146 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



notion of a group of characteristics that could not possibly change 

 or be changed from generation to generation? In more recent 

 years we have again seen the same method of reducing science 

 to a variety show for the entertainment of the tired general reader 

 applied to both biology and psychology. Weismann has tried to 

 prove that acquired characteristics are not transmitted in heredity, 

 and that the germ plasm is distinct from the somatic cells. The 

 neo-Lamarckians, Spencer, Cope, and some of the botanists have 

 contended for the older interpretation. Is biology, then, a sci- 

 ence? Forbid the thought! Heaven preserve our minds from 

 such confusion! 



If the sociologists have hoped that they alone might not be 

 overtaken by easy annihilation, they deserve to be humiliated. 

 But it is safe to say that they have cherished no such illusions. 

 If the men who have devoted much time to the scientific explana- 

 tion of society have had no other qualification for their task, they 

 have at least shown some acquaintance with the history of thought. 

 And so it is not likely that they have suffered deeply from disen- 

 chantment when they have been confronted with the regulation 

 exposure of " the present position " of their science. 



There is no need of wasting space to prove that the kind of 

 criticism here referred to is without scientific value. The present 

 position of any science can not be determined by arraying its con- 

 tradictions and inconsistencies, irrespective of a serious attempt to 

 ascertain which of its concepts and hypotheses have inherent vital- 

 ity. It is precisely when a science is at its best, surely advancing 

 year by year and full of promise for the future, that contradic- 

 tions most abound in its monographs and text-books. 



A true scientific criticism, then, must proceed by a different 

 method. The present position of a science can be ascertained only 

 by instituting three specific inquiries, namely: First, among the 

 more or less contradictory conceptions and hypotheses which con- 

 stitute its groundwork, what ones are surely displacing all others 

 and gaining the wider acceptance among active students? Second, 

 what progress is being made in the application of exact methods 

 to research? Third, is there a practical or working harmony be- 

 tween the concepts that are gaining ground and the more exact 

 methods of research that are being perfected? Do the concepts 

 and hypotheses lend themselves to exact methods, and do they, on 

 the whole, help to perfect methods? Do improving methods, on 

 the whole, confirm or strengthen the concepts that are gaining 

 wider acceptance? 



If these inquiries are applied in the domain of sociology they 

 bring to light immistakable evidence of a steady and gratifying 



