530 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



though he may realise that he was not thoroughly justified in 

 his belief. But is the method really illogical ? I fully admit 

 that the logic of the two alternative methods of treatment is of 

 an absolutely different kind and for young boys I have no 

 hesitation in choosing between them. Science should be taught 

 inductively to such boys ; the method here proposed for 

 teaching electricity starts with the study of familiar phenomena 

 and gradually works back to the fundamental principles, 

 mechanical, electrical, magnetic, etc. ; the alternative method 

 may be characterised as a semi-deductive process, starting with 

 a few fundamental abstract principles and working down to 

 familiar phenomena and everyday processes and instruments. 

 And it is legitimate to remind critics that in an inductive treatment 

 of science we are limited in precision of statement to the degree 

 of accuracy of our observations. If then we provide volt- 

 meters whose resistance is 'so high that the current through 

 them is much smaller than our possible error in measuring the 

 currents in the conductors, it can hardly be held to be unscientific 

 to use them, in an avowedly inductive course, in place of electro- 

 static voltmeters which take no current beyond that caused by 

 imperfect insulation. It is not our object in this course to 

 establish a small body of abstractions from which by processes 

 of mathematics and pure reasoning we may draw precise 

 deductions only roughly verifiable by experience. The methods 

 of mathematical physics must be taught at the appropriate 

 stage but they are ill suited to the present one. 



But many experienced teachers will probably assert that 

 frictional electricity is an excellent subject for young boys, even 

 if it be demonstrable that it is not necessary as an introduction 

 to current electricity. This view is well expressed by an extract 

 from Tyndall's preface to the Christmas Lectures on Frictional 

 Electricity which he gave at the Royal Institution in 1875. "I 

 had heard doubts expressed as to the value of science teaching 

 in schools and I had heard objections urged on the score of the 

 expensiveness of the apparatus. Both doubts and objections 

 would, I considered, be most practically met by showing what 

 could be done in the way of discipline and instruction by experi- 

 mental lessons involving the use of apparatus so simple and 

 inexpensive as to be within everybody's reach." No words are 

 needed, for those who have read his little book, in praise of the 

 skill with which he carried out his object. But in this opulent 



