

DISCOVERY 



A MONTHLY POPULAR 

 JOURNAL or KNOWTLEDGE 



No. 1. JANUARY 1920. 



PRICE 6d. NET. 



DISCOVERY, A Monthly Popular Journal of Know- 

 ledge. 



Edited by A. S. Russell, M.C. D.Sc, 8 Severn Road, 

 Sheffield, to whom all Editorial Cominnnications should be 

 addressed . 



Published by John Murray, 50.4 Albemarle Street, 

 London. W.i, to whom all Business Communications 

 should be addressed. 



Advertisement Office: 16 Regent Street, London, 

 S.W.i. 



Annual Subscription 6s., or post free ys. 6d. Single 

 numbers 6d. net ; post free yld. 



Editorial Notes 



With these notes we introduce Discovery. The 

 journal has for its aim a popular description of the 

 advance made in the chief subjects in which investiga- 

 tions are being actively pursued. We hope to give 

 also, from time to time, some account of new ideas 

 in subjects which do not lend themselves to definite 

 and concrete " discoveries " as ordinarily understood, 

 but in which new methods and new points of view, 

 of interest and importance to everyone, are being 

 developed. The articles, singly or in a series, will 

 deal with their subjects in such a way as to make clear 

 the interesting features of the discoveries with which 

 they deal, and will be written in plain, simple language 

 by contributors who can speak with authority in their 

 own branch of knowledge. The general reader, who 

 has neither time nor opportunity to pursue specialised 

 study, will thus be able to obtain at first hand an 

 account, which he can understand, of the chief things 

 which the experts are doing or have done in all the 

 chief branches of knowledge. 



Our aim is to interest the reader, not to preach any 

 special doctrine, or to lecture on any particular subject. 

 We are not, therefore, narrowing our attention to a few 

 subjects, whether literary or scientific, but mean to 

 take all knowledge as our province. Of course, in any 



particular number the limits of space will confine us to 

 a few subjects only; but in time we hope to cover all 

 subjects in which discoveries or new points of view 

 are of sufficient interest to be described. At the 

 present moment, while there are many periodicals 

 which are written for specialists by specialists, and 

 many more in which popular descriptions of discoveries 

 are given by journalists, there is none in which the 

 vast amount of new work and of new ideas in various 

 subjects is described, either by the men themselves 

 who are doing the work, or by men who are " inside " 

 the subjects they are writing about. We hope to 

 get such men to write for Discovery, and to write 

 not in the language of their specialism, but in that 

 simpler tongue which we plain men do understand — ■ 

 namel}', English. 



Our object, then, is to give readers an interest both 

 in the Sciences and in the Humanities by making the 

 work of the specialists in both as plain as possible. 

 Whether we fail or not remains to be seen. We mean 

 to try. It is a thing worth trying for. In the past, 

 unfortunately, there has been considerable opposition 

 between the representatives of science and those of 

 the humane studies. Now, since the war, it is becom- 

 ing abundantly recognised that the interests of these 

 two somewhat artificial divisions of knowledge are not 

 hostile, but complementary ; and that the welfare of 

 everybody depends upon advances being made in both 

 of these, and on our recognising the necessity of both. 



With increase in knowledge there has been a ten- 

 dency for the specialist to separate himself from the 

 amateur, the consequence being that the former works 

 with, and on behalf of, a small hierarchy of kindred 

 spirits, which has little or no dealings with outside 

 people. The biggest things which these specialists 

 do may, of course, become known after a time — often 

 a very long time; but there are many interesting 

 facts, theories, and points of view, not of such capital 

 importance, which never come into the ken of the 



