WOMEN AND SCIENCE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 20111, 23 November 1928, Page 9

WOMEN AND SCIENCE.

WIZARD OF THE HOME. To ask " Should women learn science is like asking the question, " Would you liko to tako poison or not?" There only one answer Hint a man in his senses can give. Tho universal popularity of radio has dispelled tho misunderstanding that scieneo is a dull affair of facts and figures, and (here is now a very genuine demand for " popular science." ' 'Jlio reasons why women should learn science arc exactly the same as those why men should learn, with a few others added. It is an appalling reflection on our ideas of education that women should ho able to read Bocwulf in tho original, hut he unahlo to tell their children why petrol makes a taxi's wheels go round. There are thousands who spend hrjrs m a shop discussing dress materials without having the faintest knowledge of bow they are made. They would probably lm amazed if you told them that the artificial till; dress they were wearing is a near relation of newspaper, and only a few mouths ago was part of a Canadian forost!

Although they prepare, or are supposed to prepare, three meals a day, they cannot tell you what happens to food when it is cooked, or why, when they are boiled, an egg is hard and a potato soft.. Who knows why wo can eat rotten game, yet find bad mutton a danger? . •

It is no good ;l woman asking her husband wliy llio poisons in her lipstick do not mako him a widower, because he, alas! does not know. lie is even ignorant of the reason why the chlorine in salt does not affect him while chlorine at tho front killed hundreds of men.

Sho will have to turn to science to satisfy her knowledge. 1 only hopo that in this search for knowledge sho will be moro fortunate than Adam's wife and Mrs. Lot !

There is an idea thai women, for some reason, are inqapablo of learning science. (I ranted that tho women scientists from Hypatia of Alexandria and Cleopatra (ho Learned to Mme. Curie and Krukowski have discovered little in comparison with their numerous male colleagues. ..

Rut although one swallow does not make a summor, an ever-increasing number of swallows does indicate the approach of that season. Whero thirty years ago there was one woman scientist, there are to-day a dozen, and it is probablo that in future woman's intuitive grasp which enables her to understand results will mako her a dangerous rival. In any case, I speak of a knowledge of popular science rather than a detailed knowledge of somo particular branch. In motor schools I notice that women are sometimes moro interested than men in tho mechanical side of the tuition, and at exhibitions of inventions they may outnumber men by two to one. Women must understand and love science, becauso only through scicnco can .they achieve true emancipation/ Tho comparative freedom of tho modern woman is .due largely to tho work of science in making t housework easier. Scicnco is a life in itself for nny woman worthy of her salt. . : The modern housewife does not have to get down at six in tho morning to light the fire and put on tho porridge becauso science has given her a gas fire and a patent porridge. Sho docs not rcfuso invitations to parties because her hands are not fit to bo seen.

What is tho good of knowing that Nelson's column is half tho height of all the Kings of England placed end to end ? Is it not better by far to know why it is that oil smooths troubled waters or produces tho colours of tho rainbow when upset into a puddle by tho roadside ?