In the current period when scientists are playing such a large role in the development of public policy, the inner motivations of scientists, as it has evolved over time and as it is reflected in the writing of their memoirs, is instructive; and this article illuminates that admirably.
An excerpt.
The Self-Portrait of a Scientist
Christine Rosen
In recent years, memoir has consistently been among the bestselling genres in American publishing. Readers devour tales of drug abuse, incest, depression, and sundry other personal challenges—often too credulously, as the recent rehab fabulations of author James Frey attest. Many of these books tell stories of human weakness and the redemption achieved by the author in overcoming them. In so doing they tap into our longing for narratives of the extraordinary in ordinary life, and for stories that suggest that individual lives do, indeed, matter. This is a significant change from previous eras, which preferred narratives of extraordinary lives; memoirs were then something public figures published toward the end of their lives, and the idea that the musings of a Midwestern drug addict would reach millions of readers would have been preposterous.
Part of the appeal of memoir is its promise to give readers a glimpse into the emotional worlds of other people. “There is a history in all men’s lives,” Shakespeare wrote in Henry IV, Part 2, and while this is true, some histories lend themselves more easily to memoir than others. Memoir is distinct from mere memory; it requires interpretation, the sifting and selection of many memories to present a coherent story, the creation of a whole seen from the limited perspective of a single self.
…Although scientists have been committing their memoirs to paper for centuries, there seems to be a difference in tone between memoirs written in the twentieth century and those that came before. Earlier memoirs describe a world where science was still largely an amateur activity—literally, one pursued out of love—rather than a profession. In their memoirs, Joseph Priestley, Charles Darwin, and others demonstrate a sentiment about science rather than any distinct scientific personality. That sentiment was infused with an abiding wonder and fascination with the natural world—not wholly devoid of ambition, of course, but also bounded by a humility that came from their respect for the vast amount that was, and would remain, unknowable. The ambition to be the known discoverer of new truths about nature was concealed, in large measure, in the stylistic modesty of the student, a modesty in tune with the culture of the age. Present, too, was an idealism that perhaps could only be nurtured in an age of amateur science, still filled with a healthy appreciation for the power of chance. Not long before his death in 1727, Isaac Newton touched on this sentiment when he wrote, “I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.”
…The memoirs of German physicist Max Planck (1858-1947), best known for his work on quantum theory and radiation, for which he was awarded a Nobel in 1918, are representative of this transformation of the scientific sensibility. A creature more of the twentieth century than the nineteenth (his oldest son died fighting in World War I and another son was executed during World War II after taking part in a plot to assassinate Hitler), Planck called his reminiscences Scientific Autobiography. Although the first sentence of the book invokes the language of devotion to describe his decision to pursue science, it is “pure reasoning” more than pure love that guides him. The memoir is far less reflective than Darwin’s and is devoted largely to a recounting of Planck’s education, his various frustrations finding an academic post, difficult mentors, the work of previous Nobel laureates, and his own single-minded pursuit of recognition for his scientific work.
…Although Planck’s autobiography offers some early hints about the mindset of the modern scientific personality, it is the memoir of a young, brash American scientist named James Watson that typifies it. Published in 1968, Watson’s The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA announced its perspective from the first sentence of the book’s preface: “Here I relate my version of how the structure of DNA was discovered.” The signifier “my version” is Watson’s way of notifying the reader that what follows is much more subjective memoir than faithful recounting of facts. It also signals Watson’s mindset and approach to his scientific work—straightforward, desirous of fame, and unreflective. “The thought that I should write this book has been with me almost from the moment the double helix was found,” he confesses.
