James Bryant Conant (1893-1978) was an American chemist, president of Harvard University, U.S. Ambassador and educational critic. He was an effective spokesman for the support of national policies by private and public scientific and educational institutions.
James Conant was born on March 26, 1893, in Dorchester, Massachusetts. After graduating magna cum laude from Harvard College in 1914, Conant pursued graduate studies in organic chemistry and received his doctorate in 1916. During the next three years he served as instructor at Harvard, tried unsuccessfully to set up a private chemistry laboratory, and joined the Army's Chemical Warfare Service. Engaged in the secret production of poison gases, Conant advanced to the rank of major, belonging to the elite group of organic chemists who constituted the nucleus of a growing profession in universities, industry, foundations, and the armed forces.
Returning to Harvard, Conant was appointed assistant professor in 1919, associate professor in 1925, and professor in 1927. He served as chairman of the Division of Chemistry, as consultant to the Du Pont Company, and on the Board of Scientific Advisers of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research. In 1933 he became president of Harvard University (until 1953). Following the policies of Harvard's recent presidents, Conant placed heavy emphasis on bringing talented students and faculty to Harvard. He devised interdisciplinary studies in American civilization and the history of science to improve the liberal education of the undergraduates. He sought to strengthen the graduate school of education by introducing the master of arts in teaching program.
In 1934 Conant joined the Board of Trustees of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. During World War II he directed the resources of Harvard in support of the war effort, and he himself became an adviser to the Manhattan Project, which produced the first atomic bomb. He was a member of the General Advisory Committee of the Atomic Energy Commission from 1947 to 1952 and, after his retirement from Harvard in 1953, ambassador to West Germany from 1955 to 1957. Following that, from 1957 to 1959 he undertook a study of American secondary education for the Carnegie Foundation and thereafter served in various roles as educational consultant. He died on February 11, 1978 in Hanover, New Hampshire.
发表于2024-09-10
On Understanding Science 2024 pdf epub mobi 电子书
这是哈佛大学校长(任期1933-1953)、化学家Conant教授的力作,影响了一大批美国学者,直接启发了包括托马斯.库恩这样的优秀后来人。 科学是一种高雅的素养、一种理性的思维方式、一种看人观物的成熟的生活习惯。美国在其砥砺奋发的二十世纪上半叶,正是Conant这样一代优秀教育...
评分这是哈佛大学校长(任期1933-1953)、化学家Conant教授的力作,影响了一大批美国学者,直接启发了包括托马斯.库恩这样的优秀后来人。 科学是一种高雅的素养、一种理性的思维方式、一种看人观物的成熟的生活习惯。美国在其砥砺奋发的二十世纪上半叶,正是Conant这样一代优秀教育...
评分这是哈佛大学校长(任期1933-1953)、化学家Conant教授的力作,影响了一大批美国学者,直接启发了包括托马斯.库恩这样的优秀后来人。 科学是一种高雅的素养、一种理性的思维方式、一种看人观物的成熟的生活习惯。美国在其砥砺奋发的二十世纪上半叶,正是Conant这样一代优秀教育...
评分这是哈佛大学校长(任期1933-1953)、化学家Conant教授的力作,影响了一大批美国学者,直接启发了包括托马斯.库恩这样的优秀后来人。 科学是一种高雅的素养、一种理性的思维方式、一种看人观物的成熟的生活习惯。美国在其砥砺奋发的二十世纪上半叶,正是Conant这样一代优秀教育...
评分这是哈佛大学校长(任期1933-1953)、化学家Conant教授的力作,影响了一大批美国学者,直接启发了包括托马斯.库恩这样的优秀后来人。 科学是一种高雅的素养、一种理性的思维方式、一种看人观物的成熟的生活习惯。美国在其砥砺奋发的二十世纪上半叶,正是Conant这样一代优秀教育...
图书标签: 科学 科学史
The language, customs, and manners of scientists are frequently unintelligible to the rest of the population, and there is considerable danger that the ideas and forces that are moving mountains will be increasingly inaccessible tothose outside the laboratories. The peril of such a situation to a democracy, where understanding must be assumed to be fairly general, is probably as great in the realm of ideas as the physical danger of the instruments of destruction. Dr. Conant sets out to show how the gulf can be bridged. Instead of a series of assertions about science being ordered knowledge, or the classification of facts, he presents a historical view of a number of the great scientists, of what their generation knew of their subjects, of the problem they set out to examine, and of how they solved it. The reader is enabled to follow the scientific method at work, with all its limitations and wonders.
On Understanding Science 2024 pdf epub mobi 电子书