The Role of Education in the Development of a National Science Tradition

教育在塑造与众不同的 科学的传统。 尽管我们认为科学 超越国界， 科学在概念上的进化是很重要的 因为当地的情况和顾虑。 尽管苏格兰是一个 一个小国，它的科学家具有重大影响力， 在世纪的重要性。 然而， 大学里教授物理学的方式， 传统是在文化中建立起来的。 威尔逊博士的研究 显示了苏格兰机构在 塑造了物理学的独特传统。 他的工作使 既反映了当前文化中的史学问题， 对科学和物理学发展史的影响。 具体来说，他正在写一部自然哲学史 自然哲学教授们所教授的课程， 苏格兰大学 虽然专注于自然 哲学课，研究旨在整合一些 相关主题：苏格兰与其他 国家，苏格兰的工业化， 苏格兰高等教育，苏格兰其他地区的发展 像工程学和道德哲学这样的学科， 苏格兰学生的职业生涯，以及不断变化的定义 和物理学本身的内容。 这项研究不仅将 有助于我们理解物理学的发展 一个重要的地理文化区域，但在 这样做，它也将增加我们对概念的理解， 几位国际著名物理学家的发展 由苏格兰大学在世纪制作的。 威尔逊博士已经确立了自己作为一个领先的学者， 19世纪苏格兰对英国物理学的影响， 高等教育 他关于斯托克斯-开尔文定律的著作 关系，他先前的国家科学研究的结果 基金会的支持，是对内部的重要贡献 和英国物理学的机构历史。 而且他 显示出独特的能力， 他的工作的意义。

Education has played an important role in shaping distinctive traditions in science. Though we think of science as transcending national boundaries, the way in which fields of science have in fact evolved conceptually is in important part due to local concerns and circumstances. Although Scotland is a small country, its scientists were of major influence and importance in the nineteenth century. However, little is known of the way physics was taught at the universities nor of how traditions were established in the culture. Dr. Wilson's study shows the important role that Scottish institutions played in shaping a distinctive tradition in physics. His work sheds light both on current historiographical issues in the cultural influences on science and on the history of the rise of physics. Specifically, he is writing a history of the natural philosophy class as taught by the professors of natural philosophy in the Scottish universities. Though concentrating on the natural philosophy class, the study seeks to integrate a number of related themes: interactions between Scotland and other countries, the industrialization of Scotland, the history of Scottish higher education, developments within other Scottish subjects like engineering and moral philosophy, and the careers of Scottish students, as well as the changing definition and content of physics itself. Not only will the study contribute to our understanding of the development of physical thought within an important geographical-cultural region, but in doing so, it will also add to our comprehension of the conceptual development of the several internationally prominent physicists produced by Scottish universities during the nineteenth century. Dr. Wilson has established himself as a leading scholar of the nineteenth-century Scottish influence on British physics and higher education. His publications on the Stokes-Kelvin relationship, the results of his prior National Science Foundation support, are an important contribution to the internal and institutional history of British physics. Moreover, he has shown a distinct capability for distilling conclusions of broad significance from his work.