Physics and history as a bridge across the ’’two cultures’’ gap

We describe a novel interdisciplinary course in which history and physics are presented as examples of humanistic and scientific disciplines. The course is offered to college seniors majoring in a wide variety of fields and has three main purposes. First, it presents a historical picture of the development of the physical sciences in the larger context of Western intellectual history. Second, by developing physical ideas in a fairly rigorous fashion, it presents this vital branch of intellectual history without falling into the trap of teaching the non−science students the history of something they do not understand. Third, it presents a historical−philosophical perspective of the development of the ’’scientific method.’’ We have devised a means of presentation which is simultaneously of value to science majors and non−science majors alike, and which encourages them to take a new and much less extreme view of the ’’two−cultures’’ gap. We describe experiments now in progress aimed at extending the technique to the high−school level, in order to eradicate the ’’two−cultures’’ gap at the crucial point in its formation.