In 1898 Henry Deane, president of the Royal Society of New South Wales, told its assembled members of his wish to encourage the wider community to pursue science. The colonists, he said, were not involving themselves enough in studying scientific subjects or collecting information on the natural world. There were too many who, unless they saw 'immediate gain for themselves', were 'content to let others work in the field of science and lend no helping hand.' ^[1]

It was unfortunate, said Deane, that the colonists were so bound up in sports that they devoted all their spare time to cultivating physical rather than mental qualities. If only people could be 'awakened' to the delights and benefits of studying nature, 'their own life would be enlarged to them, and there would be an additional pleasure in existence.' It was the duty of the members to ensure that 'not only educated people but the great masses of the people' were helped to learn 'something of the secrets of science.' ^[2]

Deane was not alone in expressing this concern. Increasingly throughout the 1870s and 1880s, and especially emphatically throughout the 1890s, scientific men who addressed the meetings of the main scientific societies of south-eastern Australia spoke of the advantages of securing a greater degree of public involvement in science.

This is intriguing. Earlier in the century colonial scientists had rarely mentioned the public. They certainly did not express any wish to form a closer relationship with them. For some reason - or, more likely, for some complex of reasons - by the last part of the century scientists of the south-eastern colonies had changed their tune. More and more frequently they expressed a concern for deepening their relationship with the wider community.

It was said to be the duty of the members of the scientific societies to make science accessible and attractive. They should give public lectures and write popular texts on scientific subjects, make museums more interesting to the public, and work to establish science classes. They should urge everyone, men, women, and children, to go out into the bush or down to the sea-side to observe and collect specimens from the natural world.

The scientists agreed on the benefits to come from such involvement. On the one hand, the colonial scientific enterprise - small and under-manned in comparison to scientific institutions and activities in the mother country - would prosper if more scientific workers could be recruited. Any effort to advance colonial science would, it was generally acknowledged, add to the sum of human knowledge and bring corresponding advances in technology and material prosperity to the colony. There were further benefits. Participation in scientific activities would help individual colonists to enhance their intellectual capacities, and would even improve their moral qualities.

The way nineteenth-century people spoke of the things that science and the community had to offer each other seems strange to us in the late twentieth century. Finding such opinions expressed, the student of past mentalities is immediately alerted. The discovery of statements in sources that one cannot understand indicates a difference between the author's way of thinking and one's own. As historian Robert Darnton says, 'following up the surprises' within texts, one 'may be able to unravel an alien system of meaning. The thread may even lead into a strange and wonderful world view' ^[3]. Calling his approach to history 'ethnographic', Darnton explains that, like an anthropologist, he tries 'to see things from the native's point of view' ^[4]. The idea at the heart of this approach is that people's statements are formed within a framework of their culture and the social norms, beliefs and ideologies that spring from that culture.

The history of science is a particularly fertile ground for the study of past mentalities. Science, as a method and subject of study, as a source of authority, and as a way of understanding the nature and dynamics of the world, has always possessed a role within the community. It has been a part of, and has influenced, many perceptions about progress, knowledge, authority and the qualities and workings of the natural world.

British historians of science have, in the last fifteen years, begun to look into the cultural and social context of science in the nineteenth century. David Allen ^[5], Lynn Barber ^[6], David Knight ^[7], and Colin A. Russell ^[8] are among those who have turned their attention to scientists in their social context. Their concern has been for the ideas and framework of beliefs that have shaped the role of science, including the relationship between humanity and the natural world.

Cultural and social histories of Australian science have been longer in emerging. The history of Australian science is a relatively new field and it is still necessary to unearth and assess the large quantities of evidence, establish the sequences of institutional change, and find explanations for the structure of nineteenth-century colonial science. Consequently, historians of Australian science have concentrated on the development of the scientific enterprise in Australia, and on the work of individual scientists.

Anne Mozley Moyal has assessed the development of early Australian science in her seminal work Scientists in Nineteenth Century Australia ^[9], and in A Bright and Savage Land ^[10]. She has also investigated the contribution of women to Australian botany ^[11]. Roy MacLeod has analysed the conception and growth of the AAAS ^[12], and the development of science across colonies in general ^[13]. Michael Hoare has investigated scientific institutions and the impact of prominent men of science in the colonies ^[14]. Rod Home has investigated the Australian physics community ^[15] and individual physicists ^[16]. Inkster and Todd have explored the development of Australian science throughout the nineteenth century in terms of the type and availability of colonial finances and human resources at the levels of base, infrastructure and superstructure ^[17].

In the last few years, some historians of science have begun to assess aspects of the cultural and social history of science. MacLeod has done so in relation to the AAAS ^[18]. Ron Johnston has analysed the relationship between notions of scientific responsibility and society from 1938 to 1988 ^[19]. Sybil Jack has looked into some of the cultural imperatives that contributed to the weak position of science in the first fifty years of Australian settlement ^[20]. Gregory Melleuish has discussed the importance of the notions of natural religion, Providence and harmony to society and scientists in mid-nineteenth-century Sydney ^[21]. Some social historians, notably Michael Roe ^[22], Michael Cannon ^[23] and Beverly Kingston ^[24], have considered the way scientists and society influenced each other.

Most historians have passed over the interest expressed by late nineteenth century scientists to involve the public in science. Roy MacLeod has noted that the scientists speaking before the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) talked about opening science up to the public. He concludes that it was a principle not carried out in practice ^[25]. Nevertheless, apart from MacLeod's analysis of one aspect of the concern to involve the public in science, little else has been said.

This study offers a beginning. The overall aim is to introduce the scientist's concern, identify the terms in which it was expressed, and explore the network of beliefs that the concern appears to have sprung from. The development of the scientific establishment and its relationship with the wider community is discussed in the first chapter. The speakers are introduced, along with the growth of their concern to involve the public in science.

The themes within the scientists' statements are presented in the second chapter. Looking into what the scientists said the benefits of public participation were will help us to gain a better understanding of what might have inspired the scientists to encourage public involvement.

A discussion of the complex of reasons the scientists might have had for presenting science as they did is the subject of chapter three. Rather than assuming, as many historians have, that any high-sounding ideals must have been intended to achieve material support for science, personal prestige or power, other possibilities are explored. It is possible that the scientists were indeed trying, as they said they were, to improve the material, mental and moral qualities of the colonists.

The central sources for the study are the addresses given by the presidents and vice-presidents of Australian Royal Societies to the members assembled for the celebration of the anniversary of each society. These were published annually within the Societies' Proceedings and sent to members and to similar societies in other colonies and nations. Unlike the scientific papers read to the Society at the monthly meetings, the addresses dealt with broad issues; the fortunes of the Society over the previous year, the most striking advances made in science internationally, and any local achievements.

For the social historian or the historian of ideas and mentalities, probably the most valuable part of the address is that in which the president has decided to speak of the relationship between science and the wider community. From the mid- 1880s virtually all the addresses contain some mention of the public. It is in these addresses that the scientists tend to define science and explain its value for the wider community. It is also here that they speak of involving the public in science.

While South Australia, Queensland and New Zealand had scientific societies, this study will focus on the Societies of general science in New South Wales, Victoria, and Tasmania ^[26]. It was in these colonies that Australasian scientific institutions and activities were concentrated. The AAAS was a national body, and the meetings were intended to rotate amongst the colonial capitals, but a lack of people in the younger colonies and the cost of travel meant that the Association's activities were centred in south-eastern Australia ^[27].

Science within the societies was given its direction by a few well-known, usually professional, scientists of each colony. During the 1880s and 1890s, only about fifteen men presided over the Royal Societies of south-eastern Australia and the AAAS .

They were a small group and thus form an accessible, compact group to study. Although small in size, the group held beliefs that were representative of broader beliefs. The researcher does not have to look very far into contemporary sources before it becomes clear that the way the scientists spoke about science was also the way members of the wider community were speaking about science. Most significantly, the concern to involve the non-scientific community in science was felt not only by scientists, but was a broader phenomenon.

The Society scientists were members of a learned, professional section of the middle class. To reach the fullest explanation of their motives, it is important to recognise that they shared the concerns of that class. Henry Deane and his colleagues, far from being outsiders, were active members of this middle class. They were not only occupied as scientists but also worked for benevolent societies, asylums for the deaf and infirm, in the creation of parks in suburbs, and in improving education.

Given the way scientists spoke of their social responsibilities, the lamentable state of colonial intellects and morals, and their own duty to devote themselves to lifting those standards, a fruitful place to look for a fuller understanding of their statements would seem to be the ideologies of the middle classes, particularly those beliefs that led to the expansion of nineteenth-century philanthropy, temperance, educational reform, and urban reform. The rhetoric and actions of scientists and middle-class reformers seem to be derived from the same source and are expressed in the same tone.

Throughout the nineteenth-century, but particularly during the depression of the 1890s, Australian colonists were concerned to ensure their communities advanced. While material progress was important, it was necessary to ensure that colonists did not become obsessed with materialism. Moral and intellectual progress was required. Science was identified by colonists as one powerful way to effect the advances they sought. Since the Enlightenment, science had been seen as the key to progress - not just in relation to practical problems and in the use of technology to increase prosperity and the material comforts of humanity, but also in relation to social problems: to counteract social unrest, ignorance, and vice. If the members of the wider community could be induced to 'lend a helping hand' to science, the colonies would prosper, while the colonists, becoming observers and collectors of specimens from nature, would also elevate their own minds and morals. So much good could be achieved, if the colonists would involve themselves in the cure.

Footnotes

^[1] H. Deane, M.A., M.Inst. C.E., 'Anniversary Address', in Transactions and Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, Sydney, 1898, pp.1-54, p.45.
^[2] Deane, 'Anniversary Address', Trans. and Proc. Royal Soc. NSW, 1898, p. 47-48.
^[3] R. Darnton, The Great Cat Massacres and Other Episodes in French Cultural History, New York, 1984, p.5.
^[4] Ibid., p.260.
^[5] D.Allen, The Naturalist in Britain: a Social History, London, 1976.
^[6] L. Barber, The Heyday of Natural History, 1820-1870, London, 1980.
^[7] D. Knight, The Age of Science : the Scientific World-view in the Nineteenth Century, Oxford, 1986.
^[8] C.A. Russell, Science and Social Change 1700-1900, Somerset, 1983.
^[9] A. Mozley Moyal, Scientists in Nineteenth Century Australia; A Documentary History, Melbourne,1976.
^[10] A. Moyal, A Bright and Savage Land,: Scientists in Colonial Australia, Melbourne, 1986.
^[11] A. Moyal, 'Collectors and Illustrators: Women Botanists of the Nineteenth Century', in D.J. and S.G.M. Carr, (eds), People and Plants in Australia, Sydney, 1981, pp.333-354.
^[12] R. MacLeod, 'Organizing Science Under the Southern Cross', and 'From Imperial to National Science',in R. MacLeod (ed.), The Commonwealth of Science: ANZAAS and the Scientific Enterprise in Australasia, 1888-1988, Melbourne, 1988, pp.19-39, p.40-72.
^[13] R. MacLeod, ' On Visiting the ³Moving Metropolis²: Reflections on the Architecture of Imperial Science,' HRAS, Vol. 5,No. 3, 1982, pp.1-16.
^[14] Some of his works include: Science and Scientific Associations in Eastern Australia, 1820-1890, Ph.D thesis, Australian National University, 1974. and 'Botany and Society in Eastern Australia', in D.J. and S.G.M. Carr (eds) People and Plants in Australia, pp. 183-219.
^[15] R.W. Home 'The Beginnings of an Australian Physics Community', N.Reingold and M. Rothenberg (eds), Scientific Colonialism; a Cross-Cultural Comparison. Papers from a Conference at Melbourne, Australia 25-30 May 1981, Washington D.C., 1987, pp.3-34.
^[16] R.W. Home, 'First Physicist of Australia: Richard Threllfall at the University of Sydney, 1886-1898', in HRAS, Vol. 6, No. 3, 1986, pp.333-358.
^[17] I. Inkster & J. Todd, 'Support for the Scientific Enterprise, 1850-1900', in R.W. Home (ed.), Australian Science in the Making, Sydney, 1990, pp.102-132.
^[18] MacLeod, Commonwealth of Science; in the introduction to the book he also discusses the social and cultural import of science in general. For instance, he notes the nineteenth-century belief in the ability of science to develop important virtues and dispel particular vices, ibid., p.4.
^[19] R. Johnston, 'Social Responsibility of Science: The Social Mirror of Science', in MacLeod, Commonwealth of Science, pp.308-325.
^[20] S.Jack, 'Cultural Transmission: Science and Society to 1850', in Home, Australian Science in the Making, pp.102-152.
^[21] G. Melleuish,'Beneficent Providence and the Quest for Harmony: The Cultural Setting for Colonial Science in Sydney, 1850-1890', paper given at "Scientific Sydney" Seminar on 18 May 1985, History House, Sydney, published in Journ.and Proc. Royal Soc. NSW, Vol. 118,1985, pp.167-180.
^[22] M. Roe, Quest for Authority in Eastern Australia 1835-1851, Kingsgrove, NSW, 1965, and M. Roe, Nine Australian Progressives; Vitalism in Bourgeois Social Thought 1890-1960, St. Lucia, Queensland, 1984.
^[23] M. Cannon, Section III, 'The Triumph of Science', in Australia in the Victorian Age, Vol. III, Life in the Cities, Ringwood, Victoria, 1988, pp.78-100.
^[24] B. Kingston, The Oxford History of Australia: 1860-1900; Glad Confident Morning, Melbourne, 1988, especially chapter 2, 'Belief'.
^[25] MacLeod, 'From Imperial to National Science', p.50-55.
^[26] The study focuses on the Societies of general science, partly for brevity, but also because these were the Societies that were often seen to be central to the scientific enterprise. The Linnean, Horticultural, Geographical, Astronomical, and other Societies that dealt with only one branch of science were important within the scientific scene. Nevertheless, an examination of their relationship to the public requires a study of larger scope than is possible here.
^[27] MacLeod, 'From Imperial to National Science', pp. 47, 51.