EDITORIAL. 503 



In contrast to this, " in a cotemporary article we expect a presen- 

 tation of all the data necessary to render subsequent verification by 

 other observers possible. We further expect clear information as to 

 the amount of material on which the observations were made or the 

 number of experiments on which the work is based. In other words. 

 a modern investigator will hardly receive consideration for his 

 researches unless he furnishes every aid he can to facilitate criticizing 

 and testing his results. This severe standard has been only gradually 

 evolved, but is now stringently enforced in all departments of science, 

 and is the response in our practice to our need of eliminating the 

 purely personal factor. It would be advantageous if scientific 

 authors generally viewed the obligation of providing for verification 

 as an even more serious duty than it is esteemed at present." 



Scierce grows by the accretion of ideas. It is based on personal 

 knowledge. It is developed not merely by successive accumulations 

 from a large number of workers, but also by incessant debate and 

 mutual criticism. It is the product of collaboration, none the less 

 actual and effective because it is unorganized. Hence, " the second 

 step in science making, after recording the new original observations 

 so as to make them accessible to others, is the collation of these same 

 observations into broad general results. The aim is to eliminate the 

 personal factor and to impart the character of impersonal absolute 

 validity to the conclusions. 



" In addition to the original memoirs science profits by a large 

 number of publications, almost all of v/hich are of modern, often of 

 very recent, creation. Broadly speaking, their aim is to promote that 

 collation which is begun in the original memoirs. Germany is the 

 home of most of these undertakings, which are familiar to us under 

 the names of ' J ahresherichte,^ ' C entrdlhldtter^ and ' Ergehnisse.'' " 



Following these agencies come the handbooks, which, although more 

 remote from the original investigation, are historically older than 

 the annual reviews and abstract journals. lAHiile formerly one man 

 could master his whole science and keep up with the new discoveries, 

 to-day this is impossible, and hence the modern scientific handbook 

 is a composite, a result of cooperation in which specialists contribute 

 the chapters on their respective divisions of the subject. 



The present method of recording and collating scientific discoveries, 

 therefore, comprises three stages : " First^ the record of the individual 

 personal knowledge ; second, the conversion of the personal knowledge 

 by A^erification and collation into valid impersonal knowledge; thirds 

 the systematic coordination and condensation of the conclusions. 

 . . . As soon as the discoveries are properly collated and suffi- 

 ciently verified they become permanent parts of science. Many defi- 

 nitions of science have been given, and did time permit it might be 



