Fakers of Science a 
life and service? Why, in short, must we have faking of science, where 
science, with or without faking, has no connection with the subject? 
* * * * * * 
It may appear that in this discussion I have dealt harshly with 
well-intentioned classes of people,—that I have magnified a fancied 
trespass upon our domain into a well-nigh capital offense. But, fellow 
scientists, in my profession, as in that of many of you, I associate con- 
stantly with young people, eager to learn of the whys and wherefores 
of life. In the college is eternal spring-time of youth. We as teachers, 
may eventually grow old but, figuratively at least, our classes never 
do. I cannot look into the faces of inquiring youth day after day, year 
after year, and forgive myself for any deception regarding the subject 
I am teaching. How, then, can I forgive deception on the part of 
other teachers? If we lie to our students we are unworthy of the 
high duty that is ours. 
For all of us who are teachers of science, let us note that science 
has one insistent demand, which is that we shall teach the truth, accord- 
ing to our best lights, welcome or unwelcome though the truth may be 
to others. 
So for our fakers of science. Their name is legion, though we have 
discussed but a select few. Wherever there is a truth there is a cor- 
responding untruth that may be made to resemble the truth and if there 
be any possibility of temporary profit, credit or honor in exploiting the 
untruth, the faker arises, ready for the job. The work of progress is 
thus complicated by the efforts of those who persist in pulling in the 
wrong direction. In this connection I am fond of quoting from Thomas 
Carlyle, who wrote: 
“We have, simply, to carry the whole world and its businesses 
upon our backs, we poor united Human Species; to carry it, and 
shove it forward, from day to day, somehow or other, among us, 
or else be ground to powder under it, one and all. No light task, 
let me tell you, even if each did his part, honestly, which each 
doesn’t, by any means. No, only the noble lift willingly with their 
whole strength, at the general burden; and in such a crowd, after 
all your drillings, regulatings, and attempts at equitable distribu- 
tion, and compulsion, what deceptions are still practicable, what 
errors are inevitable! Many cunning, ignoble fellows shirk the 
labor altogether; and instead of faithfully lifting at the immeasur- 
able universal handbarrow with its thousand-million handles, con- 
trive to get on some ledge of it, and be lifted!” 
Carlyle was discussing neither science nor fakers of science, yet 
his remarks could scarcely be more apropos of any other subject. Be- 
side this eloquent enunciation of the problem of life and this denunci- 
ation of the obstructionist of progress, our remarks are feeble and im- 
potent. Yet, until another Carlyle shall arise to lambast the modern 
faker of science, we shall have to be content with saying in our own 
way, the indignation that is in us. This I have tried to do. 
Purdue University. 
