Silver Spring, Md. In the Summer 1966 Rochester Re­ 2 view Dr. Lotspeich speaks of the tragedies of science. Ignored is the greatest tragedy of them all. For the most part modern scientists are more obsessed with the desire for , The Idea of a University additional research money than 3 concerned with a more scientific -Professor RICHARD TAYLOR approach to scientific discovery. A reading of Lord Snow's more recent works reflects a more sophisticated approach to this situation. R. W. HARROLD, '54 The Use of Professors 5 Rochester, N. Y. -Professor RALPH A. RAIMI Mr. Mark Battle (Summer '66) explains clearly the problem of the Negro ghetto, then concludes his article by stating: "The ghetto needs the best in schools, police protection, welfare services, etc." Things the Handbook How does he define "the best"? Exactly what should be 6 Doesn't Tell You done? I believe the first step is to clean up the ghetto; not by -CARO F. SPENCER, '27 erecting new buildings or having outside clean-up squads come in, but by instilling enough self-respect in the tenants to rid themselves of the debris, rats, garbage, etc. infesting the property. I have not the slightest idea how this can be accomplished. Suzuki at Eastman Perhaps Mr. Battle will be good enough to enlighten me. 8 FRED W. ARMBRUSTER, '16 Madison, Wis. It was very distressing to read Mr. Battle's article in the last Enter the Emperor Review for several reasons, not the least of which is disap­ 10 pointment that a University of Rochester product is capable of such illogical thinking. Mr. Battle is apparently so full of animosity that he stoops to generalizations no more rational '9 than those bandied about by our ignorant racists, black and 1965 196J white-i.e., "Whitey," "the white man." How does this differ ~9"4 from "Negroes smell funny" or "the black man wants white 192]19001. Classnotes women"? Mr. Battle is at such great pains to enumerate the wrongs a 1956 60 19Sm committed by "the white man" that some of his statements become contradictory and therefore are not very convinc­ The "Petnapping" Debate: ing. While condemning attempts to make slum Negroes con­ form to middle-class morality and the lack of understanding New Threat of the middle class for slum folkways, he gives as his ex­ 15 to Medical Research? ample the unfortunate 16-year-old whose slum circum­ -DAVID R. BRANCH stances forced his complicity in the family crap game. How then does he come around, one page later, to condemn the (Continued on Page 27) The Not So Shameful 20 Graduate Schools ROCHESTER REVIEW, VOLUME XXIX, NUMBER 2, Winter, 1967. Editor-Judith E. -Professor GEORGE H. FORD Brown; Art Director-Robert S. Topor; Production Manager-Barbara B. Ames; Classnotes Editor-Patricia Coppini; Publications Committee of the Alumni Federation: Robert W. Maher, '37, chairman; Dr. Norman J. Ashenburg, '38, '40GM, '51M (ex officio); John C. Braund, '53, '61G (ex officio); Allen M. Brewer, '40; Dorothy B. Champney, '31, '41G; Diane Morrell Jenkins, '58; Doris J. Lamoree, '20. Published by the University of Rochester four times a year in Fall, Winter, Spring, Summer, and mailed without charge to all alumni. Editorial office: 107 24 The University Administration Bldg., Rochester, N. Y. 14627. Second class postage paid at Rochester, N. Y. PHOTO CREDITS: Linn Duncan, Don Eddy, Nicholas Graver, Rosemary Kendrick, Lou Ouzer, Gannett Newspapers. COVER: The University's newest building-the Nuclear Structure Research Laboratory-is also the first building 2 on the South Campus. A report on the Laboratory starts on Page 10. to swim before they are graduated. How come? Is this because, vouchsafed some special light that is withheld Theldeaof from the minds of laymen, educators have seen that learn­ ing cannot be accomplished except in conjunction with swimming? At Princeton, perhaps, one now long by­ A University gone day, some student swam out into the Atlantic and Professor Richard Taylor was drowned. Soon afterwards someone proposed that all students there should learn how to swim and, to this y RATHER PRETENTIOUS title, borrowed from Car­ very day, that is what they have to do. There is no more M dinal Newman, may lead you to expect a reminder to it than that. If there were consistency here, then all that a university is a "community of scholars" or a "cita­ students would have to take driver education, too, for I del of learning"-something of that sort. much doubt that no student has ever killed himself in a Actually, I prefer the description of a university given car. But part of what I'm getting at is that there is very by Dr. Barnaby Keeney, recently the president of Brown little consistency in the world, and it should not be University. He said a university is "a can of worms." And expected in a university either. that is pretty much my theme. Perhaps a less misleading title, then, would have been "The Idea of a University ETTING BACK to the curriculum, the curricula of all vs. the Fact." Guniversities differ. Some say everyone needs to take By saying that a university is a can of worms I mean philosophy; others, that a laboratory science is the essen­ to expose the kind of nonsense that is so common even tial thing. Some educators think that everyone must know in the minds of men who should know better, because it history, and others that a man cannot be cultured with­ is nonsense that can be hurtful. For example: I once saw out having read Shakespeare (from which it would, of an enormous and elaborate chart which purported to set course, follow that Plato was uncultured). Except, then, forth the structure of one of our great universities. Many for such things as swimming and English composition, hours had gone into preparing it, and it was distributed to new faculty members so that they could derive a fairly complete picture of the university. There were, however, two slight omissions from the chart. It nowhere men­ The articles on Pages 3 through 7 are adapted from three tioned (a) the students, or (b) the faculty. It was a pic­ talks given during Freshman Week. PROFESSOR RICHARD ture of a university which exists no place on earth. TAYLOR, who became chairman of the Department of Now let us consider some particulars of more direct Philosophy in September, was one of 14 faculty members concern. Part of the idea of a university is that it has a honored by undergraduates last spring for "outstanding teaching." PROFESSOR RALPH RAIMI, associate chairman curriculum. A curriculum is, according to the Latin, a of the Department of Mathematics, is the Department's course to be run. I have always thought of it as a sort of acting chairman this year. Currently secretary of the race track, with obstacles thrown up here and there and, steering committee of the DR's Faculty Senate, he headed at the end, some sort of cup having essentially symbolic the Senate's Subcommittee on Academic Honesty for two significance. According to the idea of a university, the years. MRS. CARO FITZSIMONS SPENCER, '27, is associate director of admissions and student aid on the River Cam­ curriculum is the fruit of the combined wisdom of the pus and a frequent commentator on campus traditions. faculty. But it is a bewildering thing. Most universities seem to require that at least all male students know how 3 II1Int Every Freshman Should Know there is not much uniformity in curricula. Each one, how­ -will in fact be exactly what, on the very first day, they ever, is indisputably the best, and therefore very resistant appear to be: crashing bores. And students or their to change, because each is the fruit of the combined fathers will pay in tuition about six dollars and twenty­ wisdom of the faculty. I have actually heard academic five cents for every single meeting of every class, and we people say that the curriculum is the fruit of the com­ should not pretend that every class meeting will be worth bined wisdom of the faculty. And if they believe this, it, by any standard. others can hardly be blamed for thinking so, too. Nevertheless, in the sum total it is somehow worth it. At this university, I think students are required to take Winston Churchill once said that democracy is the worst four social science courses, four natural sciences, and form of government there is, with the exception of all four humanities. This neat, three-fold division doesn't the others that have been tried. I often think that uni­ fit the facts terribly well. Into which basket should one versities are the worst systems of education there are, drop linguistics, for example? Or social psychology? Or with the exception of all those proposals we read for even mathematics? These problems are resolved by stipu­ revamping them. lation. It was thus that I was astonished to learn, when I joined this university, that philosophy is a social science! HE FACT IS that for several years students are thrown Now where did that curricular requirement come Ttogether with men and women who at least are think­ from? Why four courses in each of those artificially cre­ ing about something, whether or not it is what we teach­ ated "fields," and not three? Or five? The truth is no ers expect them to be thinking about. Students will not one really knows. The requirements are printed in the be competing for money, not for a while, and no one will book, but no one knows who invented them, or why.