Royal Society of New Zealand Amendment Bill

Clause 8 is smaller than the clause we were considering previously, but within it lie some interesting matters that need to be discussed.

Clause 8 is headed “No dividend or profit to members”, and makes some additions to the current section 8 within the Royal Society of New Zealand Act. For the benefit of members, I think it is worth reading out what this clause is about. It cuts to the heart of some of the issues that make up the Royal Society and why it operates in the way that it does. The current section 8 in the Act states: “The income and property of the Society must be applied solely towards the object of the Society, and (except as otherwise provided in this Act) no portion of the income and property of the Society may be paid directly or indirectly by way of dividend, bonus, or otherwise to members.” That section is saying that membership of the Royal Society is about science, it is about the humanities, and it is about the society’s reason for being there; it is not about any kind of pecuniary gain.

But quite obviously there are limitations to that proposal. There is a certain purity in that statement; it certainly sheets home the fact that the Royal Society is about the importance of science—and now the humanities—beyond all things. But there will always be exceptions, and the current section 8 goes on to say what those exceptions are. It says that the previous paragraph “does not prevent the payment of remuneration to employees of the Society or members in return for services rendered or goods supplied;”. There are certainly members of the society who work within the Royal Society framework. They work on projects in relation to particular issues, and they work on the panels and funds that Mr Hodgson talked about earlier in the debate, so they are in a position where they will receive some money. Clearly an exception is required for that situation, and it is covered in this section of in the Act.

Section 8 further states that the Act does not prevent: “(b) the repayment of money borrowed or the payment of interest on money borrowed; or (c) the payment of expenses incurred in the performance of office;”. Certainly there are office holders within the Royal Society of New Zealand Council and the Academy Executive Committee who will receive payment for expenses incurred when attending Royal Society of New Zealand Council meetings or Academy Executive Committee meetings.

This bill moves to make some amendments to the final exception to remuneration, which relates to the granting of awards and prizes. As we have discussed at some length in different parts of the debate, the Royal Society gives out a range of prizes and awards. Quite clearly, members of the society will receive those awards, so an exception needs to be made. Section 8 provides an exception for “the grant of awards or prizes for—(i) achievement in scientific or technological research; or (ii) the advancement or promotion of science and technology in New Zealand.” For those final two subparagraphs I mentioned, the bill is omitting the reference to “science and technological research” and substituting “research in science, technology, or the humanities”. Section 8(2)(d)(ii) is amended to omit “science and technology” and substitute “science, technology, and the humanities”. Those amendments make sure that those exceptions for prizes and awards will include the humanities.

Although this is a technical change at one level, it is also very significant. It says that those who work in the humanities will be eligible for those awards. The list of Rutherford Medal winners I read out earlier does not, at this time, include anybody whose field of study was in the humanities. I mentioned Sir Peter Gluckman, and Catherine Delahunty has just mentioned Paul Callaghan. Some of their work subsequent to winning the Rutherford Medal has verged into the social sciences, particularly, but until this point in time the Rutherford Medal has not been awarded to anyone from the humanities. This clause makes that possible, and that is quite a significant change.

The range of awards and prizes given out by the Royal Society is recognition of the importance of those disciplines, and tonight we are making a change that will enable the humanities to be a part of the provision of those prizes. That is a very significant thing to be doing. As Dr Prasad said earlier, it is elevating the humanities to the same level as the sciences. It will be a very proud day for New Zealand when someone from the humanities or the social sciences wins the Rutherford Medal.

It is dangerous to name-drop a scientist at this time, but I think of scientists like Richard Bedford, who studies populations at Waikato University and has done some remarkable things. I also think of Richie Poulton, who runs the multidisciplinary study in Dunedin. These are people whose work transcends those boundaries of the traditional sciences, and they could potentially be a recipient of something like the Rutherford Medal in the future. Clause 8 makes a change to allow those who work in those areas to receive prizes for achievement, or for the advancement and promotion of the humanities. I think we should be very proud of the fact that as a Committee we are overseeing what will be quite a significant change.

I wanted to make those comments just by way of introduction. I will be interested to hear views from any other members in relation to the importance of this clause, and whether there are matters that perhaps we have not considered. I wanted to highlight the fact that although it seems like a minor technical clause, it is, in fact, making a significant change. In years to come I hope we will see people from the humanities represented in the awards and prizes that the Royal Society so proudly gives out.

I want to speak straightforwardly and uncomplicatedly in favour of clause 8 of the Royal Society of New Zealand Amendment Bill, and I will say why that is so shortly. But before I do that I just want to refer, with your permission, Mr Chairman Tisch, to some remarks made by Catherine Delahunty on the previous clause. She said of the people who had come to the Education and Science Committee on this legislation that she had found them to be—and I think I have her words correct—fiercely eccentric. That is a lovely, poetic description of scientists when they are being scientists. I commend the member for that description; it seems to me to be a cracker.

As long as this clause makes its way into law, as the member in the chair, Grant Robertson, pointed out, we now have the opportunity for a person who is primarily interested in the humanities to be involved in picking up prizes that are big in the range of prizes that exist for scholarship in general. Those prizes are inevitably administered by the Royal Society. Who else would administer them? The member in the chair pointed out that we might see a person picking up the Rutherford Medal, for example, who has a humanities background. Here is the thing: it is entirely possible—actually, I would assert it is likely—that a person who picks up the Rutherford Medal for the humanities may well also be a scientist. In my experience, which is not vast or anything, people who have brains way bigger than mine will move quickly and easily across endless disciplines. They just get comfortable with themselves, and comfortable with their ability to think. They do not see boundaries; they do not see limitations.

I do not want to name-drop particularly, but I went offshore with Dr Alan MacDiarmid in about 2000-and-something. We went to China, Korea, and Japan. His job was to open scientists’ doors, and to get into the Chinese and Japanese academies of science, or whatever they are called. My job was to open Government doors, and we had 20 or 30 science managers with us. I think it was a successful trip. I hope it was; it was certainly well planned. Dr MacDiarmid was nearing the end of his life, and he put in a huge amount of energy. He was an amazingly energetic man. But he was also, in a way, fiercely eccentric, and he would just wander off, almost into hyperspace. I could not keep up with him. He had certainly moved away from all of the chemistry that he received his Nobel Prize for many years ago. He was miles away from that; he was entirely philosophical about any issue that came to mind. So it seems within the bounds of possibility that such a person might receive the medal that the member in the chair spoke of, and might in fact be moving freely across from one discipline into another, and back again.

Actually, that point raises another matter, which is the link between the sciences on the one hand and the humanities on the other. We have some classic examples in which we know that science and the humanities interact. The interaction with the humanities in the Antarctic is an example of that. Writers and poets, as well as photographers, give us an insight into that environment, given that most of us will never be allowed to go there, because scientists are allowed to go and non-scientists are not, unless they are the occasional writer, poet, or photographer. That is an example.

When I first because the Minister of Research, Science and Technology, the Ministry of Science, Research and Technology ran something called the Smash Palace Fund, in which it put scientists and artists together for the day, or for 2 days, or whatever it was. They had to do problem solving, and they had to then explore how each other’s mind worked. Solving the problem was the given issue, but in actually working out the difference between the way that the left brain and right brain worked, the link between the two voids, the two big lumps of science and arts, was explored.

Then, of course—and I think other people have made mention of this—we now have some sciences that need the arts. Everybody’s really favourite science these days is neuroscience. It used not to be; 10 years ago the favourite was forensic science. But, hey, we have a new fashion: it is neuroscience. Neuroscience does not make good progress unless the arts are involved. It does not make a lot of sense unless we take a bit of behaviourism and fold it in, and behaviour, is, of course, very often an expression of culture. We would love for economics to be a science—

💬 David Shearer: Dismal science.

—well, some people call it a dismal science—but I do not think it has enough of a body of knowledge to be a science yet. Certainly there is enough in microeconomics, but there is not in macroeconomics, in my view. The behavioural economics developments that are occurring now as a result of neuroscience are pretty interesting. I have had the opportunity to study them in the last year or two. I understand that some members of the Committee may not want to do so, but I have done that, and I have enjoyed it and found it to be reasonably interesting. Those developments have come about because science and the humanities have been required to collide, and the collision is reasonably productive.

So I do not think that the Royal Society legislation that we have in front of us, and the clause 8 contribution that means that someone who has a humanities background might be involved in picking up a prize, is the limit of what we are about to get up to tonight. I think that we are offering a sort of legislative can-do to the idea of the collision between the arts and science. I do hope that especially in economics it makes progress, because economics as a discipline needs to make some progress.

If you will indulge me, Mr Chairperson, I have just finished reading this book by a guy called Lloyd Geering. The title is Christianity without God.

💬 Hon Christopher Finlayson: Heretic!

I thought he was found not to be such. I could be wrong. I thought that the decision in 1966 was that he was not a heretic, but if the member wants to correct my history, he is welcome to do so. I was not about to get into that issue. I was about to draw this thread: the good professor says “We are encouraged by no less an authority than the Bible to believe that we have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle and over all of the Earth.” Lloyd Geering asserts, in other words, that biblical theism encouraged us to exploit the Earth. He then goes on to say that in earlier times, when we were not being monotheist, when we were dealing with many Gods, we were much more aware than we are now, and I quote again “that their continued existence on Earth was dependent on the forces of nature. That is why they, our ancestors, personified and deified these forces and tried to placate them. That is why they believed their own destiny to be in the lap of the Gods, the most important of whom was mother Earth.”

All I am saying there is that the humanities collided with environmentalism, and therefore with environmental science. Am I right? I do not want to make a big deal of that, but that is what a big brain can do. I cannot do that, but a big brain such as Lloyd Geering’s can. It seems to me to be not a bad example, in a book that I finished reading a couple of days ago, of where that collision between the humanities and science might lead us.

There is another thing to be said, and then I will stop saying anything. The other thing to say is that the opposite of that, ignoring the role of humanities as a scientist, or of science as a humanities student, is just a form of chauvinism. It is not tolerable, it is not useful, it is something we should not put up with, and it is the reason why we should, I hope rapidly, pass into law clause 8, which puts science, technology, and the humanities on an equal footing for the first time in our legislative history.

It is an honour and a pleasure to be here at 7 minutes to 10 to take a call on the Royal Society of New Zealand Amendment Bill, in my second call of the night. I acknowledge what the member sponsoring the bill, Grant Robertson, said about clause 8: that although it is a small, technical clause, it is a very important part of the bill. Although it is technical, it keeps the single focus of the Royal Society on excellence as we introduce the humanities into the realm of the Royal Society of New Zealand. Earlier in the debate I think my colleague David Shearer said the single focus of the Royal Society, when we introduce the humanities into its sphere, should be to ensure that the best work and the best research it can possibly do is maintained. Although we are introducing the humanities to it—and I spoke in an earlier contribution about the importance of science and technology to our economic growth—bringing in the humanities and making sure that we keep a single focus on excellence—

💬 Hon Christopher Finlayson: Shearer’s clearly a soft vote.

I welcome the contribution from the member across the Chamber, whose legal prowess is equal to his anger tonight. I will not call him nasty, because I think that is unfair; it is 10 to 10. We maintain a focus on excellence—

Progress reported.

Report adopted.