SECTION F BACTERIOLOGY 



(Hall 15, September 24, 10 a. m.) 



CHAIRMAN: PROFESSOR HAROLD C. ERNST, Harvard University. 

 SPEAKERS: PROFESSOR EDWIN O. JORDAN, University of Chicago. 



PROFESSOR THEOBALD SMITH, Harvard University. 

 SECRETARY: Dr. P. H. Hiss, JR., Columbia University. 



RELATIONS OF BACTERIOLOGY TO OTHER SCIENCES 



BY EDWIN OAKES JORDAN 



[Edwin Oakes Jordan, Associate Professor of Bacteriology, University of Chicago, 

 Chief of Serum Division, Memorial Institute for Infectious Diseases, b. July 28, 

 1866, Thomaston, Maine. S.B. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1888; 

 Ph.D. Clark University, 1892; Post-graduate, Clark University, 1890-92; Pas- 

 teur Institute, Paris, 1896. Lecturer on Biology, Massachusetts Institute of 

 Technology, 1889-90; Associate in Anatomy, University of Chicago, 1892-93; 

 Instructor, ibid. 1893-95. Member of the American Public Health Associa- 

 tion; The Society for Experimental Biology and Medicine; Association of 

 American Pathologists and Bacteriologists; Society of American Bacteriologists; 

 Fellow of American Association for the Advancement of Science. Translated 

 Huepe's Bacteriology; Editor of The Journal of Infectious Diseases.] 



IT is possibly a contemporary delusion that we are living in a pe- 

 riod of unexampled mental activity. The life of the intrepid modern 

 scholar affords opportunity for self-deception. If one becomes a 

 member of a sufficient number of learned and quasi-learned societies, 

 and attends committee meetings for an adequate variety of purposes, 

 the impression of profitable intellectual endeavor may be prematurely 

 acquired. There is much, however, to account for the prevailing 

 sensation of breathless advance. The physiologic and psychologic 

 accompaniments of a breakneck pace are not altogether lacking 

 in the modern world, and there are bacteriologists, in particular, 

 who will lend a credent ear to affirmations of the rapidity of scien- 

 tific progress. However this may be, few can question that the 

 development of the science of bacteriology has been marked by an 

 unusual tempo. To those who have followed this development 

 closely, discovery has trod upon the heels of discovery in bewil- 

 dering succession. The scant thirty years of its history have been 

 crowded with feverish activities, which have found their best justi- 

 fication in the results accomplished. At present the science touches 

 nearly many human interests, and sustains manifold and far-reaching 

 relations to the whole body of natural knowledge. It is no matter 

 for surprise that such should be the case with a science that owes 



