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| Hiroshima Peace Memorial |
Home again after almost three weeks at the New York Society for Ethical Culture, a time filled with many meetings and discussions of the archives of the Ethical Culture Movement, I am now trying to sort through my notes and papers to assess what was accomplished for the expansion of the Bibliography. At the moment I am finding notes on Jerome Nathanson, NYSEC leader, mid-twentieth century. One book that has caught my attention is Science for Democracy. First published in 1946, the Internet Archive has a digitized copy of the 1970 reprint by Books for Libraries Press.
Nathanson edited the volume and wrote a preface in which he argues that it is the role of scientists to insist on freedom of inquiry in a democratic nation. It is the role of those who are not scientists to break any habits of complacency and educate themselves about the importance of science and free inquiry to a democratic nation so that they can support such inquiry for the sake of the nation.
The chapters of the book are the results of several papers and two symposia that were presented as part of the Third Conference on Scientific Spirit and Democratic Faith, held at NYSEC, May 1945, and chaired by Nathanson. He points out that the conference was held "weeks before a section of the earth was atomized, and before even those who knew were at liberty to say that such a thing as the atom bomb was in the immediate offing" (viii). The questions/topics posed for the symposia were:
- Does private industry threaten freedom of scientific research?
- The role of science in the determination of democratic policy.
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