REPORT ON GEOPHYSICS 1 77 



Swedish Geological Survey, says: "In my opinion, the plan of estab- 

 lishing a geophysical laboratory is a grand one. Ably conducted, 

 such an institution may no doubt proffer elucidation on many an 

 obscure question and powerfully promote the progress of many 

 branches of geology and petrology in general." Professor Seder- 

 holm, of the Geological Survey of Finland, says: "The enterprise 

 which you hope to start aims at nothing less than to lay a new and 

 in many respects more certain base for geological science. There 

 can be no question about the exceedingly great advantage to the 

 science of such experimental studies. If they have till now played 

 an inconsiderable part in geology, it has been mostly because it has 

 not been possible to make them on a scale in any measure adequate 

 to that of nature." Professor Suess, President of the Royal Acad- 

 emy of Science in Vienna, says: " I would heartily envy the country 

 which might first boast of such an institution. ' ' 



These opinions are in accord with those expressed by leading 

 physicists and chemists to the Secretary of the Carnegie Institution 

 and published as an appendix to the report of the Advisory Com- 

 mittee for Geophj'sics. These men, all of whom speak of the im- 

 portance of geophysics to geology, or to geology and science in 

 general, include Poncaire, Lord Kelvin, Ernst Mach, Becke, 

 Kohlrausch, Van't Hoff, G. H. Darwin, and Nernst. 



The establishment of a geophysical laboratory was also discussed 

 with many geologists at the International Congress of Geologists at 

 Vienna this year, and there was but one opinion among represent- 

 ative geologists — that the foundation of a geophysical laboratory 

 would do work of fundamental importance for the science of geology. 



Indeed, the Council of the International Congress of Geologists 

 unanimously adopted a statement concerning the subject which was 

 accepted without dissent from any source by the entire Congress. 

 This statement is as follows : 



" It is a well known fact that man^^ of the fundamental problems 

 of geolog}' — for example, those concerning uplift and subsidence, 

 mountain making, vulcanology, the deformation and metamorphism 

 of ore deposits — cannot be discussed satisfactorily because of the 

 insufficiency of chemical and physical investigations directed to their 

 solution. Thus, the theory of large strains, either in wholly elastic 

 or in plastic bodies, has never been elucidated, while both chemistry 

 and physics at temperatures above a red heat are almost virgin fields. 



" Not only geology, but pure physics, chemistry, and astronomy 

 would greatly benefit by successful researches in these directions. 

 Such researches, however, are of extreme difficulty. They would 



