Physical training as a factor in social ethics / Jakob Bolin.

Bolin, Jakob, 1863-1914.

Date:: [1907?]

Credit: Physical training as a factor in social ethics / Jakob Bolin. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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$= a, S aaae big atl . ay: of. , \. A | “ © | A 2 EtemARY | | urth if a Lor is8 ake (Reprinted from Physical Training) Filer Pa LL o Physical Training as a Factor in oy. ; i ; Social Ethics Jakob Bolin, New York ; The individual of our day rises to professional emi- nence and material success chiefly through specialization. The evolution of society forces each of us with wellnigh irresistible power into some narrow field of activity, while excluding us more or less rigorously from participation in, and even knowledge of, the struggles which take place in the broad expanse of human life outside of our own little corner. Speaking in a general way, the skilled artisan, master of all that pertains to his trade, is no more. He has been succeeded by an automaton, who presses buttons, re- verses levers and turns wheels in a monotonous routine. The scientist of yore, embracing the whole field of hu- man knowledge, has, by the extension and intensification of this knowledge, been forced to yield place to a host of specialists, weighing atoms or words, measuring impon- derable substances, dealing with figures and fractions which, in their approach to the infinite, far transcend concrete human experience and nearly baffle the imagi- nation. The multifarious and seemingly opposing in- terests in our body politic all have their special repre- sentatives in the halls of legislation, but few are those who may be said to speak for the nation as a whole. Far be it from me to deprecate this development, which undoubtedly is a necessary condition for the ad- vancement of the race. But in far-going specialization there lurks always the danger of intellectual provincial- ism. In focussing his attention closely on one single thing the individual may easily lose from his view the many things which belong in the marginal zone, and thus fail to perceive the many bonds of union between that which he is set to do and that which falls in the field$

Physical training as a factor in social ethics / Jakob Bolin.

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