56
authority in the growing study of cosmic rays. He was able to return to Spain
in the fifties and began lecturing on cosmic rays at the Faculty of Physical
Sciences. He persuaded the British to loan him measuring instruments, but—
incredibly—he was never able to extricate them from Spanish customs! Such
was the state of affairs in our country.
The great effort and tenacity of many people in remedying the decadence
into which scientific research had fallen in our country in order to get to
where we are at the dawn of the twenty-first century are neither well-known
nor valued by society. We may say that we have managed to reach the level of
our neighbouring countries in record time, at least in some disciplines, and
the story is worth telling. We are concerned here with the story of astrophysics
because it is a tale of great significance and because it is the example that I am
most familiar with. Frankly, astronomy in Spain had not yet advanced towards
astrophysics, but remained fossilized in the state it had been in at the dawn of
the twentieth century.
Many of our foreign colleagues speak of the ‘Spanish astrophysics miracle’
when referring to the unexpected leap forward taken by our country in this
branch of science in the final third of the twentieth century. But the reductionist view that that ‘miracle’ was brought about by the avalanche of foreign
instrumentation set up in our country provides no real explanation. There was
a much greater avalanche of foreign instrumentation in Chile, but with
entirely different results. For me, the key issue was the presence of people who
were able to see, understand, and take full advantage of the circumstances.
They were many, and it was necessary to unite all their efforts to attain
this goal.
At the beginning of the sixties astronomy in our country was poorly provided for and heavily bureaucratized. In practice, it was dedicated to positional astronomy and celestial mechanics; that is to say, the orbits and
ephemerides of asteroids, comets, and visual double stars. There were only
three chairs in astronomy, all of them occupied by mathematicians. There
were three main observatories manned by very few professional astronomers:
the National Observatory of Madrid (part of the Geographical and Land
Registry Institute), the San Fernando Observatory in Cádiz (belonging to the
Spanish Navy), and the geophysically-orientated Ebro Observatory of the
Company of Jesus.
The urgent need to improve this lacklustre panorama was clear, and for that
to happen many things would need to be changed, but where to begin bringing about such a revolution? It was necessary to proceed with caution and
shrewdness since ingrained habits, vested interests, mistrust, and entrenched
powers were great obstacles. Convincing strategies, however daring, needed to
F. Sánchez
authority in the growing study of cosmic rays. He was able to return to Spain
in the fifties and began lecturing on cosmic rays at the Faculty of Physical
Sciences. He persuaded the British to loan him measuring instruments, but—
incredibly—he was never able to extricate them from Spanish customs! Such
was the state of affairs in our country.
The great effort and tenacity of many people in remedying the decadence
into which scientific research had fallen in our country in order to get to
where we are at the dawn of the twenty-first century are neither well-known
nor valued by society. We may say that we have managed to reach the level of
our neighbouring countries in record time, at least in some disciplines, and
the story is worth telling. We are concerned here with the story of astrophysics
because it is a tale of great significance and because it is the example that I am
most familiar with. Frankly, astronomy in Spain had not yet advanced towards
astrophysics, but remained fossilized in the state it had been in at the dawn of
the twentieth century.
Many of our foreign colleagues speak of the ‘Spanish astrophysics miracle’
when referring to the unexpected leap forward taken by our country in this
branch of science in the final third of the twentieth century. But the reductionist view that that ‘miracle’ was brought about by the avalanche of foreign
instrumentation set up in our country provides no real explanation. There was
a much greater avalanche of foreign instrumentation in Chile, but with
entirely different results. For me, the key issue was the presence of people who
were able to see, understand, and take full advantage of the circumstances.
They were many, and it was necessary to unite all their efforts to attain
this goal.
At the beginning of the sixties astronomy in our country was poorly provided for and heavily bureaucratized. In practice, it was dedicated to positional astronomy and celestial mechanics; that is to say, the orbits and
ephemerides of asteroids, comets, and visual double stars. There were only
three chairs in astronomy, all of them occupied by mathematicians. There
were three main observatories manned by very few professional astronomers:
the National Observatory of Madrid (part of the Geographical and Land
Registry Institute), the San Fernando Observatory in Cádiz (belonging to the
Spanish Navy), and the geophysically-orientated Ebro Observatory of the
Company of Jesus.
The urgent need to improve this lacklustre panorama was clear, and for that
to happen many things would need to be changed, but where to begin bringing about such a revolution? It was necessary to proceed with caution and
shrewdness since ingrained habits, vested interests, mistrust, and entrenched
powers were great obstacles. Convincing strategies, however daring, needed to
F. Sánchez