Modern Science : A Criticism 



of Nature) — our knowledge of it must be either 

 absolute or relative. But we cannot know the 

 absolute path ; and as to the relative, why all we 

 can say is that it does not exist (any more thain 

 species exists) — we cannot break up Nature so ; 

 it is not a thing in Nature, but in our own minds 

 — it is a view and a fiction. i 



Again, let us take an example from Physics 

 — Boyle's law of the compressibility of gases. 

 This law states that, the temperature remaining 

 constant, the volume of a given quantity of gas is 

 inversely proportional to its pressure. It is a 

 law which has been made a good deal of, and at 

 one time was thought to be true, i.e.^ it was thought 

 to be a statement of fact. A more extended and 

 careful observation, however, shows that it is only 

 true under so many limitations, that, like the 

 elHpse in Astronomy, it must be regarded as a 

 convenient fiction and nothing more. It appears 

 that air follows the supposed law pretty well, 

 but not by any means exactly except within very 

 narrow limits of pressure ; other gases, such as 

 carbonic acid and hydrogen, deviate from it very 

 considerably — some more than others, and some 

 in one direction and some in the opposite. It was 

 found, among other things, that the nearer a gas 

 was to its liquefying point, the greater was the 

 deviation from the supposed law, and the con- 

 clusion was jumped at that the law was true for 



^ Such fictions, however, are (I need not say) quite necessary 

 as our only means of thinking out, however imperfectly, the 

 problems before us (1920). 



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