202 FROM NEBULA TO NEBULA 



and at equal speed, with the planet, that Doctor See pred- 

 icates a "vast amount of nebulous resistance ! ' ' And, 

 finally, because he sub-consciously sees the preposterous- 

 ness of his pretensions, he strategically diverts attention 

 to an already general divination that other planets may 

 one day be discovered beyond Neptune, as if laying in 

 advance the foundation for a future claim to prophecy 

 and corroboration should the expected come true. 



THE TIDAL-EVOLUTION THEORY 



It was in the year 1755 that Kant published his work 

 on The History of Nature and Theory of the Heavens, in 

 which he maintained that, because of tidal friction, the 

 earth's axial rotation is slowing up and our day conse- 

 quently lengthening. His argument was, of course, 

 based on Newton's theory of tidal formation, and, grant- 

 ing the correctness of that, Kant was undoubtedly right. 

 He was one of the very few who have had an inkling of 

 the truth that celestial mechanics is essentially the same 

 prosaic thing as everyday terrestrial mechanics and not 

 the poetic-license monstrosity that Newtonianism and 

 Laplacianism have pictured it. He looked upon the earth 

 genuinely as a physical object capable of being stopped 

 or retarded like any other, given the natural forces; al- 

 though it must be confessed he seems to have found noth- 

 ing amiss in the silly notion that the earth perennially 

 centrifugalizes her equatorial waters without the con- 

 sumption of power. Though straining on the gnat, he 

 experienced no difficulty in negotiating the camel. 



Remarkable as it may seem to the uninitiated, as- 

 tronomers have found a way to test Kant's conclusion. 

 This they have done by comparing the records of ancient 

 eclipses as far back as the 8th century B. C., almost three 

 milleniums. The result, however, has been negative, 

 demonstrating, according to Young (Genl. Astr., p. 105) : 



At present it can only be said that the change, if any has oc- 

 curred since astronomy became accurate, has been too small to be 

 detected. The day is certainly not longer or shorter by i-ioo of 

 a second than in the days of Ptolemy, and probably has not 

 changed by i-iooo of a second. 



