| Themes > Science > Physics > About Physics, Generalities > A Brief History and Philosophy of Physics > Dissemination of the Results of Scientific Research |
Written exchange of information among scientists in different countries was common from before the time of Galileo, and books on science were published from shortly after the development of the printing press in Europe by 1450. Starting in 1644 in England, John Wilkins, a Puritan clergyman, organized weekly meetings of several scientists in London, who called themselves the "Philosophical College". They met to discuss scientific theory and carry out experiments, first at a pub and then at Gresham College. When the Puritans under Cromwell came to power, Wilkins was appointed the head of Wadham College in Oxford. There he established the Philosophical Society for the discussion of science. Under the Commonwealth, interest in science had increased substantially, and shortly after the restoration of Charles II to the throne in 1660 a group of forty-one persons founded a college for scientific learning which became the "Royal Society for the Improvement of Natural Knowledge" two years later, with about one hundred members; John Wilkins was one of its two secretaries. This organization eventually became the Royal Society of London, which persists to today. Similar societies emerged on the continent. These organizations published regular journals of the findings of their members. Today, there are hundreds of scientific societies world-wide, some discipline-based and national in focus such as the Canadian Association of Physicists, and some research-area-based and very international in membership, such as the American Vacuum Society. Most hold meetings annually or more often. There are more than 100,000 articles published per year in physics alone. With this enormous amount of information, it has been necessary to develop bibliographic search tools just to enable researchers to find papers of interest. In physics these include three major journals. Physics Abstracts, published monthly, catalogues by subject and author almost all the articles published in physics in the previous period. Current Contents, published weekly, lists by journal, author and subject all papers in the main journals. Science Citation Index, published monthly, lists articles covering all the sciences, which have been published or cited (referred to) in the previous period. This last journal enables researchers to use their knowledge of a seminal article in a given field to find the most current related work. These search tools have become immensely more powerful recently, with the application of computer programs which provide rapid searching, cross-referencing and automatic print-outs. Searching can even be done on-line using remote data banks. |
|
|