6i2 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



unfavorable reception of Ohm's conclusions. Professor H. W. Dove, of Berlin, 

 says that, "in the Berlin JahrbucJier fiir wissenschaftliche Eriiik, Ohm's theory 

 was named a web of naked fancies, which could never find the semblance of 

 support from even the most superficial observation of facts." "He who looks 

 at the world, ' ' proceeds the writer, ' ' with the eye of reverence must turn aside 

 from this book as the result of an incurable delusion, whose sole effect is to de- 

 tract from the dignity of nature." 



In seeking to explain how this extraordinary opinion came to be held 

 the following facts will be of aid : 



1. The paper containing Ohm's principal experimental results was 

 published in a German scientific periodical and has never been trans- 

 lated, whereas his theoretical deductions, published in German the 

 very next year, have since gone through two English and one French 

 edition. The theoretical results were therefore far more widely 

 diffused than were the experimental. Indeed it would be easy for a 

 reader of both publications to confuse the priority of two so nearly 

 simultaneous documents. 



2. It was only by virtue of the recognition, tardily but distinctly 

 rendered, on the part of Fechner in Germany, Lenz in Russia, Wheat- 

 stone and others in England, that Ohm came out of obscurity. Until 

 this was the case and recognition was given by men of recognized 

 standing, there was little reason why any more attention should be 

 given Dr. Ohm and his meager set of experiments than to a number of 

 equally reliable and equally little-known workers, whose results dis- 

 agreed with his. 



3. To whatever extent the English translation may be supposed to 

 have supplied information as to the degree of interdependence of theory 

 and experiment matters could not have been helped by an inexcusable 

 error of translation of a sentence, the German of which is as follows: 

 " Die Grosse des IJberganges zwischen zwei zunachst beisamen elementen 

 habe ich unter iibrigens gleichen umstanden dem Unterschiede der in 

 beiden Elementem befindlichen elektrischen Kriifte proportional 

 gesetzt." This sentence occurs near the beginning of tlie book and 

 immediately after an intimation that his hypothesis depends in part on 

 experiment, and a wrong rendering must have conveyed a false impres- 

 sion of the real character of the experiments, and therefore of their 

 value. The rendition of this important sentence is: "The magnitude 

 of the transition between two adjacent particles under otherwise 

 exactly similar circumstances, I have a?-sumed as being proportional to 

 the difference of their temperatures.'"^ How the word " temperature " 

 came to be rendered for " elektrischen Krafte " is difficult to see, and it 

 can not be called an improvement on the original. 



4. In his paper of 1826 Ohm did not very fully set forth part II. 



1 A correct translation is given on a former page. 



