GENERAL BIOLOGY 



or conies to a conclusion without all obtainable knowledge, he cannot 

 approach correctness even this often. 



The evidence forces the conclusion that, under present conditions, 

 if we should know all that is possible for a human being to know, we 

 could be right only about one-half the time. As knowledge is the only 

 way in which we can be right even as frequently as this, it follows that 

 in instances w r here an opinion is called forth without any knowledge, a 

 man forms approximately 215 erroneous conclusions to every one that 

 is correct. The scriptural command becomes intelligible : "Get ye there- 

 fore knowledge." 



It has been said that the evidence from diagnostic sources is almost 

 ideal to illustrate the point here made. Everything we do that requires 

 an opinion is pure diagnosis. In other words, every time one passes 

 a judgment upon the facts presented, it is diagnosis of some kind, and 

 any error in our diagnosis means that no intelligent suggestion can 

 come forth as to a remedy, except on the basis of one correct one to 

 215 erroneous ones. The diagnosis must be correct or the remedy is 

 absurd with the only possible exception of a guess accidentally correct. 



No intelligent person wishes to have his government run, his estate 

 adjusted, his house built, or his farm managed upon pure guess work 

 in which the chances are two hundred and fifteen times more wrong- 

 things being done than right ones. And this is not only the case in 

 medicine, dentistry, and the professions at large, but in the every-day 

 business world as well. Dun and Bradstreet, who keep a record of every 

 individual entering, as well as every one failing in business, tell us that 

 95 out of every 100 men w r ho enter a commercial line for themselves 

 fail at some time in their lives. This is due, not only to an ignorance 

 of the particular line of work they may enter, but also to ignorance of 

 business principles and methods at large. 



To many persons it seems that the purely practically-trained in- 

 dividual is better equipped than he whose training has been theoretical, 

 and individuals usually mentioned as examples to illustrate this point 

 <of view are always some of the ablest practically-trained men to be 

 found, who are then compared with some of the poorest theoretically- 

 trained. Because a boy is sent to college does not mean anything 

 except, that, if he has a capacity for the work that he there takes up ; 

 he will be able to get the practical side of his study, while in addition 

 he will learn why he does what he does, when he does it. Any man 

 with great ability along a given line will naturally know more, and be 

 able to work better along that line than any man without such capacity 

 who has merely taken some theoretical course. But, if we take two 

 men of equal intelligence and capacity, who take up, let us say, the 

 plumber's trade, he who has mastered both the practical and the theo- 

 retical side of his work will always be superior to him who has become 

 interested in only one or the other. It must be remembered that 



