As India basks in the celebrations of its recent space mission, we look at how science finds a place in national sentiments. How do we make meaning of it in a democracy, and what values do we place on it as citizens?
In a historic first, on the 23rd of August, India became the first country to successfully land a spacecraft near the south pole of the moon. National sentiments, naturally, were at a high as celebrations swept across the country. Aside from its enormity as a technological feat, it is hard to ignore the sociocultural impact this makes on us as citizens, and people. There’s a reason Neil Armstrong is quoted as often as he is, saying that the Apollo 11 mission was “one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind” – because it brings a new awareness of our place in the universe, an awe for science, and a connection to something bigger than just ourselves. Space author Andrew Chaikin mentions that public interest in space missions also tends to fall in the same way that it rises, quickly. ‘In a culture attuned to “firsts,” even the second occurrence of something as extraordinary as landing men on the moon could not generate the same level of excitement’, he says of the Apollo 12 mission. It is almost impossible to believe that something so futuristic happened more than 50 years ago, Chaikin points out. For India, however, the ‘first’ is only just now being lived through and reckoned with.
When Nehru formed his first cabinet, he took upon himself the ministry for science and technology, stating that a scientific approach was essential to a new nation. This choice “drew on a long tradition of founding national identity on a particular claim to an allegedly universal ideal of scientific competence”, say political scientific researchers Harrison and Johnson. The idea is that science would be the neutral teacher, and the foundation for necessary development. Looking back on the Enlightenment as a period during which modern science and the nation state joined forces, scholars point out that the first countries to take advantage of this joined force then became globally dominant, and set a trend for the rest to follow.
The education system in a country has a crucial role to play in how science is perceived by its people. “Educating citizens is one of the projects that modern states undertake, and the education of scientists, in particular, has been the domain of the nation-state.” In India specifically, a respect for the sciences finds itself ingrained in the education system, becoming something that everyone must aspire to do. The Indian Express ran a piece that captures this sentiment in its title – ‘If I can, anyone can’: From a government school in Tamil Nadu to the moon, the Chandrayaan 3 project director’s rise and rise.’
Perhaps, then, millions of people tuned into the landing to see themselves in what was happening. To aspire towards something outside of their classrooms, cities, and planet. The idea that science is patriotic rests solely on the meaning that people, especially those outside of the hard sciences, derive from it. To some, science means something that exists beyond the grasp of our knowledge, and yet, something that we allow ourselves to participate in. Whether we have been aware of it or not, it has been baked into the policies that govern us, and the ideals that we hold as a nation.
We learn the value of living in a country that is scientifically and technologically developed, a country that can put rovers on the moon and teach it to children in our schools. Feeling pride for something that our country has achieved can only occur when we feel like we belong to it, – that we, as Indians, are part of a common intellectual effort that is constantly progressing towards better futures. We have both science, and democracy, to thank for that.
