SOLAR PHYSICS COMMITTEE 41 



II. Besides the above reasons, which are of international 

 significance, there are others which may be 

 classified as 



(d) Purely Scientific Reasons. 



Apart from the educational value of astronomical research, 

 the doctrine that all work should be relegated to the country 

 most suitable for it, requires that advantage should be taken of 

 the unique climatic conditions of Australia, which is unrivalled 

 in the abundance of her sunshine and the clearness of her atmo- 

 sphere. Such problems as the nature and cause of sun spots, 

 to which the recent discovery in America of vast vortices and 

 intense magnetic fields has added so much importance — the nature 

 of the corona and other solar appendages — the distribution of the 

 elements over the solar disc — the pressure of the sun's atmosphere 

 — solar rotation — the cause of the remarkable differences between 

 the spectra from the centre of the disc and from the limb — the 

 connection between solar disturbances and terrestrial phe- 

 nomena are all questions of world-wide interest, and it may be 

 hoped that Australia will share in the task of elucidating them. 



(e) Practical Reasons — 



It would be to Australia's advantage to undertake the work. 

 Much has been written about the connection between solar and 

 terrestrial phenomena, between sunspots and rainfall, barometric 

 pressure, etc., and it is the earnest hope of solar investigators 

 that this subject may be fully dealt with at Observatories well 

 equipped for the purpose. The Council of the Royal Society of 

 London urges the establishment of a Solar Observatory in 

 Australia, " especially as the subject includes the connection 

 between solar changes and meteorological and magnetic pheno- 

 mena." Moreover, the great work on solar radiation carried 

 out in Washington by the Astrophysical Observatory of the Smith- 

 sonian Institution "was deliberately undertaken in the hope of 

 improving weather forecasts," and for furthering this study 

 Australia is exceptionally well placed. It is well known that the 

 newly-established Indian Solar Observatory has been erected in 

 the belief that it will ultimately furnish results of direct value in 

 famine prediction, the action taken by the India Office being 

 based upon the Indian Famine Commission Report of 1880. The 

 Indian observations cannot, however, be linked up with those of 

 the American Observatories until an Australian station is estab- 

 lished, and Australia's interest in problems connected with her 

 rainfall well fit her to join India in attempting to elucidate them. 



Attention may also be drawn to the communication from 

 the Smithsonian Institution, given on page 45, in which it is stated 

 that " it may be fairly claimed that an Australian Solar Observa- 

 tory would have a direct value for the people of Australia. Indeed, 

 there is no branch of astronomy which more fully deserves the 

 support of the Government because of its probable utility than 

 the study of solar radiation in its relations to life and climate 



