Anul 20202 - Centenarul Institutului de Speologie "Emil Racovita"
2020 - Centenary year of the "Emil Racovita" Institute of Speology

Summary/Abstract: Speleological research were developing after 1895, when the French specialist Edouard‑Alfred Martel first used the term speleology. The same E.A. Hammer founded the Society of Speleology – the only one at that time in the world, in which Emil Racoviţă also activated. According to Racoviță, the term speology is more phonetic in Romanian language and easier to use in compound words. Today, speleology is an interdisciplinary domain, in which knowledge of biology, paleontology, archeology, chemistry, physics, geology, cartography, meteorology are intertwined. The year 2020 means the Centenary of the Speleology Institute „Emil Racoviță” – first in the world, in Cluj. The scientist Racoviță argued the permanent actuality of the Institute of Speleology, both for the orientation of the higher education, for the development of the national culture, for the improvement of the social organisms related to production, as well as for the adaptation to the current conditions and needs of the administrative methods. According to Racoviță, the specialized research institutes are representing one of the necessary wheels for the current social economy, and their recent establishment is a normal phenomenon of the evolution of science and production needs. He attributed to the speleology a synthetic character, in the sense of inter‑ and multidisciplinarity, because its program involved the study of a part of the globe with all its material entities and with the energy factors. The discipline of speleology has special educational values, susceptible to encyclopedic generalizations, without taking into account its complex practical importance. Today, the Centennial Institute preserves and develops the principles of the brilliant organizer Emil Racoviţă, through the team of specialists from Bucharest and Cluj, who strive and manage to impose the Institute as an active presence in the scientific life of national and international communities

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