DISCOVERY 



79 



Reviews of Books 



SOJklE BOOKS ON PHYSICS 



fa) What is Science? By Norman Campbell, Sc.D. 



(Methuen, 5s.) 

 (b) Atomic Theories. By F. H. Loring. (Methuen, 



I2S. 6d.) 

 Ic) Ftfiy Years of Electricity. By J. A. Fleming, D.Sc., 



F.R.S. (The Wireless Press, 30s.) 



{a) Dr. Norman Campbell has written this book with 

 the hope of encouraging the study of science in the classes 

 of the Workers' Educational Association. His object 

 has been to explain what are the aims and objects of 

 science, and what kind of satisfaction can be derived from 

 its study. He has aimed at drawing attention to those 

 aspects of its more abstruse departments which may 

 be expected to appeal to men and women of wide intel- 

 lectual sympathies. The chapter headings are : Two 

 Aspects of Science ; Science and Nature ; The Laws 

 of Science ; The Discovery of Laws ; The Explanation 

 of Laws ; Measurement ; Numerical Laws and the use of 

 Mathematics in Science ; and The Applications of Science. 

 These should give a reader an idea of the contents. 



This is a valuable book, and much of the value lies in 

 the exposition, which is simple, scientific, and eminently 

 sane. Dr. Campbell has written a book which makes a 

 subject, by no means a simple one, not only intelligible, but 

 really interesting and even fascinating, and this he has 

 done in simple English without employing mathematics 

 or technical expressions. Few books have come to my 

 notice which can be recommended to the reader more 

 whole-heartedly than this one. 



(b) The greater part of Mr. Loring's book deals with 

 subjects too specialised in character to be followed except 

 in outline by readers of this journal, but as it is the first 

 book to deal comprehensively with the newer subjects 

 which are now engaging the attention of many of the 

 present generation of scientists, it would not be right 

 to pass it over in silence. 



The author has gathered together in book form the 

 main facts and theories of the recent work on the atom 

 associated with the names of Aston, Bohr, Bragg, Lang- 

 muir, Planck, Rutherford, and J. J. Thomson. But it is 

 a curious book. Many will find it a mine of information, 

 but the illumination in the mine is curiously uneven, and 

 it is essential that one should watch one's step. The book 

 suffers because the author has written necessarily from 

 the point of view of a special reporter who tries to set 

 down faithfully what he has heard or been told, instead 

 of from that of one who is inside the subject, and who can 

 really write about it critically. 



The subject at present is too unsettled to be described in a 

 book ; moreover, it is too dif&cult for all but those who have 

 taken their degree. Why, then, not wait for more tranquil 

 times, and leave the research man to do until then what 

 he is easily capable of doing, namely, to hunt up the 

 necessary information in the original papers themselves ? 



The first four chapters deal with the atom, the nucleus, 

 atomic weights, and isotopes ; Chapter V with X-ray 

 spectra ; and Chapters VI and VII with radio-activity 

 and crystal structure as clues to atomic structure. In 

 Chapters VIII and IX are given accounts of Rutherford's 

 atom and the quantum theor\' ; and these lead logically 

 to Chapter X, which discusses the Rutherford-Bohr atom. 

 Six of the later chapters deal with the recent Lewis- 

 Langmuir atomic theory, which was discussed at the British 

 Association at Edinburgh. The book finishes up with 

 accounts of atomic and solar energy, the magnetic pro- 

 perties of the elements, and a series of appendices. 



The author has covered an enormous field, and has 

 really shown great energy and enthusiasm, but many 

 paragraphs appear as though they were the first draft 

 and badly require rewriting. The arrangement of chap- 

 ters is very poor, being in places " all anyhow." The 

 author, too, has a fondness for interpolating oddments of 

 information that are irrelevant and unnecessary. One of 

 the appendices, for example, explains the meaning of 

 negative indices. Surely a reader who is capable of under- 

 standing the Rutherford-Bohr atom, or of following the 

 many explanations which Langmuir's theory involves, 

 need hardly be told or even reminded that lo"' is the 

 same as 'ooi ! 



(c) The Wireless Press are to be congratulated on 

 pubhshing this large and handsome book on Applied 

 Electricity by Professor J. A. Fleming. Its sub-title, 

 the Memories of an Electrical Engineer, suggests a bio- 

 graphical treatment, but the book is neither treatise nor 

 biography, but one of those comprehensive accounts of 

 a subject, written for the intelligent general reader, which 

 a re%iewer is delighted to welcome from an author com- 

 petent both in knowiedge and in exposition. 



This book places before the reader a popular but 



careful and comprehensive view of the chief triumphs of 



applied electricity during the last half-century. This 



" fifty years of Europe" is the period of Dr. Fleming's 



service in electricity. One chapter deals vvith the great 



improvements made in telegraphing and telephoning in 



the five decades, another with electric lighting, a third with 



electric cooking, heating, and furnaces, a fourth with 



power transmission, a fifth with wireless telegraphy and 



telephony, and so on for all the principal divisions of 



applied electricity. Even the theory is not overlooked, 



and an interesting chapter on the great strides made in 



that department of physics is included. 



A. S. R. 



Prehistory : A Study of Early Cultures in Europe and the 



Mediterranean Basin. By M. C. Burkitt, M.A.. 



F.G.S., with a short Preface by L'Abbe Breuil, 



Professor at the Institute of Human Palaeontology, 



Paris. (Cambridge University Press, 35s.) 



Mr. Burkitt has attempted to supply a need which everj^ 



student of prehistoric archaeology has long felt. It is a 



remarkable fact that there should still be no modern book 



in the English language dealing with prehistoric archaeology 



as a whole and written by one who has himself conducted 



researches in each department of it. Good and indis- 



