Delegates Gather For Science Congress

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29898, 11 August 1962, Page 13

Delegates Gather For Science Congress

Many of the 700 delegates to attend the Royal Society of -New Zealand's tenth science congress in Christchurch next week arrived in the city yesterday and more are due today. The congress will open on Monday. The previous congress was held in May, 1960. and the present one has been brought forward to this month to coincide with the centennial of the Canterbury branch which, established in 1832 as the Philosophical Institute of Canterbury, is the senior continuing scientific society in New Zealand.

Representatives of all the scientific societies in the

Dominion. are participating in the congress, in the 17 sections of which will be heard papers on everything from horticulture to space science. The congress will be officially opened in the University of Canterbury Hall on Monday at 11.15 am. by the Minister in charge of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (Mr Tennent). This will be preceded by the registration of delegates. Morning and afternoon sessions of the various sections will be held daily at the university. while each afternoon in the Civic Theatre public sessions will be given. The guest speaker at the congress, Professor C. W. Shoppee, of the University of Sydney, will deliver a public lecture on “The Carbon Atom.” This lecture will follow an official welcome to the congress by the Mayor (Mr G. Manning) at 7.30 p.m.

in the Civic Theatre. Professor G. A. Knox, who is president of the Canterbury branch of the Royal Society of New Zealand, will be chairman of the science congress.

Archaeologists

Welcomed

The C-anterbury Museum was in the forefront of the national movement to ensure that excavation of historic sites wan undertaken only by authorised and expert organisations. said Mr G. C. C. Sandston, chairman of the museum trust board last evening. He was welcoming members of the archaeological and anthropological section of the New Zealand Science Congress. Those present would be holding the first conference in Christchurch of the New Zeeland Archaeological Society and this was appropriate. Mr Sandston slad. Sir Julius von Haast had done notable work in Canterbury, the museum had built up one of New Zealand's finest native oollectkxis. and the director (Dr. R. S. Duff) was probably the greatest living authority on the Maori. The Maori people resented desecration of their ancestors’ graves f'K private gain, said Mr Weraahi Couch, chairman at the Rapaki Tribal Committee. “We are a comparatively young race, our burial grounds do not go back far in time and such acts hurt,’’ he said. But, for these reasons, the Maori alac lacked something in their sense of time and history. Therefore, archaeologists who worked in approved groups, sought permission, and excavated with

discrimination and control brought discoveries of value to the Maori people, Mr Couch said.