FONTANA HISTORY OF SCIENCE GENERAL EDITOR; ROY PORTER already published: Environmental Sciences PETER J. BOWLER Chemistry W.H. Brock Jrtheomin: ‘Technology DONALD CARDWELL Mathematics. 1VOR GRATTAN-GUINNESS. Physics RUSSELL MACCORMMACH ‘Astronomy JonN NORTH Blology ROBERT OLBY Medicine ROY PORTER Selence in Society LEWIS PYENSON 6 SUSAN SHEETS-PYENSON ‘Human Sciences ROGER SMITH FONTANA HISTORY OF SCIENCE (Editor: Roy Porter) THE FONTANA HISTORY OF THE ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES Peter J. Bowler FontanaPress An Inpri of BarperColicsPublbers nazThe Problem of Perception ‘The environmental scences have now become a matter of acute concern. We all know that modem technology has encouraged massive exploitation of the world’s resources, with all the resulting problems of pollution and environ- ‘mental exhaustion, Science has clearly played a role in this cxplotation— yet, at the same time, it is the sd- entists (or at least some of them) who are warming us fof the dangers. A historical study of how those sciences dealing with the environment have developed may throw some light on our predicament. If science is simultaneously part of both the problem and the solution, we need to know how our attempt to understand and exploit the world has taken on its modem form. To what extent do these sciences reflect the underlying values of western culture ~ indeed, to what extent is the very notion of a rational study of Nature part of a purely western world view? Can there be a scientific study of the natural world that does not to some extent reflect the values of those who fund and conduct the research? Have those values changed through time and, if $0, does the very concept of an environmental ‘science’ depend on the nature of the soctety that sustains it? These are questions of vital interest fm the modem world, but they may be illuminated by a historical analysis of how the environmental sciences have developed. ‘The scope of the problem is evident from the fact that the very term ‘environmental sciences’ has a modern context that would not have been recognized by the scientists of catfier generations. Twentieth-century science has become2+ The Problem of Perception highly specialized, and the reseatch programmes of di Cplines often differ in character even when ~ 10 the ou ‘Suer ~they seem to be dealing with closely related topics Environmentalist critics argue that seience has encouraged fragmented image of Nature in which the details of everything are studied, but there is no scope for an overview that might help us to understand the problems ofthe earth gs a whole. The unity of the ‘environmental sciences’ is ‘hot created by the sciences themselves: it is imposed by the public's growing awareness of the threat posed to the environment by our own activities. ‘The history of the environmental sciences may thus seem ‘a somewhat artificial category. In the twentieth century, dr Teast, it must encompass a wide range of studies that have litle real interaction. Our growing awareness that the environment as a whole is something worthy of study provides a kind of unity through hindsight, but this 1s Externe! to the sciences themselves. The growth of envi- Fonmentalism provides no historical focus because most ‘Sciences have traditionally been associated with the desire ‘understand Nature in order to dominate and exploit. Even cology began asa science devoted to understanding natural telationships for the purpose of improving our ability 10 control them. TL is possible, however, that history may supply its own form of conceptual unity. The specialization of scientific disciplines that created the fragmentation of modem per- Spectives at the research level has built up over the last Couple of centuries. Geology emerged as a coherent field ‘of study around 1800, ecology about a century later. Earlier Scientists did not divide the study of Nature into such rigid Categories, and were thus in a better position to appr Gate the links between what have now become distinct Fevearch topies. Even when independent disciplines began to emerge, individual scientists often worked in scveral of them simultaneously, and could appreciate how they might {nteract, Much of Charles Darwin’s early research was in the ‘The Problem of Perception ° 3 area of geology, not evolutionary biology. There have been ‘several eplodes in the history of science where active efforts ‘were made to encourage the kind of interactive studies that ‘modern environmentalists demand. ‘Too much of the history of science has concentrated con exciting episodes such as the ‘Darwinian revolution’, teaving other topics unexplored even when they were of direct interest to the central figures in the debates we have ‘chosen to highlight. Historians were fascinated by the image ofa ‘war between science and religion, and focused their Sttention on those episodes where the conflict seemed most fpparent. We are now beginning Co realize the damage that this preconception has done to our interpretation of the past. The growth of environmentalism provides historians {with a new incentive, a new level of hindsight that directs ‘our attention to hitherto ignored areas of science. And 2s we study these areas, we sce both the range and the unity Of earlier efforts to understand the environment. If our Current desire to create a unified group of enviconmental Sciences forces the scientists themselves to take a broader perspective, this will merely revive a sense of unity that fas been lost in the period of increased specialization. But historians, too, have been given a new agenda that {s forcing them 10 look at areas of science once dismissed 5 to0 technical to be of interest to non-specialists. ‘Another way of illustrating the problems confronting & historian of the environmental sciences is to expose the ‘elationship between science and changing cultural values. ‘One could write a history of western attitudes towards ‘Nature that paid very little attention to the character of science ise. The unit of analysis would be how the people ‘ofa given century thought about the world in which they lived, and the historian could appeal to literature and the visual arts as well as to natural history and the disciplines that we accept as part of ‘science’. It is true that a rigid separation of scientific and non-scientific ways of looking a1 Nature only came about during the last few centuries.