QUANTITATIVE ENTOMOLOGY. 
C. W. WoopwortH. 
The best answer to the question, ‘‘ What is it that we con- 
sider worth while in Entomology,’’ is given by the record of our 
activities. There are innumerable descriptions of rare new 
species of insects. Peculiar habits or structures receive detailed 
consideration. Unusual inter-relationships between insects and 
their environment compel our attention .and interest. An 
insect that is noticed for the first time to attack our crops or 
our persons is investigated with great thoroughness. 
When we make textbooks we endeavor to assemble and 
arrange in an orderly fashion this wonderful wealth of detail. 
Throughout the exceptional, the unique and the unexpected 
are given the emphasis. . All of this is right and proper. It 
is in this way that all sciences have been developed, but this 
does not constitute the final goal nor leading method of science. 
Finally, the predominating question becomes not what, but 
how much? Finally, it is a question of values. Thus in 
physics we have ceased to give much prominence to the mere 
operation of physical laws, but must measure the results with 
such accuracy that this science has almost become a branch 
of mathematics. Likewise in chemistry the wonderful advances 
of the subject in later years both in theoretical and technical 
lines depend upon the study of reactions quantitatively. 
The present paper is intended as suggestions and a plea 
for the development of a quantitative entomology. Qualitative 
work must not cease nor be abated, but to it should be added 
the higher development of the subject which will finally come 
to be considered the essential portion of the science. 
A beginning has already been made in nearly every depart- 
ment of entomology towards this quantitative method of 
study, enough to give us some idea of the simpler lines of 
procedure and of the results likely to be secured. Quantitative 
entomology is not therefore a wholly new idea, but is a great 
territory, the boundaries only of which have been explored 
and in the depths of which we may expect to find the chief 
justification for our endeavors. 
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