402 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



should be utterly condemned. Nor can it be wrong to experi- 

 ment with a variety of working theories, even though it is 

 recognised that they are not, as they stand, compatible with each 

 other. Only so shall we secure a willingness to try experiments 

 in every direction and have our attention directed upon the 

 facts that may lurk in every quarter. In short, for the narrow- 

 minded intolerance of a logic that speaks only in terms of 

 "necessity," "cogency," and "proof," and leaves us wrecked on 

 the rocks of scepticism when it turns out that absolute truth and 

 certainty are nowhere attainable by man, we must substitute a 

 logic that will allow us to take risks and is familiar with the 

 notions of freedom, toleration, and success, and knows how to 

 justify its selections and preferences by their superiority in 

 scientific value. 



It may be thought that these general considerations are 

 somewhat remote from the special topics of Sir Oliver Lodge's 

 Address ; but in fact they conduce directly to its proper apprecia- 

 tion and supply the principles which are properly applicable to 

 the controversial issues which it raises. Not only do they 

 render rational and intelligible that profusion of speculation 

 of which Sir Oliver Lodge gives so lucid and fascinating a 

 description, but they justify also such of his speculations as are 

 still somewhat repugnant to the prejudices of those who have 

 been brought up to believe that at every temporary halting-place 

 of knowledge they had attained absolute and final truth. 



I will not presume, however, to discuss what I take to be the 

 primary subjects of scientific interest in Sir Oliver Lodge's 

 Address. These appear to lie in the region of physics, and 

 concern the scientific status of the ether and the atom. I will 

 not venture to comment on Sir Oliver's championship of the 

 reality of the ether, beyond remarking that he still seems to me 

 to leave all the properties of the ether functional and the belief 

 in it a methodological assumption, i.e. one of those pragmatic 

 postulates which pave the way for the advance of science. But 

 this is not of course to deny that our notion may not some 

 day be found to be something more than a convenience of 

 thought. The strange romance of the atom, which began as a 

 bit of metaphysical dogmatism, which had a long career as 

 a methodological assumption, and seemed just about to be reduced 

 to a methodological fiction when it was shown to be a real fact in 

 nature, should serve as a signal warning against the rash 



