SHORT PAPERS 



DR. SAMUEL P. SADTLER, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, read a paper before 

 this Section on " Flameless Wood," and discussed the various processes of fire- 

 proof treatment. 



The following paper on " The Relation of Technical Chemistry to Human Pro- 

 gress" was presented by Dr. Harvey W. Wiley, of the United States Department 

 of Agriculture, and Chairman of the Section of Technical Chemistry : 



I yield to no one in my admiration for that part of our science which is perhaps 

 sometimes improperly denominated "Pure Chemistry." To be sure, we need not 

 object to the use of the word " pure " as applied to chemistry, and it seems to me it 

 can be applied to all branches with equal propriety. The term "pure" as used 

 above, however, refers solely to chemistry when considered entirely apart from 

 any practical application or general utility. And yet it is almost impossible to 

 consider chemistry in that light. No matter how abstract the investigation may 

 be as a rule it treats in some way of human interests. In other words it is quite 

 impossible it seems to me to divorce chemistry from the humanities. Tech- 

 nical chemistry perhaps more than any other branch of our science lies quite 

 close to human hopes and human progress. The application of chemical investi- 

 gations forms the foundation of sanitation and hygiene. It provides the remedies 

 which are used in diseases. It produces antitoxins which counteract biological 

 poisons, and builds up the technique which renders their manufacture and dis- 

 tribution possible. It determines the purity of the water-supply and of the air. 

 It discovers the forms of food adulteration which are injurious to health and 

 presides over the inspection which prevents them, and in a dozen other ways 

 ministers to the public health. It is evident that technical chemistry in this 

 aspect tends to prolong human life and make it more useful. After all, life is the 

 one great desire of man and thus in prolonging it technical chemistry ministers to 

 man's supreme desire more than any other branch of chemistry or of any other 

 science. Technical chemistry opens the wilderness to civilization. By its means 

 have been built those marvelous lines of communication between distant parts of 

 the same country and countries separated by the seas. The railway and all its 

 appliances are creatures of technical chemistry. The steamship is no less so. Thus 

 technical chemistry is the most important of the sciences lying at the basis of 

 transportation. Associated with its sister science, "Physics," chemistry has 

 helped to build up the great industry of the applications of electricity to the arts. 

 Electro-chemistry is intimately associated with all that the mastery of electrical 

 science has done for human progress. It may not be much to its credit, but chemis- 

 try is the dominant science in the art of war. It not only makes the explosives but 

 also the guns which carry them, and while it is true that chemistry has thus made 

 war more deadly, it has without doubt made it more humane. The fierce personal 

 hatred and enmity which must have characterized the hand-to-hand fighting of 

 antiquity is now an incident rather than the whole of battle. No sooner, however, 

 has technical chemistry made as efficient as possible the implements of destruc- 

 tion than it turns, on the other hand, to ameliorating the suffering of the wounded 

 and thus softens the pangs of the hospital and saves thousands of lives which 

 otherwise would have succumbed to wounds. There is perhaps no more remark- 

 able contrast than these two applications of technical chemistry, on the one hand 

 to destroy and on the other to save. In the art of agriculture, technical chemistry 

 is one of the chief factors, and agriculture must be recognized as the basic industry 



