ASSOCIATION OF SCIENTIFIC WORKERS: SCIENCE AND THE NATION (1947)

After the Jewish Victory in the Second World War, here is just one sample of propaganda

Blue-and-white post-war Pelican book in Britain (price one shilling; published by Penguin); intro by Blackett, famous as a hard-headed unphilosophical type, with no comments on wars; unindexed; anonymous—no authors mentioned that I could see. President of Association, who wrote '.. spare-time work of.. mostly young men and women, scientists, engineers and social scientists, who are united in the desire to see the quickest possible application..' No authors are credited. (Most notes by Rae West, 2007)
A commentary on Jews winning the Second World War, but, by a philosophical paradox, being unable to claim this apparently great distinction. Note the anonymity: why should these people all have odd foreign names, must have been a frequent British reaction.
Notable at intervals how wartime planning affected people: [Note: part of UK socialism?] 76 'the whole transport system requires much greater co-ordination than has so far been secured in peacetime.'—See notes on coal, gas, railways, below, to recapture that atmosphere; 44 on hydro-electric power where large capital investment is necessary.
This doesn't seem to come into the category of a state promotion job; might perhaps cp Penguin Special 'Science in War'. But it does look like lots of special pleading; see e.g. the section on 'fundamental research'.
'More than 40,000 scientific journals in the world'—is this alarmist? Surely it's misleading—there must be at least say 8 major languages. And an awful lot must be of marginal importance. There's a section on comptes rendus and abstracts and off-prints and encouragement in classifying papers rather better; one wonders if anything happened though surely summaries have become common.
I just can't decide... is it a myth about 'science' at all—since all the specialisations are split up, why not just treat them as all separate topics—is 'science' a word covering something that doesn't exist? Perhaps like 'community'?
I wonder if this sort of book affected me—the idea that science is needed today; something that seems almost non-existent now in general education and the media. (The idea of teaching General Science is however recommended in this book; as is the idea of looking at everyday objects and investigating the underlying ideas, rather than introducing various 'laws').
HMSO 1946 had a 'Scientific Manpower Report' which in fact has figures which sound low to me.
Building seems treated in a rather disposable way—many buildings fit only for demolition, etc. Post-war building has little emphasis on bob damage—milch more on slum clearance. Probably this has to do with the mythology of the Second World War since bomb damage to Germany was infinitely higher.
Interesting to see how the world was then; applied science triumphs listed as jet engine, mass production of penicillin, atomic bomb, radar... all based on prior research. There's a list of plastics, including polythene though I'm unsure if this was mass producable then. (Perspex certainly existed—Spitfire hoods). P 77 on electrification of trains, and 'the construction of a trunk-road system, kept clear of all obstacles..'. Not good on futurology: curiously little on things like space and rockets and satellites and the moon walk fantasy; or on TV, transmission of images—digital storage I think simply unmentioned although computors as I think they were known had been invented by then. Radio 'receivers' 'a mass-production problem'—four or five million a year manufacturable without strain'; I note 74 radio energy used for heating as presumably in microwave ovens. I wonder if cars were regarded as perfected, then—think of Rolls-Royce!

- CONTENTS:
1 WHAT SORT OF WORLD?
2 SOME ASPECTS OF BRITISH ECONOMY
3 KEY INDUSTRIES OF BRITAIN: I: FUEL AND POWER
4 KEY INDUSTRIES OF BRITAIN: II: HEAVY CHEMICALS
5 KEY INDUSTRIES OF BRITAIN: III: ENGINEERING, TRANSPORT, COMMUNICATIONS
6 KEY INDUSTRIES OF BRITAIN: IV: AGRICULTURE
7 TWO INDUSTRIES OF THE FUTURE: PLASTICS AND FERMENTATIONS [Latter includes some alcohol-type things, but also penicillin]
8 HEALTH AND THE MEDICAL SERVICES [This was written just before the [Joke: notional health?] National Health Service came into operation]
9 FOOD AND CONSUMER GOODS INDUSTRIES
10 BUILDING AND HOME DESIGN
11 CONSUMER RESEARCH: HOW TO ASSESS OUR REQUIREMENTS
12 PROBLEMS IN ADMINISTRATION
13 THE FUTURE OF FUNDAMENTAL RESEARCH IN SCIENCE [Joke: include particle physics, electron microscopy in biology, social sciences]
14 THE PLANNING AND FINANCE OF SCIENCE
15 FACILITIES FOR SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH
16 SCIENCE AS PART OF CULTURE [Two culture stuff: and note: hypocrisy?: 205 'To scientists the pursuit of science has an intellectual and aesthetic value which may be compared with that given by the cultivation of the graphic arts or music; ...']
17 SCIENCE IN GENERAL EDUCATION
18 THE TRAINING OF SCIENTISTS
19 THE POLITICS OF SCIENCE

-30: Patents by then held by enormously powerful monopoly groups. '. significant factor in the restriction of world trade and.. international discord.' Original idea was that monopoly rights should be carefully controlled. (The idea of individual inventors benefiting seems entirely missing here—perhaps this is part of the Labour ideology; or the result of wartime efforts; or the people not themselves being inventors?)

-32: coal: 'no one wanted to work in the mines' and "Bevin boys" directed to the mines—this might have been dad! It's stated the workers hate the industry because of the owners [a wartime H G Wells book mentions a strike in a coal mine, in Kent, during the war].
'The coal industry grew up haphazard. The richest and most easily tapped seams were exploited to squeeze out large profits quickly; .. poorer and less accessible seams are our heritage. .. antiquated methods. ... financial ties .. to which coal is supplied .. below the average marker price. .. The great number of firms has prevented any planning for the coal-field as a unit.. failure to mechanise .. neglect of scientific research... the whole country welcomed the nationalisation of the industry by the Labour Government through the Coal Bill, 1946. ..' (49 mentions the National Coal Board).
-37 has coal industry accidents
-39 sour comments on 'coal merchants' written by someone who knows his grades of coking coals, etc

- 47: Gas: '.. the many hundreds of small gas companies throughout Britain.. are mainly responsible for the unsatisfactory general level of efficiency.' Dec 1945 'The Gas Industry' Report by the Committee of Enquiry. Suggested gas grids. (Presumably this is what became the Gas Board.)

-64: machine tools and manufacturing methods: experience showed US mass production was better than the more hand made UK style. (I have a book on machine tools, by Sir Alfred Herbert of Coventry, autobiographical—I wonder if he'd agree with this assessment?)

-68-69: The automobile industry. Various interesting comments inc bad effect of the Annual Motor Show with superficial changes and people not buying before it. 'Before the war, selling-costs were enormous, amounting perhaps to 40 per cent of the selling price.' Firms 'stripping and examining American models'—sounds like the Japanese! Also British industry paid 50 per cent more for steel than the Americans. Special mention of radiant-heat plant for drying paints and enamels, induction-hardening [what's this?], electric-welding; negative-rake milling [?], and electromagnetic methods of crack reduction.
'The basis of motor taxation should be further changed, so the type of car produced for the home market will be readily exportable.'

-70-71: Aircraft industry: probably 10% of wartime production. Also needed research—there was a cartel or group on aeroplane manufacturers, not doing research; if state funded research little point in companies being in private hands...

-71: Royal Navy and merchant navy; latter, 'Only about half the tonnage afloat at the beginning of the war has survived' and some are old due to shipyards concentrated mainly on ships of war.

-75: future of air travel—people and also goods—predicted in glowing terms by some; cautious assent given to this. [NB very few actual costs are given—was it regarded as horrifically expensive?]

-76: 'The problems with the railways... As with many old-established industries the railways appear not to be paying the price of injudicious policies in their earlier days. .. the industry is saddled with vast assets tied up in obsolete premises, plant and equipment. The financial position.. needs overhauling by public authority; it is difficult to see any valid case against national control. .. [then some technical details].'
[Ministry of War Transport commented on—conflict between road and rail interests 'must submit to control']

-88: [What are 'leys'?] 'Similar remarks apply to wireworm studies, especially in relation to duration of leys in ley-farming. ..'

-103: National Health Service: when this book was written, and then published, the NHS didn't yet exist. Interesting comments on preventive medicine.

-121: 'In 1939 there were 12 1/2 million houses in Great Britain'; 350,000 destroyed or made uninhabitable 'by enemy action'. Also 4 million had been 'damaged'—is this credible? Discussion on housing—dismissive and not that helpful; eg houses based on designs of houses of the wealthy 200 years before rather than on principles of comfort etc. Pre-fabrication teething troubles—and also acknowledgement that with poor control it could be like the worst jerry-building. Central refrigeration a possibility, like central heating. Central laundering? 129 'fractional horse-power electric motors' for washing-up and washing machines ... these were relatively unknown (or perhaps completely?—I'm unsure). Fluorescent lights wondered about; it sounds as though most people used feeble light bulbs to save electricity, causing 'strain'.

-208ff: [Films as a modern application of science; not art in the Victorian sense, opposed to the world of work. Mentions eg coated lenses and Citizen Kane. Also says 'scientific film societies are more numerous that aesthetic film societies ever were even in their heyday'—I presume the latter just means ordinary films? '.. they must secure a proportion of time on the public screens.'
The B.B.C. gets mentions; it's not even praised; it's simply calmly taken for granted that it's authoritative.