THE EXISTENCE OF PLANETS ABOUT THE FIXED 



STARS. 



By T. J. J. SEE. 

 (Read April 23, 1910.) 



The question of the existence of planets about the fixed stars 

 is an old one, and has been more or less discussed by astronomers 

 ever since the popularization of Copernican doctrines by Giordano 

 Bruno, who suffered martyrdom at Rome in the year 1600. Up 

 to the present time, however, there has been no rigorous criterion 

 for the construction of a conclusive argument ; and the discussion 

 has been comparatively unprofitable, except in the development and 

 expression of free opinion. Disputations leading to the expression 

 of individual opinion may be of some value, because new ideas may 

 thus be suggested, and accordingly such habits have been encour- 

 aged since the days of the Greeks, as we learn from the collections 

 of opinions handed down by such writers as Diogenes Laertius. 



But to render such efforts effective from a scientific stand- 

 point it is necessary to find criteria which make it possible to 

 build up a conclusive argument. The discussion then ceases to be 

 a mere record of individual opinion, and becomes an integral part 

 of science supported by the necessary and sufficient conditions re- 

 quired to ensure the validity of accurate mathematical reasoning. 

 This improvement in our knowledge of the existence of planets 

 about the fixed stars has been made possible by the writer's recent 

 discoveries in cosmical evolution, and we shall, therefore, give a 

 brief summary of the argument as it stands today. 



So long as we did not know the exact process involved in the 

 formation of the solar system it was possible to argue that just as 

 planets exist about our sun, so too, they may by analogy be inferred 

 to exist also about other fixed stars. This natural inference rests 

 on the implied uniformity of the creative process involved in the 

 development of the planets. Obviously we could not observe 



