fair. You need both components.

The science centres, by providing a hands-on experience, motivate young people to explore in depth the process of invention and discovery. Once motivated, they should have immediately accessible the opportunity of implementing this 'exploration in greater depth' of the background of basic current knowledge, and the history of discoveries and inventions by which this knowledge has been accumulated. This is the role of the academic source of the history of discovery and invention.

An important resource supporting the interface between the science centre and the academic understanding of the process of discovery and invention could be the interactive multimedia CD-ROM. We have the capability of producing this type of resource in Ireland for the world market, which, as we heard at the recent conference, already supports of the order of 1000 science centres, and is expanding rapidly.

However it would be difficult for the several local firms interested in the production of knowledge-intensive interactive multimedia material to develop this market opportunity without some degree of constructive interaction between one or more science centres and Irish-based sources of academic understanding of the history of invention and discovery.

Public Awareness Budget

On the science centre side, there is what appears to be the makings of a network of centres of aspiration and achievement, some of which have a prospect of ongoing funding, others of which have locations with potential. There is evidence that self-funding to some degree is feasible, and that industrial funding can be raised from science-based industry. The evidence is however that in Ireland there is far too much dependence on voluntary effort by a few enthusiasts whose time is limited.

It would appear that the best way initially to use State funding would be to support the overheads of the projected Science Centre network, rather than to support any one centre exclusively. If the Network were to be resourced to the extent of being able to support an energetic Director, with a background in science, technology and innovation, and good industrial contacts, the funding problem could then be addressed by approaching industry, and making contributions tax-deductible. There should of course be an ongoing additional State and local/regional government support for each local/specialist centre, as is the norm elsewhere.

The subsequent development plan should include a network of generalist regional centres, as well as several national specialist centres, rather than a single 'national centre'.

From the point of view of primary and secondary schools, the key is local accessibility. From the point of view of teaching third-level business schools, historians, economists etc about the development significance of science and the innovation process, the key is depth of historical and scientific understanding. If you try to do both in a single national centre, you will fall between two stools.

The fact that Derry can actively aspire to support a hands-on science centre suggests that there could easily be several in Dublin, of both generalist and specialist varieties.

For example, the 'Stack A' concept, which it seems has ongoing funding sources already lined up, could pilot the generalist hands-on concept with easy accessibility from most of central Dublin.

The Pidgeon-house concept, which has ESB support, might be developed in specialist mode, as an interactive museum for the electrical and communications industry.

There would be scope for several accessible generalist centres in outer suburbs such as Dun Laoire, Tallaght etc, and for the development of existing specialist centres such as the Marine Museum in Dun Laoire and the Transport one at Howth.

Sectoral specialist museums can be envisaged in locations having historic links with inventions and discoveries, on the pattern of Birr Castle and Dunsink. It would be up to the Director of the Network to identify these, picking up where possible on local initiatives, negotiating a collection policy and scope for the specialisation, and identifying appropriate funding sources.

There are, for example, historic associations with Tyndall in Carlow, Boyle in Lismore, Bernal in Nenagh, Boole in Cork, Ferguson in Belfast, Larmor in Galway etc; there are nuclei of museum collections available on the fringe of most university departments (indeed some of their equipment still in use is museum material, due to the dearth of funding!).

The all-Ireland scope of the network is a matter for national political decision in the context of the current 'all-party talks', with the aid of the historic all-Ireland scope of the Royal Irish Academy. This should be on the Anglo-Irish political agenda: that science and technology in Ireland should be seen as a whole, as part of an all-Ireland cultural tradition, with a strong Protestant component.

I hope you find the foregoing of use in planning the science awareness budget.

Yours sincerely / Dr Roy H W Johnston

The 'History of Science Centre' (again)

TECHNE ASSOCIATES / Techno-Economic, Socio-Technical, Socio-Linguistic and Environmental Consultancy / PO Box 1881 / Rathmines / Dublin 6

Peter Bowler in QUB / 4/10/97

Dear Peter / I have been making enquiries here and there, and I have got the IRSA (exec sec) and the DIAS (registrar) in support of the concept. I have not yet put them a formal proposal. Let me outline the current state of the project vision:

1. A full-time position for a professional historian of science in DIAS (ie an opportunity for Nick Whyte), supported by a panel of part-time associates, senior (and possibly retired) people with science backgrounds and a track-record in historical work (people like Wayman, Herries Davies, Scaife, Dooge; the scope should include the technology aspect; I can also perhaps include myself in this category, though not among the front-runners). Do you have any more names?

2. A budget for publication, including publication in innovative mode ie on the Web (I would see this as where I would primarily come in, in an editorial role, for the resultant hypertext mesh of focused review-papers).

3. The tasks would include the identification of key papers and books focusing on

(a) lives and times of significant Irish scientists and technologists

(b) specific inventions and discoveries having relevance to the Irish context (this would include not only episodes such as Hamilton's quaternions, Callan's induction coil, the Birr telescope etc, ie discoveries and inventions made in Ireland, but also things like the steam engine and the railway system, the electric telegraph, wireless telegraphy, electrical power transmission etc and their socio-economic impacts on Ireland)

(c) studies of the Irish environment from the angle of its influence on science and technology (this would include questions like technical and university education, science teaching in schools, aspects of Government policy eg agriculture, energy etc).

4. The key integrating task would be the publication and presentation of the above as an interconnected whole, in a form which would be of value:

(a) to Irish Studies people abroad (I don't yet have a complete list of these, but there seem to be an increasing number, additional to Liverpool, Notre Dame etc; also in France, Germany, Japan etc)

(b) to science and engineering faculties seeking to give their students a background in history (this is beginning to happen in Limerick and in DCU)

(c) to business and humanities faculties seeking to give their students a grounding in the role of science and technology in economic and cultural development. (also Limerick and DCU)

This would be the role of the web-site mode of publication, this being increasingly seen as a key educational resource.

We are talking about an annual budget in the region of £100-150K, and this should be pulled in under the long-term implications of the 'public awareness' requirement of the STIAC Report, supplemented perhaps if necessary from other sources.

I have discussed this with John Duggan the DIAS Registrar, with a view to clearing the political road towards a sensible location to specify in the proposal; he is supportive. I have also discussed it with John Donovan of the IRSA, who has come back with several pertinent comments. I quote:

.....On a quick read, I think the idea is a very good one and long overdue. I have no problem trying to get IRSA to write such a letter.......Your estimated budget (100 - 150k pa) would absorb more than half of the present Public Awareness Budget (such as it is). An alternative source might be the Heritage Council which is made up of a significant number of scientists and engineers (4 I think).

....At the moment the School of Theoretical Physics and Celtic Studies in DIAS are funded through money from the Lottery via the Dept of E,S&T. Could the Historian function be coupled to the Celtic Studies and get some funding through the Department of Arts, Culture, Heritage, Gaeltacht and the Islands .......?

....Any proposal would be likely to be much more successful if some income could be shown to arise from the generation and publication of teaching materials for Primary, Secondary and Tertiary level as well as the General Public. We have managed to sell both our National Expertise Register and the CD-ROM etc. on the basis that it will be self-supporting beyond the first year........However, even though there is a significant backlog of work to be done on Irish Scientific Heritage, within a few years most of the significant streams would have been covered to an acceptable level. Perhaps the position should also focus on Irish research in the wider European (and possibly World) context. From that point of view funding for the position might also be available through the Irish Studies faculties of some of the larger American Universities, Irish multinationals, International Fund For Ireland, The Ireland Fund, The Wellcome Trust History of Science Unit, Department of Foreign Affairs and/or through the EU.....

(The idea of a world market for CD-ROM published material relevant to the role of science in the development of new post-colonial nations is highly pertinent; no-one else is doing it, and it is en evident need, for which a market can be seen to be emerging on the Web. RJ)

JD goes on to suggest that I might try to organise some sort of representative group spanning the interests of the various organisations; a sort of steering committee for the project, composed of people who as a group might be listened to by Government and/or Foundations. He voices approval of the RIA response to STIAC, which he regards as an indication that the Academy is 'waking up'. He goes on to suggest some names who might be relevant:

......Emer Colleran from UCG, and a UCG botanist are two of the people on the Heritage Council. The names and affiliations are all available from Mespil Road and may be on the irlgov (web)site.....

.......Heavyweight steering committee (Keep it small and focused):

1 RIA
1 IRSA (an IRSA person in the RIA, David McConnell say might do both)
1 DIAS (Dervilla Donnelly might do double duty as both DIAS and RDS)
1 RDS
Senator Fergal Quinn
Senator Brendan Ryan
Dr Tony Ryan (Ryanair)
Mrs (Allison) Moffat, Moffat Engineering (recently bought out by PowerScreen RJ)
Ms Ann O' Riordan, Microsoft.

John Miller of the MIT Club of Ireland might be worth sounding out with regard to funding from overseas. He is in Trinity. As for Wellcome, perhaps the most significant Irish research history has been medical and surgical. Perhaps a carefully pitched Irish Medical (Vet. Dent. Public Health) proposal as a sub-plot to the historian angle might be looked on favourably. Consult with Geoff Chadwick of RCPI and perhaps Senator Mary Henry.

Thus far the Vision and John Donovan's ideas for a heavyweight support group. I would be prepared to work towards the development of the support group if I felt that the Academy Committee would support the concept, lend its name, and help in the process of pulling in the appropriate people. This is NOT yet fit to bring up at a committee; people would pick holes in it. Please come back to me first with a view which will help me to produce the next approximation suitable for you to produce at an Academy meeting and get it accepted.

Yours sincerely / Roy H W Johnston

Again I failed to get the necessary support for any proposal along these lines; the barrier at this point seems to have been a perception that there was a proposal on the agenda in the context of UCD. Subsequent enquiries have elicited that the orientation of the UCD project is towards history of science in general, without linkages to the specific socio-cultural Irish context. I have not perused it since. It will be for others to pursue it, and if the above is of any help in focusing the ideas, then so much the better.

Quasi-academic papers in the 1990s

I have similarly published some 'Science in History' papers, in the form of a hypertext construct based on a paper published in the Welsh 'Planet', and on a paper prepared for Studies but which for some reason never appeared. I don't think it was actually 'rejected'; it seems to have just got lost. The culture-gap between science and the rest of the Irish cultural canon remains with us. I feel I have done all I could to bridge it.

See also the 1990s academic module where I have placed on record a couple of modest contributions to the Blackwell Companion to Irish Culture, done at the request of the editor WJ McCormick, so some slight awareness must have been generated. I also have reviewed Nicholas Whyte's disappointing Science and Colonialism in Ireland (Cork UP, 1999) in the Irish Democrat.

The reviewing process continues into the current century; see for example Recoveries: Neglected Episodes in Irish Cultural History, John Wilson Foster, UCD Press 2002, ISBN 1 900621 82 7, hb, NPG.

See also a critical omnibus review of several publications, from the RDS, RIA and elsewwhere, about science in Ireland, in the June 2006 issue of Books Ireland.

I have included the previous two reviews, along with some others, in a developing compendium of science-related reviews written since 2001. See also the science sector of the current Techne web-site.

Some navigational notes:

Copyright Dr Roy Johnston 1999