THE PALEONTOLOGIC RECORD 581 



THE PALEOXTOLOGIC RECORD 

 The Paleontological Society Conference Papers 



By Professor JOHN M. CLARKE 



STATE MUSEUM, ALBANY, N. Y. 



Introductory. — The birth of a new society devoted to special scien- 

 tific aims counts but little for the advancement of knowledge and cul- 

 ture in these days of multiplex organizations if it fails to come into 

 being and before the world with an adequate excuse and a clean-cut 

 purpose. The Paleontological Society, which was conceived a year 

 ago and born last -winter in Boston at the meetings of the American 

 Association, is the outcome of a conviction on the part of workers in 

 this science that there is a common bond of interest among them all, 

 in spite of the peculiar conditions which have stamped paleontology 

 with their diversity and kept its devotees asunder. Students of this 

 science have approached it along different avenues. Some, and chiefly 

 those dealing with the vertebrates, have laid the foundations of their 

 work in the living world; others, and here chiefly the students of 

 invertebrates, have made their entry as geologists and have worked 

 their way from beneath upward to the earth's surface. Among the 

 paleobotanists good men have arrived through both approaches. As 

 an equipment for trustworthy and lasting work, both of these lines of 

 preparation have proved their efficiency and so all arguments bent to 

 demonstrate the superiority of the one over the other schooling resolve 

 themselves to a conclusion that both are essential to the best result. 



Diversity in training and in the field of activity has led to diversity 

 of sympathy, and it seemed, even to those who had long hoped for a 

 unification of these interests, that it might hardly be practicable to 

 obliterate these cleavage planes. The governing principles of the sci- 

 ence are common, the bearings of paleontologic researches and results 

 are the widest conceivable in their relation to the problems of life, 

 whether past, present or future, and it is not likely that the magnitude 

 of the science can be unduly stated. From some such considerations as 

 these, the writer, chosen as first president of the new society, endeavored 

 to bring into the foreground of the society's first meeting, by a " Con- 

 ference on the Aspects of Paleontology," an introductory presentment 

 of some of the broader factors and principles of the science, and the 

 articles that follow herewith are the partial outcome of this conference. 

 In every case where practicable, the themes were presented by two 



