摘要:

The beginnings of education have not hitherto seemed very relevant to the interests of scientific men. They have been anxious to make good the placeof science in all the important later stages of education, not merely for profesional training, but also as an esential part of any wide, civilised perspective appropriated to our time. They have offered their own contribution of method, in the heuristic form, as a valuable and typical educative experiencek But whilst their professional demands have been more or less satisfied, the cultural assimilation of science makes slow progress. It is still treated as an alternative to the humanities. It still appears to many educated people as a form of specialism irrelevant to general education. Perhaps it is the belated and limited introduction of science which perpetuates this disjunctive%view and prevents the true value of science for liberal education from being seen. If it is thus made to appear as a new and separate beginning in knowledge, leading away into a special field, it can scarcely do otherwise than disconnect this field, and the limited number who enter it, from the general body of future educated opinion which stays outside and indifferent.If, however, the world of science is only the common world greatly enlarged and much more adequately known, and if its methods are the methods by which such more adequate knowledge is achieved, then guidance to some understanding of this would clearly need to be recognised as a major aim for any humane education. If that aim were defeated by any late and separate beginning in science, that would be a serious limitation, not of the educative value of science, left unused, but of the prevailing order and method of education which kept it so. It would then be necessary to trace the disjunction between science and the common world back to its source in the current educational process and to seek to remedy it there. The earliest stages would thus become very important and the question would arise whether they could not be so ordered from the beginning that this false 'disjunction could never arise at all. Specialisation would come at its due late time, as now, for those whose interest led them to it, but it would be continuous with a liberal general education which aimed at making some representative sense of the scope, aims, and methods of scientific knowledge a common possession for all.It is this representativeness that would be aimed at, graded from the first beginnings of concrete knowledge in the common world to its typical highly developed and organised forms. The value of science for education would then lie in the continuity of its character and history being made available for a parallel continuity of development in knowledge of the child. The approved method of starting science learning at some rudimentary concrete beginning, at whatever age it is begun, which can easily be made to seem highly artificial, would receive its natural meaning if it set out from the age where the simplest kind of direct knowledge -learning actually began. We should thus be proposing not another fixed programme or schedule, but a difficult and important problem in liberal education. It would become a matter for careful and scientific study what was the best manner and sequence of procedure, in order to preserve the" continuity of method and perspective at which we should aim. We should have a valuable initial advantage over formal subject-knowledge and subject-teaching because we should be working with a powerful native educative interest in the child, but it would be a part of our problem, and a very central one, to preserve this interest and to carry it on.The first direct knowledge-learning from which we should start would thus be that which emanates from the child itself, spontaneously and usually actively. Most normal children of, let us say, 4-5 years of age show a lively, inquiring curiosity in the world around them, and want to know how things work, what they are, how they are made. Their curiosity seeks knowledge and takes pleasure in finding it. We should be endeavouring so to guide, reinforce, and develop this curiosity of the normal child in the world around him that it could pass continuously by its own activity into the same interest, informed and organised, in the world-not different but greater-of science. We should; of course, not assume that this could be done, but should be content with not laying down in advance that it could not be done. A critical examination of all the avoidable ways of preventing, restricting, discouraging, misdirecting, or confusing the advance of knowledge, familiar to us in the history of knowledge of the race, but not all and always avoided in that of the individual, would show the evidence against us to be at least inconclusive. It would be possible that the interlocking quality of the older system of formal knowledge, formal teaching, and enforced receptivity gave rise to what evidence there was; and whilst this system would have to continue in some partly mitigated form so long as we knew no other way, it would be important to try any way in which we might conceivably learn better. To endeavour to establish a high road from natural curiosity to representative scientific knowledge would at any rate be to test one possible way.In the meantime we should have this initial interest in the child to work upon, to stimulate and encourage, to refer to active, direct inquiry, to provide with graduated experience of the relation between such inquiry and discovery, and to carry on to a more and more developed sense of the terms on which knowledge could be gained, tested, and enlarged in an enlarging world. This would then make a formidable problem for highly skilled research. It would, of course, only be a part of the problem of progressive education, since for the point of view here adopted, scientific knowledge is far from being the only kind of knowledge, or knowledge the only aim of education. Thus, for example, taking knowledge alone, a historical perspective upon science itself, and this in turn set in some just proportion in a larger historical whole, would clearly be a like condition and eventual aim for the process of scientific education itself. But there would be reason for suggesting that the scientific way would be the first, easiest, and most natural way of beginning education and establishing some foundation of direct experienced knowledge and its way of increase, for later indirect knowledge to be built upon.That would be in full accord of principle with the recent trend of enlightened educational theory, which, coming more and more under the influence of psychological knowledge, itself advancing, aims at grading the processes of education from the start so that they should flow easily and naturally out of the child's development. In practical progress it has inevitably remained conditioned by the powerful tradition which it has sought to change but within which it has had to work; and its scope has thus been rather to liberalise old methods and subjects and gradually to bring them closer to the child, than to consider any more radical possibilities of theory. For the further advance of education, however, it is necessary that these more radical possibilities should be fully worked out, and, according to their promise, practically tested. Given now the aim of adaptive grading and psychological integration, and given also the inherent limits of a vast deal of traditional knowledge which can only be communicated verbally and by methods more or less unrelated and arbitrary, it is a crucial problem for psycho-logical education whether there is no other knowledge, which can be developed first, from natural roots; and carried on continuously by the same methods to a high integration, as a pattern and framework of what knowledge can be. The natural continuity of science provides a possible solution alike for a first beginning of education in knowledge and for its organic development later. To make this solution actual, however, there is needed practical research of a high order, fundamental in character, by many investigators, bringing wide resources and high qualifications to bear. But if education is important, research in it is important, and its pre-conditions must be fulfilled. We must assume that education may technically only be at its beginnings in order to look for definite ways of verifying this and to press for adequate and multiple research.Some interesting commencements have been made in recent years, though still somewhat entangled in general programmes of practical education. Thus the Maison des Petits attached to the Institut Rousseau at Geneva, and the Walden School in New York, may be instanced. Perhaps more directly relevant is the Malting House School at Cambridge which specially aims at exploring the educative use of introductory science from the outset of education. During three years, the response of children of 4-7 years of age under free conditions to opportunity and stimulus for the direct discovery of many kinds of natural knowledge-mechanical, physical, biological-has been observed and studied. As, however, this remains an unseparated element in the general plan of humane education of the school, and the number of children is small, any encouraging results obtained can so far only be suggestive. A recent prominent advertisement of this school has set very high standards for a more specific investigation in the same field, and the result should prove significant; but since scientific work is nothing if not cumulative, it must eventually be judged less by what it does than by what it begins. What is important, therefore, is continuance, and a sustained movement of similar work. The simple, obvious principle on which the research attitude is based, that facts are only as unalterable as all the conditions on which they depend, and beliefs only as valid as all the assumptions on which they rest, is as applicable to education as to engineering. It should become as much a commonplace in the former as in the latter field that no a priori assumptions, but only the quality, extent, and coordination of actual research done, can determine how much progress is-or is not-possible.

ISSN:0028-0836    

DOI:10.1038/120105a0

出版商:Nature Publishing Group    

年代:1927

数据来源: Nature

摘要:

THIS second volume of the " World List of Scientific Periodicals " contains the abbreviations proposed for the titles of the 24,028 periodicals the full titles of which were given in the first volume, a notice of which appeared in NATTJEB of Sept. 19, 1925, p. 419. There is a supplement containing 658 further titles as to which information has been received since the publication of Vol. 1. There is also a list of abbreviations proposed for the titles of the reports of some 140 international congresses. The titles in the previous volume were numbered. In this volume the same numbers appear, followed by the proposed abbreviations. We think, however, that the reader will find, in most cases, that the abbreviations are full enough to make it unnecessary to refer to Vol. 1. Thus the meaning of such an abbreviation as " Bull. Soc. Sci. Nat. Phys., Montpellier," would appear fairly obvious, though, if the reader should wish to quote the exact wording of the title, he would do well to make certain by looking at Vol. 1, for it is explained that such an abbreviation as ' Sci.' may mean science, sciences, or scientific, while ' Bl.' may stand for Blatt or Blatter.For the convenience of those who may wish to make a card catalogue, the volume is printed on one side only of the paper, so that it can be cut up and pasted on cards. The outstanding feature of this volume, and that for which British science will be most grateful, is the information showing the libraries in which a periodical can be consulted. Those who possess this volume need not fear to be told by a librarian that the journal they wish to consult is not in his library, for they will know beforehand which library to visit. The libraries which have furnished lists of the periodicals on their shelves are in the cities of Aberdeen, Aberystwyth, Birmingham, Bristol, Cambridge, Cardiff, Dublin, Dundee, Edinburgh, Glasgow. Leeds, Liverpool, London, Manchester, Nottingham, Newcastle, Oxford, Rothamsted, St. Andrews, Sheffield, and Swansea. In London 27 libraries have given full information as to the scientific periodicals they possess, in Cambridge 27 libraries, in Edinburgh 21, in Oxford 19, in Glasgow 9, in Manchester 7, and in Birmingham and Sheffield 6 each. Altogether there are If 2 libraries in the list, and against every periodical in the " World List " there is a note showing in which, if any, of these libraries it is Available.It may happen that in some library the series of a particular periodical is incomplete. In the " World List " an attempt is made to give full information as to gaps in the sets. Knowledge that volumes are missing from a series in a library is not only valuable to those who use that library, but also will remind the custodians of the institution that these missing volumes should be supplied as soon as possible. While it is satisfactory to note the large number of periodicals that are to be found in one or other of the British libraries, there remain very many which, according to this list, cannot be consulted in Great Britain. It would be worth while to make a close study of the entries to -see whether some of these missing journals might not take the place of others of which there may be an unnecessary number of copies.The origin of the " World List of Scientific Periodicals " was explained in the notice of the first volume. At the suggestion of Sir Sidney F. Harmer, until recently Director of the Natural History Departments of the British Museum, and Dr. P. Chalmers Mitchell, secretary to the Zoological Society, the Conjoint Board of Scientific Societies appointed as a Committee Sir Sidney Harmer, Mr. F. W. Clifford, Sir Richard Gregory, Dr. P. Chalmers Mitchell, Dr. A. W. Pollard, and Prof. W. W. Watts to consider the possibility of preparing a list of the chief scientific periodicals, with an indication of the libraries in which they might be consulted. This Committee decided to index scientific periodicals in existence from Jan. 1, 1900. Details as to the sets of these periodicals before 1900 may also be given. It was soon found that the cost of preparation and publication of a work of this magnitude could not be covered by subscriptions and sales. Help was given by Sir Robert Hadfield, Mr. Robert Mond, and the trustees of the Carnegie United Kingdom Trust. In 1923 the Conjoint Board came to an end, but it had previously entrusted the " World List " to Sir Arthur Schuster, Mr. Robert Mond, and Dr. P. Chalmers Mitchell, who formed a company limited by guarantee to complete, own, and conduct the " World List of Scientific Periodicals." This company was incorporated with a council of management consisting of Dr. P. Chalmers Mitchell (chairman), Sir A. Schuster, and Mr. R. Mond. Miss Joan B. Procter became secretary. The work of the council is voluntary, and by the articles of association no benefit can be distributed to the members of the company. The company holds the copyright of the " World List " and, at a future date, if funds should permit, it will arrange for the issue of reprints and supplements. It is also provided in the memorandum of association that if some stronger body were willing to take over the duties and responsibilities of the company, then any surplus funds which may have accrued should be handed over to some " other institution or institutions the objects whereof shall be certified by the President of the Royal Society of London for the time being to tend to the advancement of science." It is therefore quite clear that any one wishing to advance the interests of scientific research by helping to make its published results accessible, may contribute to the funds of this company, confident that his money will not be used otherwise than in the interests of science.Much skill and an enormous amount of labour have been required in collecting and arranging the titles of 25,000 periodicals, preparing abbreviations, and indicating where the periodicals may be found. The trustees of the British Museum, on the recommendation of Dr. Pollard, then Keeper of Printed Books at the Museum, supported by Sir Frederic Kenyon, Director and Principal Librarian at the Museum, allowed the compilation of the list to be undertaken by the staff of the Museum as part of their official duties.The co-operation of the librarians of a large number of libraries in the United Kingdom has made it possible to state the libraries, if any, in which each periodical is to be found. The original editor of the " World List " was Dr. A. W. Pollard, who was assisted by Mr. W. A. Smith. Mr. Smith, with advice from Dr. Pollard and Dr. P. Chalmers Mitchell, has undertaken the chief burden of editing this second volume. Among difficult problems with which the editors have had to deal were those arising from changes in the titles of periodicals. In the reports from the various libraries there was found a want of agreement as to the date on which a change of title had taken place. Much labour was required before these dates could be fixed. The problem was not confined to changes of title during the period 1900-1921 covered by the " World List," for libraries possessing sets of periodicals which started before 1900 and continued beyond that date, were allowed to give details of earlier years. It has therefore been necessary to decide as to the identity of a periodical under the different names it has borne during its existence.The date at which a periodical ceased to exist has been denoted by an asterisk. The editors found that very few library catalogues give accurate information on this point. They have taken great pains to discover the exact date of the ' death ' of all periodicals which have ceased publication to be found in libraries in Great Britain, but they are not able to guarantee that the information on this point regarding periodicals of which no set is preserved in the country is always correct.Much importance attaches to the choice of the abbreviations, for these are intended to be used by authors in referring to articles in the journals. The rule that the order of the words on the title-page of a journal should be followed in the abbreviation has been adopted. Thus the Journal of the Chemical Society of London is abbreviated " J. Chem. Soc. Lond." and not " Chem. Soc. J.'.' It is true that this method separates the different publications (Proceedings, Reports, Transactions) of the same Society, but it makes it much easier for the reader to reconstruct the full title. It is greatly to be hoped, for the sake of uniformity, that the abbreviations used in the " World List " will be accepted as the standard of general practice. The place of imprint is omitted except when needed to distinguish periodicals with the same title; but when the abbreviated form would leave the language of the original uncertain, the imprint is added for all except the best-known language of those between which confusion could arise, the order of familiarity being fixed as English, French, German, Italian, or Spanish. This strikes one as a rather curious rule. We think it would have been better to give the town of publication in all cases except those in which that town is mentioned in the title.One cannot help asking whether it is really necessary that there should be so many periodicals dealing with science. Perhaps the publication of this list may suggest that some of these journals might amalgamate and so lessen the number which the scientific worker may be called upon to consult. The two volumes of the " World List " will be of very great value not only to librarians but also to all who have an interest in science. Those who have taken part in their preparation and the Oxford University Press are to be heartily congratulated. All scientific workers will thank Dr. P. Chalmers Mitchell for the resolute way in which he has guided the enterprise through its difficulties and finally brought it to a successful conclusion.

ISSN:0028-0836    

DOI:10.1038/120107a0

出版商:Nature Publishing Group    

年代:1927

数据来源: Nature

摘要:

PROF. GOLDSCHMIDT has given biologists a very stimulating book. It may be incorrect or incomplete in a number of individual points, but the author will not, we suspect, mind this so long as the book is widely read, and read in the spirit in which it is clearly intended, namely, as a pioneering venture into the new and almost uncharted sea lying between genetics and Entwick-lungsmechanik, which, with our author, we may call physiological genetics. It is now fifteen years ago that Goldschmidt published his first paper on the problem, which will be as classical to students of physiological genetics as is Mendel's work on the pea to students of simple (or distributional) genetics-the problem of intersexuality in Lymantria. There, as is well known, he was able to show, first, that inter-sexuality was produced by a lack of balance between definite genetic factors for maleness and for femaleness; secondly, that this imbalance revealed itself in the time-sequences of development-the inter sexes were animals which began their development of the ' right' sex, but later became switched over to the development proper to the other sex; and thirdly, that the greater the upset of balance, the earlier did the ' wrong ' sex come to have the upper hand. From these facts Goldschmidt drew the conclusion, which appears as unassailable in its broad outline as is Mendel's conclusion of purely-segregating unit - factors, that the male- and female - determining factors exist in a number of related forms (presumably multiple allelomorphs) differing, inter alia, in their quantitative potency; and that the more potent differ from the less potent in effecting the same reaction more rapidly.In the present volume Goldschmidt seeks to universalise this view, and advances the theory that all Mendelian genes are concerned fundamentally with the rates of developmental processes, and that the differences between allelomorphs can always be reduced to, and indeed best thought of as, differences in such rates of action. Let us say emphatically at the outset that this is an extremely fruitful view-point. Most geneticists, so long as their experiments led to thediscovery of definable gene-units, have been perfectly content to note the mere fact of relationship between gene and character-effect, without attempting to think out how that relationship was brought about.The gene -for bar-eye,' ' the factor for wrinkled seeds,' ' the gene which produces reduplicated legs in Drosophila kept at low temperature,' ' lethal factors,'-for the most part geneticists have been content with such purely descriptive statements. There have been honourable exceptions. Sewall Wright, following Onslow, has given a most illuminating analysis of all the coat-colour genes of mammals, which is based upon the idea of the interaction of two or three quantitatively-controlled pigmentary reactions; Miss Wheldale has attempted to analyse the relationship between the biochemistry and the genetics of anthocyan pigmentation in plants: the recent beautiful work of Plunkett (J. Exp. ZooL, 1926) on the mode of action of bristle-inhibition in Drosophila is one of the greatest value; and there are other examples. But they are all exceptions. Goldschmidt attempts to generalise. Let us give a few examples. He himself has worked out the larval coloration of Lymantria dispar. The older geneticists would have said that there existed a number of multiple factors for melanin production, several of which show reversal of dominance. Goldschmidt shows that all the factors affect the rate of production of melanin (or other time-relations: see later), and that the so-called reversal of dominance occurs only when factors are present, the major part of whose effect in increasing the amount of melanin falls in the larval period; for only then will the original condition of little or no pigment and the final condition of much pigment both be visible, together with all intermediate conditions. Quicker acting genes will hurry the pigment up and make the larva already dark at hatching, slower acting ones will leave it pale right up to pupation.In Drosophila, dozens of eye-colour and eye-shape genes are known, and their linkage-relations have been ascertained, but the how of their action has scarcely been thought of. Goldschmidt, without pretending to advance more than a formal explanation in terms of physiological genetics, points out that we have in any case to consider the following time-reactions: (1) that of the process which determines the differentiation of the eye-rudiment. (2) As with other differentiations, if the eye-determination does not take place by a certain time, other processes are at work which irrevocably determine the cells in some other way-in this case as ordinary epidermis. If (1) is too slow, or (2) too speedy, an eyeless animal is the result. (3) The number of facets depends on the number of cell-divisions t iking place in the ' eye-determined ' material. Goldschmidt assumes that these cell-divisions are inhibited, when the end-products of some process, also with its specific rate, have reached a certain concentration. Changes in the rate of either (1) or (3) will therefore bring about changes in facet-number, as in bar-eye, etc. Finally, he treats the colour-mutations from the same point of view as in his Lymantria larvae. Now it is clear that many assumptions have been made, some of which, such as (3), may very likely be replaced by better. None the less, it is equally clear that new ways of thinking and new methods of experimental attack are at once suggested by this treatment. One further example, this time of fact rather than theory. Goldschmidt and his pupils have been able to show that the wing-pigmentation of Lepi-doptera is brought about by a curious interrelation of developmental processes. The scale rudiments develop at different rates, so that before any pigment exists in the wing, the future pigmentation can be read off as a structural shadow-pattern. The various pigments appear to be produced in the body at different times, and to be shot out into the wings when ready. In the wings they can only be deposited in scales which are at a certain stage of their development: they pass over the rest. Thus the relative rates of scale differentiation and of pigment production both contribute to the actual pattern. Goldschmidt has further been able to show that the melanic form of Lymantria mona-cha differs from the normal, not in an excess production of melanin, but in a greater development (brought about by a greater rapidity of action of the corresponding genes) of the scales which are in the sensitive stage when the melanin-flood is generated.In a number of other points Goldschmidt is very suggestive. The phenotypic identity of two conditions, one of which can be shown to have been brought about by altering the organism's environment, the other by altering its genetic constitution, has often been regarded as a grave stumbling-block. Goldschmidt points out, however, that if all visible characters depend upon gene-controlled rates of developmental processes, then this identity is what should be expected. Valuable as the book is, however, it calls for one or two criticisms and caveats. Goldschmidt has not entirely rid himself of the habit, familiar to students of his earlier works, of providing illustrations which appear to represent curves of accurate quantitative processes without sufficiently warning the reader that they are in reality nothing of the sort, but merely very useful diagrams of possibilities to assist the visualist. In his earlier works the curves for production of male- and female-determining substances in Lymantria—now copied into all the text-books— fell into this category. In the present book, although it is true that warning has often been given, this is by no means always so. The theoretical curves for the larval pigmentation of Lymantria (pp. 56-57) are a case in point. That on p. 57 is a chemical impossibility. As a matter of fact, the actual experimental curves obtained (p. 55) can readily be interpreted by adopting two subsidiary hypotheses—that not only the rate of pigment-prction is controlled by genes, but also (1) the final density of pigment (equilibrium level) obtained, and (2) its time of onset. Both these statements actually hold good for the pig mentation of the eye of Gammarus, and probably in general (Ford and Huxley, Brit. J. Exp. Biol., in press).Even where at first sight quantitative accuracy appears to have been attained, this may not turn out to be really the case. Goldschmidt, for ex ample, has a very able discussion on the whole problem of bar-eye in Drosophila (p. 59 et seq.), which at first sight seems demonstrative. Certain assumptions, however, turn out not to be justified; and as a matter of fact, a careful analysis of the figures which I undertook, with the able assistance of Dr. C. F. Pantin, has convinced me that Gold- schmidt’s explanation will not work quantitatively in its present form. On the other hand, I am perfectly convinced that it is on the right general lines, and that if systematic experiments and em bryological studies on bar-eye, based on Gold- schmidt’s ideas, were undertaken, we should soon find ourselves in possession of really accurate quan titative laws bearing on the action of genes in development, and of general application. This brings me round to my starting-point, and I will merely conclude by recommending the book to the notice of all interested in genetics, develop mental physiology, and, indeed, general biolog

ISSN:0028-0836    

DOI:10.1038/120109a0

出版商:Nature Publishing Group    

年代:1927

数据来源: Nature

摘要:

THE late director of the International Meta-psychic Institute, Paris, was an enthusiastic " exponent of what he and his associates termed metapsychic science.' Although this large volume contains nothing new in principle for the student of mediumistic phenomena, the collected results and studies of Dr. Geley's researches mark the end of many decades of controversy as to the reality of the phenomena. It must now be admitted that the various kinds of lucidity and of ectoplasmic formation are facts of experience as actual, though as sporadic, as hypnotism, insanity, or physical deformity. Geley had the qualifications for research work such as are required for observations ' in the field ' and for recording the states and behaviour of pathological and mental cases. He was an experienced and capable investigator and his introductory explanations of the conditions requisite for metapsychic research should be read by all those engaged in it. If his precepts were followed there would be fewer than there are at present.The incentive to devote one's life to these investigations must be either a fixed idea or a temperamental interest in abnormal and degenerate human types. Geley's temperament probably led him into this work, for his only prepossession seems to have been a harmless attachment to a word- " dynamo-psychism "-from which he sought in an earlier work, " From the Unconscious to the Conscious," to evolve a philosophy. In the annals of science it is usually the innovator who enunciates the principles or laws operating in new fields of investigation o others further confirm, elaborate, and tabulate. Geley was not an innovator, but he and other men of science have about completed the survey as regards terminology and classification of evidence and material. There is no scientific or ethical justification, however, for the repetition of these experiments by others. Flourney, Joire, Schrenck-Notzing, Morselli, Richet, Osty, Geley, and others have established the facts without any religious or spiritualistic implications. On the Continent spiritism and metapsychics are not synonymous, as the layman, and even some men of science, in Great Britain, believe. These facts can be accepted, just as we acknowledge those guaranteed by specialists in any other research work where the novice and layman do not feel called upon to confirm them by personal investigation. They concern chiefly physicians, large numbers of whom have taken part in the experiments described in this and many other books. Scientific deductions from these facts are now wanted. Nothing new can be learned and no exact knowledge will be obtained regarding the human constitution until the laws governing hypersensible cognition and ectoplasmic matter are formulated. Morselli used analogies from radioactive phenomena to describe certain aspects of ectoplasm. Geley records interesting observations connecting ectoplasmic forms and micro-organisms, especially in regard to the action of light and the production of cold physiological light. Richet suggested that clairvoyance dealing with things was due rather to excessive tactile sensitiveness to emanations with which the article had been charged, unconsciously, by the owner. Others have made the obvious comparisons of radio-telegraphy and television with clairaudience, mental telepathy and clairvoyance.These comparisons are merely suggestive; they may be true, but they arc not scientific analogies. Since human nature is a complexity of many kinds of matter, said to be the crown of creation on this earth, we must find analogies that will run right through all the levels of matter, so far known, and correlate these levels in man before the results of metapsychic experiments will have true scientific significance. It is possible that a synthesis of all the sciences relating to man might be achieved could such a scientific correlation be made. A generalisation that includes all the facts of psychic phenomena is necessary; but it must be a principle or law-not a mere word or phrase which may be variously interpreted according to temperament. We know something of the protean possibilities of matter, and this characteristic of ectoplasmic formation is shown by the reproductions of photographs in the book, several of which were published in smaller size in Geley's previous work. The plates also include John Tissot's drawing of the lovely apparition named " Katie King " with her Indian guardian, obtained through the medium-ship of Eglinton in the early 'seventies, and photographs of the revolting animal and bird forms materialised through the mediumship of Mr. Kluski during experiments conducted by the Polish Society for Psychical Research in 1920. Fifty years of Europe ! Could we explain merely this degeneration in the types of materialised forms, the whole subject and its dangers would be understood.Geley inferred from his experiments and believed that there is no essential difference between animals and man; he concluded also that creative genius and mediumship cannot be distinguished in essence, nor can self-conscious clairvoyance and ectoplasmic formation operating during trance. There were no gods, angels, or supermen in his cosmos ! Psychodynamic matter is tending to a vague divinity ! What difference this from the ' materialism ' for which ' orthodox ' science is arraigned? r When we leave the solid ground of Nature, unable to understand its operations, word-spinning and idols of the mind masquerade as law.

ISSN:0028-0836    

DOI:10.1038/120111a0

出版商:Nature Publishing Group    

年代:1927

数据来源: Nature

摘要:

DURING the last twenty years of his tenure of the chair of theoretical physics at Leyden, Prof. Lorentz delivered short courses of lectures analysing-in the incomparable manner we have learnt to associate with his name-the various aspects of his subject which, during that period, came in for critical examination by the scientific world. As a result of the energy and enthusiasm of his pupils, these lectures have been preserved in book form, and the present volume is a translation (the originals are in Dutch) of the first of the series. It deals with such subjects as (we quote the titles of the separate lectures) aberration of light; mechanical ether theories; Kelvin's model of the ether; attraction and repulsion of pulsating spheres; inner friction and sliding, treated hydro-dynamically; friction and sliding, treated kinetic-ally; Knudsen's investigations on rarefied gases; remarks on Lesage's theory of gravitation; friction and heat conduction in the propagation of sound; kinetic theory of systems of electrons, Richardson's investigations; vacuum contact of plates of different metals; problems in which the motion of electrons plays a part. As these titles suggest, the first section deals with the possibilities and probable hidden secrets of a mechanical radiation-carrying ether and is on lines which were familiar to all physicists twenty years ago. These discussions are now somewhat out of fashion, although a recent attempt-arising out of a complete misunderstanding of certain positive results obtained by Miller in a repetition of the Michelson-Morley experiment-has been made to revive interest in them. They lead almost inevitably to the conclusion which we find here stated so concisely by Lorentz. " To a certain extent these theories are successful, but it must be admitted that they give but little satisfaction." Actually they can be made more impressive than Lorentz shows, because so many of the difficulties so clearly discussed by him reaHy arise from an attempt to make the ethers explain not only themselves but also matter as well. If we adopt the more reasonable attitude and accept matter as being something over and above the ether-the ribbon tying the knots-then, as Larmor so ably shows in his review of these problems,1 we are not involved in a large number of the paradoxes which otherwise present themselves. Even then, however, it is difficult to avoid the troubles involved mainly in the possibility of the coexistence of two independent statical conditions-electric and mag- M netic-so we cannot but subscribe to Lorentz's final conclusion.In the other sections of his lectures Lorentz deals with less speculative problems. But his treatment of such familiar matters as viscosity and internal friction, the flow of rarefied gases through tubes and orifices, the propagation of sound in gases, and certain problems in the electron theory of metals, are exceptionally lucid and satisfying. Like the rest of Lorentz's work, it combines a most exceptional blend of physical intuition and analytical skill which carries conviction with it at every stage. His concluding lectures on the statistical problems of the electron theory of metals contain an elaboration of an important point which should be noted. The usual simpler forms of the theory lead to a number for the electron content which is at least 1000 times too large. If, however, an internal potential for each electron and characteristic of "the metal-suggested by Lorentz in his original memoirs on this subject-is included, this funda mental difficulty disappears and so also do some of the difficulties in the further development of the subject not dealt with by Lorentz in these lectures. The translators-and publishers-have carried out their task very satisfactorily. Here and there, owing to an obviously too strict adherence to the order of words in the original, an awkwardly constructed sentence holds up the reader, and a few words like paralldepipedon and generatrix are given an unfamiliar-but not misleading-form. These slight blemishes are, however, few and far between, and the book is on the whole worthy of the author whose name appears on the outside; it can in consequence be specially commended to those who are-and were-interested in the subjects with which it deals.1 "AEther and Matter." This book should be read in conjunction with these lectures of Lorentz.

ISSN:0028-0836    

DOI:10.1038/120112a0

出版商:Nature Publishing Group    

年代:1927

数据来源: Nature

摘要:

FOR some time past considerable attention has been given to the principles of mine ventilation; institutions, committees, and individuals have been hard at work for some years trying to render our knowledge of this complex subject more accurate, and at the same time to express that knowledge by means of readily intelligible formulae. It is beginning to be generally admitted that no single formula can quite accurately express all the facts, but there are strong hopes that a reasonably simple formula giving results near enough for all practical purposes may be the outcome. The two books now before us are evidence of the widespread interest that is being taken in the subject; both are fairly satisfactory works within their own spheres, but, curiously enough, these spheres are entirely different. The British book is addressed essentially to students, the American book essentially to mining engineers. Thus it is that in the former it is thought necessary to give such elementary information as that " inversely means in the opposite direction," and to conclude each chapter with a series of questions, adapted apparently to the capacity of elementary students, whilst in the latter attempts are made to discuss such advanced problems as the economics of ventilation, and to solve such problems as, for example, " What is the most economic size of an airway under given conditions? " It must unfortunately be admitted that the author's solution of the problem is neither complete nor correct, but the fact that he attempts to solve it indicates the stage to which the work is carried. Necessarily there is very much that is common to the two books, and indeed there is a mass of material available which may fairly be said to be the common property of all mining engineers interested in the subject. The British work, however, devotes much more attention to the details of fan construction, which the American writer takes for granted; the former is aware that students must be taught the construction of different types of fan on the market, but the latter assumes that the engineer will be sufficiently familiar with these to require but little additional information. Furthermore, it may be pointed out that whilst the British work practically limits itself to the consideration of the ventilation of collieries, the American work, hailing as it does from California, naturally devotes as much attention to the ventilation of metalliferous mines as to that of collieries. The weakest point in both books is their failure to treat adequately the practically important subject of the testing of fans, although, as might be supposed, this is rather more fully considered by the American than by the British author.

ISSN:0028-0836    

DOI:10.1038/120113a0

出版商:Nature Publishing Group    

年代:1927

数据来源: Nature

摘要:

MR. H. J. L. BEAUNELL, during his service in the Geological Survey of Egypt, enjoyed the privilege of two years' survey of the mountains of Sinai. In this book he gives an interesting narrative of his experiences and records, his observations on the country and people, and especially on its geology and physical geography. The country is of popular interest from its connexion with the wanderings of the Children of Israel on their way from Egypt to Palestine; and the author's account indicates that the physical conditions of this region were the same then as now, and that no large body of people could have crossed the mountains of southern Sinai. Moses probably followed a route across the northern plains. The scientific interest of Sinai depends largely on the light it throws on the nature of the gulfs on either side. According to Dr. Ball, of the Egyptian Geological Survey, the Gulf of Suez is a normal valley of erosion and was excavated by a river along the summit of an arch. According to the alternative explanation, the Gulf is a rift valley due to the subsidence of a strip of country between parallel faults; the actual dislocation of the rocks may be seen from passing steamers, but according to Dr. Ball these disturbances are merely landslips. Mr. Beadnell declares that the evidence that the Gulf of Suez is a fault-made valley is irresistible. His new information also supports the conclusion drawn from W. E. Holland's map of 1869 - to which there is no reference in the text - that the angular parallel-sided valleys of Sinai are also tectonic and are due to the rifting of the country by the earth movements that made the adjacent gulfs.The photographic illustrations are of especial interest, for they show the topography and structure with almost diagrammatic clearness. An interesting introduction by Dr. Hogarth refers to the historic associations and attractions of this country which he describes as looking, when seen from the eastern Gulf, as alluring as a Gustav Dore vision of hell.

ISSN:0028-0836    

DOI:10.1038/120114b0

出版商:Nature Publishing Group    

年代:1927

数据来源: Nature

摘要:

As a stimulating introduction to prehistoric man, his haunts, habits, and arts of life, this volume in " The Simple Guide Series " will prove very useful. It is written vividly and without any surface pedantry though itcondenses a good deal of information into a small space. It will succeed in sweeping from the picture of our stone age ancestors some of the dry dust with which the learning of specialists, as well as the centuries, have covered it. It leads us from lemurs, monkeys, and apes up to the man of the bronze age. Needless to say, no specialist in. prehistory will completely agree with any other author's conclusions, whether these be put in popular or learned language, but, on the whole, Mr. Henderson succeeds in giving a fair and well-balanced summary of the sound and established results of modern prehistoric science.

ISSN:0028-0836    

DOI:10.1038/120115d0

出版商:Nature Publishing Group    

年代:1927

数据来源: Nature

摘要:

THE phenomenon of heterothallism (the separation of sex in different individuals) is known to occur in the Phycomycetes (Mucor), in the Ascomycetes (Ascobolus, Penicillium), in a large number of Hymeno-mycetes (mushrooms and toadstools), and in the Smut fungi. Therefore the question arises: Does heterothallism occur in tho Rust fungi? An attempt to solve this problem, which is of considerable theoretical and perhaps practical interest, has been made by the author by sowing the sporidia ofPuccinia helianthion leaves of young Sunflower plants and observing whether or not aecia are produced: (1) when a single sporidium is sown by itself, and (2) when two sporidia are sown close together.Sporidia produced on promycelia developed by teleutospores attached to old dead Sunflower leaves were allowed to fall on to the green leaves of young Sunflower plants in such a way that, as a rule, they settled at some distance apart but so that, sometimes, two sporidia settled close to ono another. The sporidia were not actually seen on a leaf after they had settled there. When a sporidium infects a leaf, the pustule at its first appearance is a tiny reddish clot no larger than the dot of an i in this letter. Altogether more than 1200 monosporidial and about 200 bi-sporidial pustules have been under observation. The facts observed during the investigation upon Puccinia helianthi may be thus summarised.A. Within two weeks the following happens, and usually within three weeks nothing more happens: 1. Each isolated pustule derived from a mono sporidial infection usually becomes 0'6-1-2 cm. in diameter and develops pycnia which excrete nectar, but it does not give rise to any aecia (Fig. 1, pustule to the left). The pycnia appear about 8 days after the sowing of the sporidia.2. In a compound pustule formed by the coales cence of two simple pustules, each simple pustule owing its origin to a monosporidial infection, when the distance between the two centres of infection is not more than about 1 mm., either: (a) aecia appear in the compound pustule 10-11 days after the sowing of the spores (Fig. 1, pustule to the right), or (b) no aecia appear. 3. When two simple pustules, each derived from a monosporidial infection, arise near to one another, coalesce, and produce aecia: the nearer they are and the sooner they coalesce, the sooner are aecia developed; while the farther apart they are and the later they coalesce, the later arc aecia developed.4. Where in compound pustules, each derived from two monosporidial infections, the centres of infection are not more, than 2 mm. apart, the number of compound pustules producing aecia is about 50 per cent, of the whole. This conclusion is based on observa tions made upon about 175 compound pustules. B. At the end of three weeks or more rarely less, in respect to pustules both simple and compound which hitherto have not produced any aecia, the following happens:1. A majority of the pustules (about 60 per cent.) never produce aecia, even when the pustules persist for so long as six weeks. 2. A minority of the pustules (about 40 per cent.) produce aecia of normal form and colour. In at least some of these aecia the aeciospores are uninucleate, whereas in aecia produced in a compound pustule 10-11 days after the sowing of the sporidia (vide A, 2, above) the aeciospores are all binucleate.The following theoretical deductions may be drawn from the series of facts just recorded. 1. Since pycnospores appear on every mycelium of monosporidial origin, it is clear that, if the pycno spores are really nothing but non-functional male gametes (spermatia), Puccinia helianthi is not dioecious. In other words, the monosporidial mycelia of the Sunflower Rust fungus are not of two kinds: (a) male, bearing spermatia, and (b) female, not bearing spermatia,.2. The pycnospores are not functionless male gametes but are simply conidia corresponding to the uninucleate oidia which appear on tho monosporous mycelia of such heterothallic Hymenomycetes as Goprinus lagopus, C. niveus, Stropharia semiglobata, and Collybia velulipes. FIG. 1.-Underside of a Sunflower leaf which was inoculated on its upper side with sporidia of Pmcinia. heliauthi, photographed twenty-three days after inoculation. To the left, a pustule derived from a monosporidial mycelium showing absence ol aecia (it had numerous pycnia on its upper side). Xo the right, a compound pustule formed by the coalescence of two simple pustules each derived from a monosporidial mycelium. The compound pustule has developed typical aecia. Magnified two and one-half times the natural size.3. The pycnosporos produced on (+) monosporidial mycelia are (+) in their sexual nature, while pycno spores produced on (-) monosporidiai mycelia are (-) in their sexual nature. 4. The sporidia are xinisexual arid produce unisexual mycelia. The (+) and (-) monosporidial mycelia, and therefore tho (+) and (-) sporidia from which they originate, appear to be about equal in numbers. This suggests that segregation of the (+) and (-) factors takes place in tho promycelium during nuclear division in the same manner as it takes place in the basidium of Coprinus Kostrupianus and of C. radians (- C. domesticus).5. When two sporidia of opposite sex, (+) and (-), are sown close together on a Sunflower leaf so that the pustules arising from the two infections soon coalesce, the two monosporous mycelia come into contact, fuse together, and give rise to normal binucleate aeoio-spores, each conjugate pair of nuclei formed in the spore-bed consisting of a (+) and of a (-) nucleus derived from a (+) and from a (-) mycelium re-spectively. 6. When two sporidia of the same sex-that is, two (+) sporidia or two (-) sporidia-are sown close together on a Sunflower leaf so that the two pustules arising from the two infections soon coalesce, the two monosporous mycelia come into contact but do not interact sexually, and therefore do not give rise to any aecia.7. The belated aecia, which appear at the end of about three weeks on pustules of monosporidial origin or on pustules of bisporidial origin where presumably the two sporidia are of one and the same sex, probably arise without any hyphal fusions. 8. In any heterothallic Bust fungus that behaves like Pucoinia helianthi there is a possibility of two strains of the same species being crossed by means of the union of their monosporidial mycelia within the tissues of one and the same host-plant.A few experiments have already been made by sowing the sporidia of Puccinia graminis on the leaves of the Barberry. The results, so far as they have gone, appear to be similar to those already described for Puccinia helianthi. In conclusion, I desire to acknowledge valuable assistance derived from consultation with Prof. A. H. Reginald Buller.

ISSN:0028-0836    

DOI:10.1038/120116a0

出版商:Nature Publishing Group    

年代:1927

数据来源: Nature

摘要:

IT is customary to use coal gas as a dielectric in the mercury interrupter and it has generally been found to be quite satisfactory in action. There are, however, places in the country where coal gas is not available, and the following experiments were under-taken with the view of examining the possibility of employing carbonic acid gas used in connexion with X-ray work carried out in hospitals at such places.Carbonic acid gas is available in cylinders at many places, and, being an inert gas, it naturally suggests itself as a very useful substitute for coal gas. It is, however, necessary to examine the efficiency of the interrupter using carbonic acid gas by comparing it with that using coal gas and also hydrogen. Since the most important function of the dielectric is to extinguish the flame, it is necessary to examine its action when- it is employed in an interrupter in two different circumstances; in one case, when the primary of the induction coil is connected up straight to the source of electric power which gives just sufficient potential difference in the primary to obtain the desired E.M.F. in the secondary, and in the second case, when the primary draws current from the supply mains through a large rheostat which regulates the current in the primary to yield the desired E.M.F. in the secondary. It is obvious that the two cases are different. In the first case, the sparking inside the interrupter is considerably less than in the second case, where the whole potential difference of the supply mains is effective in producing the spark at the break.The experimental work for each gas was consequently divided up into two parts. In the first part the power to the primary was supplied from a potentiometer device connected up to the 230 volts D.C. mains, and in the second, the primary was connected to the mains through a rheostat. The length of the spark-gap was taken to indicate the magnitude of the voltage generated in the secondary. The current drawn by the primary could be read off from an ammeter placed in series with it (see Fig. 1). The same experiments were repeated with an X-ray tube connected up with the secondary with a milliammeter in series (see Fig. 2).In the second part of the experiment the primary and the interrupter wore connected up to the main, supply of 230 volts and the current was suitably cut down by means of an adj ustable rheostat and measured by means of an ammeter (see Fig. 3). The same experiments were then repeated, using an X-ray tube (see Fig. 4). It can be seen from the results that in either case, when hydrogen or carbonic acid gas is used, the efficiency of the interrupter is greater than when coal gas is used. Hydrogen gives the longest spark-gap, that is, the highest value of the secondary E.M.F. with the smallest potential difference in the primary. The difference between the working of the gas-mercury-interrupter using coal gas and carbonic acid gas is less in the case when the full 230 volts are allowed to play across the break than when the potential difference at that point is carefully adjusted to the minimum to yield the required E.M.F. in the secondary as indicated by the length of the spark-gap. The curve for carbonic acid gas being lower than the curve for coal gas, it is also clear that it would be more economical to use carbonic acid gas, since to obtain equal E.M.F.'s in tho secondary, less electric power is required in the primary.FIG. 1. FIG. 2.FIG. 3. FIG. 4.There is next the question of safety in handling the gas. Carbonic acid gas, being heavier than air, is capable of easily displacing the air from the interrupter, and the fact that' the interrupter is full of the gas can be easily tested. The gas itself is of course harmless. Further points in connexion -with this gas are that it has no action on the electrodes and the gas remains unaltered after long use. In order to ascertain that the gas remained unaffected by constant sparkings inside the interrupter, the gas was tested after half an hour's continuous run. Samples of the gas-filling were drawn off from the interrupter, and on analysing them it was found that the gas had not undergone any appreciable change. The electrodes also were not affected.These results should prove useful in places where coal gas is not available but where carbonic acid gas can be carried in steel containers.

ISSN:0028-0836    

DOI:10.1038/120117b0

出版商:Nature Publishing Group    

年代:1927

数据来源: Nature