July 14, 192 1] 



NATURE 



613 



ised by immediacy. But this immediacy, if we 

 have understood the author correctly, is always 

 relative : the reasoning has been so swift that we 

 have not noticed the stages. Intuition is simply a 

 telescoping of that imaginative experimenting in 

 which all reasoning consists. No one, we venture 

 to suggest, would adopt such a view had he 

 studied instinctive behaviour directly and in its 

 general aspect without attempting to base theories 

 of genesis on specially induced experiments, 

 whether on the infusoria or on the higher verte- 

 brates. The theory may not be wrong, but the 

 method is suspect. 



One of the most penetrating and instructive sec- 

 tions is the critical review of the forms of mathe- 

 matical reasoning. Algebra stands at the top 

 of the scale, logistic at the bottom. The former 

 never parts company completely with the concrete 

 as the latter does. Moreover, logistic stands con- 

 demned in our author's view for its utter inability 

 to advance by reasoning to any new fact. Creative 

 imagination is the driving force of reasoning, and 

 this is not only absent from, but also definitely 

 eschewed by, logistic. 



Where Signor Rignano will seem to some to 

 fail is in what he denies rather than in what he 

 affirms. The concept when detached from the 

 sensible imagination is for him purely verbal. A 

 concept, self-contained and self-subsistent, a con- 

 crete universal, has no place in his theory of 

 reasoning, and in itself is unintelligibly. The 

 polemic against metaphysics seems to us the 

 weakest part of his book, and as it is quite un- 

 necessary to his argument its introduction is to be 

 regretted. The metaphysical inquirer is described 

 as one who is determined at all costs to save 

 values. He is moved by affective, and not by 

 intellective, motives. The reply is simply that, as 

 a matter of fact, it is notoriously untrue. The philo- 

 sopher, as philosopher, is absolutely indifferexit to 

 values as values. What impels him to meta- 

 physical inquiry is not desire, or emotion, or affec- 

 tive consideration of any kind ; it is the pure need 

 of intellectual satisfaction. Even the author pro- 

 tests that the most "positive" and least 

 metaphysical of inquirers cannot be indiffer- 

 ent to values — why, then, is it presumed to 

 vitiate the motive in one case and not in the 

 other? 



Regarded from the author's point of view, as it 

 should be, the book is full of interest, clear and 

 sustained in its argument, and maintained through- 

 out at a high level. We hope there will be a 

 good English translation, for it should prove an 

 excellent text-book for advanced courses. 



H. WiLDON Carr. 



NO. 2698, VOL. 107] 



Text-books on Theoretical Chemistry. 



(i) Die chemische Literatur und die Organisation 

 der Wissenschaft. By W. Ostwald. {Hand- 

 buch der allgemeinen Chemie. Band i.) 

 Pp. iv+i2o. (Leipzig: Akademische Verlags- 

 gesellschaft m.b.H. : Gustav Fock, 1919.) 



(2) The Foundations of Chemical Theory. By 

 Prof. R. M. Caven. Pp. viii + 266. (London : 

 Blackie and Son, Ltd., 1920.) 12s. 6d. net. 



(3) Inorganic Chemistry. By E. L Lewis. Third 

 (revised and enlarged) edition. Pp. xv + 443. 

 (Cambridge : At the University Press, 1920.) 

 95. net. 



(i) pROF. OSTWALD'S book constitutes 

 XT vol. i. of the " Handbuch der allge- 

 meinen Chemie " which he is editing in conjunc- 

 tion with a number of eminent collaborators — 

 Kuenen, Drucker, Marc, Bruni, Dutoit, Cohen, 

 Halban, Bredig, and others — all recognised 

 authorities on the several sections of physical 

 chemistry to which they contribute. This intro- 

 ductory volume is, in effect, a long and discursive 

 essay on the methods of propaganda of science 

 and on the graduar development of the means of 

 disseminating scientific truth. It traces the spread 

 of scientific knowledge through the agency of 

 societies, general and specialised, by means of dis- 

 cussion and publication, by scientific Journals, and 

 lastly by treatises, monographs, and text-books. 

 It contains nothing but what is generally known 

 to those familiar with the history of science, but 

 the story is put together with considerable skill, 

 and constitutes an eminently philosophical disquisi- 

 tion on an aspect of that history which has 

 hitherto had few expositors. 



Towards the conclusion of his essay Ostwald 

 gives a free rein to his imagination in seeking to 

 forecast the lines upon which the dissemination 

 of scientific knowledge must proceed in the future. 

 He is thus naturally led to what is an obsession 

 with him — the possibility of the universal language 

 — and we are treated to a short excursus on the 

 relative merits and disadvantages of Volapiik, 

 Esperanto, and Ido. Recent events, for which 

 Prof. Ostwald 's own countrymen are wholly 

 responsible, have absolutely shattered whatever 

 hopes he may have entertained of the speedy 

 realisation of his ideals. But, as he says in his 

 preface : "Die Schrift wurde bereits 1914 fertigge- 

 stellt und gesetzt : die Ausgabe ist durch den 

 Weltkrieg bisher verzogert worden." To allow 

 the concluding paragraphs to remain unaltered 

 when the work appeared in 1919 is characteristic 

 of German mentality. It requires a very robust 

 faith in the future to believe in their appositeness 

 in present circumstances. We fear that the 



