Modern Science : A Criticism 



form, but to which it has never given and never 

 can give any definite meaning. ^ 



Similarly with other generalities of Science : 

 the " law " of the Conservation of Energy, the 

 " law " of the Survival of the Fittest — the more 

 you think about them the less possible is it to give 

 any really intelligible sense to them. The very 

 word Fittest really begs the question which is 

 under consideration, and the whole Conservation 

 law is merely an attenuation of the already much 

 attenuated " law " of Gravitation. The Chemical 

 Elements themselves are nothing but the pro- 

 jection on the external world of concepts consisting 

 of three or four attributes each : they are not 

 more real, but very much less real than the indi- 

 vidual objects which they are supposed to account 

 for ; and their " elementary " character is merely 

 fictional. It probably is in fact as absurd to speak 

 of pure carbon or pure gold, as of a pure monkey 

 or a pure dog. There are no such things, except 

 as they may be arrived at by arbitrary definition 

 and the method of ignorance. 



In the search for exactness, then, Science has 

 been continually led on to discard the human and 

 personal elements in phenomena, in the hope 

 of finding some residuum as it were behind them 



I I am not, of course, here arguing against the use of ther- 

 mometers or other instruments for practical purposes. This is 

 certainly the legitimate field of Science. But (as in the case of 

 prediction before mentioned) the exactness of results obtained is 

 a very different matter from the truth of the generalities which 

 are supposed to underlie these results. In using a thermom.eter 

 you need not even mention the word " temperature." 



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