Physicists and the revolt against science in the 1930’s

To most people the main link between the abstrusities of science and the wonders of modern life is technology, seen as tangible machines that spew forth goods or ease the burden of labor. After the crash of 1929 many Americans began to ask whether chemistry produced more than consumers could absorb, whether machines destroyed more jobs than they created. Going beyond earlier humanist critiques, thoughtful citizens wondered whether science was not responsible, at least in part, for the end of the miracle, for the failure of machine civilization. In this context, an emotionally charged dispute between two physicists about the origin of cosmic rays became a focal point in the public reaction against science. The principals in this unprecedented and highly publicized debate were two Nobel laureates, Arthur Holly Compton and Robert A. Millikan. The repercussions of this dispute and the attendant revolt against science exposed difficulties in physics in the US that remain with us to the present day.

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