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Sparking Major Success for the Academy

From research and development executive to wartime electronics officer to inventor and professional author, David R. Schwarz has had a long and storied career.

Published September 1, 2000

By Arianne Vena
Academy Contributor

“We are here because we care about what is happening in and to science—and what the future may hold for the generations we have nurtured as parents and mentors. I am concerned about that future,” David R. Schwarz told a group of fellow Academy members at a Lyceum Society meeting several years ago.

“When David is concerned about something, great things happen,” says The New York Academy of Sciences (the Academy) president Rodney Nichols. “He looks analytically for explanations. He also has a taste for what cannot be so easily measured—the art of life, the art in life, and the meaning and power of hope.”

During the past 62 years, Schwarz has served with distinction as a research & development executive, wartime electronics officer, consultant to government and industry, volunteer leader, inventor, and professional author. He took degrees in science at Harvard and Columbia.

“Coaxed” to Join the Academy

A research scientist “coaxed” him to join the Academy in 1952. “In those days,” he recalls, “the Academy was a meeting place for academics. Today it is much more proactive and significant to a broader group of people.”

“The Academy,” he adds, “is uniquely positioned to spearhead an effort that is more generous to the culture, one that doesn’t put us in a position of just trying to aggrandize science. We have a responsibility to make sure that science is properly appreciated, properly financed, and properly considered in policy debates. But we need something more. We must provide a center for bringing science and culture together. No organization does this as well as The New York Academy of Sciences.”

Schwarz was concerned about follow-up to the Academy’s 1995 conference and 1995 Annals volume (no. 775), The Flight from Science and Reason. According to Nichols, that concern was “the spark” that led to the June 2000 conference on The Unity of Knowledge.

Luck: Essential to a Good Life

From left, Academy Director of Science and Technology Meetings Rashid Shaikh, David Schwarz, and Academy President and CEO Rodney Nichols.

About two years ago, in response to Nichols’ request, Schwarz shared his ideas in a memo. “A successor conference on the status and future of science should move toward a more collaborative vision of science as a dynamic element of culture in the 21st century,” he wrote. “I thought it would be fruitful to revisit the subject matter of Annals 775…in the atmosphere of consilience.” (Schwarz happened to be reading Edward O. Wilson’s book Consilience at the time.)

“David was determined and persistent in his suggestion,” says Rashid Shaikh, Director of Science and Technology Meetings. “He brought up the idea of a conference several times and even visited Ed Wilson during one of his trips to Cambridge. Soon thereafter, we all spoke by teleconference, and the idea of the conference was born.”

“To prove he meant it,” Nichols adds, “David made the first financial contribution. He enabled us to move ahead and plan the conference, knowing that a good program would attract other contributions. And that is exactly what happened.” Schwarz is already thinking about future conferences. “I’d like to see more attention paid to religion and science,” he observes. “They need to better understand one another. There should also be more on science and the arts.”

“Luck is essential to the good life,” Schwarz wrote in a Harvard collection of reflections of the Class of ’37. At a recent tribute to Schwarz, Nichols observed, “we here are blessed with the luck to have David as a friend, partner, and colleague.”

Also read: The Journey of a Psychopharmacological Pioneer


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