171 



SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



Bifliciilties 

 igestion 



perature of 40 F. and a pressure of one 

 ton per square inch than it is at 60 F. 

 and the ordinary barometric pressure of the 

 sea-level is a question that has not yet been 

 brought to an experimental test. 



Whatever the answer to this question may 

 be, the fact remains that a greater percent- 

 age of animals from the deep sea exhibit 

 some sort of phosphorescent light when 

 brought on deck than animals that live in 

 shallow water. HICKSON Fauna of the Deep 

 Sea, eh. 4, p. 76. (A., 1894.) 



833. DIFFICULTY OF OBTAINING 

 KNOWLEDGE OF MANLIKE APES Sto- 

 ries Largely Mythical. Sound knowledge 

 respecting the habits and mode of life of the 

 manlike apes has been even more difficult of 

 attainment than correct information regard- 

 ing their structure. 



Once in a generation, a Wallace may be 

 found physically, mentally, and morally 

 qualified to wander unscathed through the 

 tropical wilds of America and of Asia, to 

 form magnificent collections as he wanders, 

 and withal to think out sagaciously the con- 

 clusions suggested by his collections; but, 

 to the ordinary explorer or collector, the 

 dense forests of equatorial Asia and Africa, 

 which constitute the favorite habitation of 

 the orang, the chimpanzee, and the gorilla, 

 present difficulties of no ordinary magni- 

 tude; and the man who risks his life by 

 even a short visit to the malarious shores of 

 those regions may well be excused if he 

 shrinks from facing the dangers of the inte- 

 rior; if he contents himself with stimula- 

 ting the industry of the better-seasoned na- 

 tives, and collecting and collating the more 

 or less mythical reports and traditions with 

 which they are too ready to supply him. 



In such a manner most of the earlier ac- 

 counts of the habits of the manlike apes 

 originated; and even now a good deal of 

 what passes current must be admitted to 

 have no very safe foundation. The best in- 

 formation we possess is that based almost 

 wholly on direct European testimony re- 

 specting the gibbons ; the next best evidence 

 relates to the orangs; while our knowledge 

 of the habits of the chimpanzee and the go- 

 rilla stands much in need of support and en- 

 largement by additional testimony from in- 

 structed European eye-witnesses. HUXLEY 

 Man's Place in Nature, p. 203. (Hum.) 



834. DIFFICULTY OF SOCIOLOGICAL 



STUDY Positivism Would Assign It to a 

 Caste Possibilities of Persecution in Name 

 of Science. In M. Comte's opinion, the pe- 

 culiarly complicated nature of sociological 

 studies, and the great amount of previous 

 knowledge and intellectual discipline requi- 

 site for them, together with the serious con- 

 sequences that may be produced by even 

 temporary errors on such subjects, render it 

 necessary, in the case of ethics and politics, 

 still more than of mathematics and physics, 

 that whatever legal liberty may exist of 

 questioning and discussing, the opinions of 



mankind should really be formed for them 

 by an exceedingly small number of minds of 

 the highest class, trained to the task by the 

 most thorough and laborious mental prep- 

 aration; and that the questioning of their 

 conclusions by any one not of an equivalent 

 grade of intellect and instruction should be 

 accounted equally presumptuous, and more 

 blamable, than the attempts occasionally 

 made by sciolists to refute the Newtonian 

 astronomy. All this is, in a spnse, true; but 

 we confess our sympathy with those who feel 

 towards it like the man in the story, who, 

 being asked whether he admitted that six 

 and five make eleven, refused to give an> 

 answer until he knew what use was to 

 be made of it. MILL Positive Philosophy 

 of Auguste Comte, p. 70. (H. H. & Co., 

 1887.) 



835. DIFFICULTY OF WIDE-SPREAD 



REFORMS Early Fixedness of Mental States 

 New Conceptions Rarely Acquired in La- 

 ter Life. Most men begin to be old fogies 

 at the age of twenty-five. It is true that a 

 grown-up adult keeps gaining well into mid- 

 dle age a great knowledge of details, and a 

 great acquaintance with individual cases 

 connected with his profession or business 

 life. In this sense, his conceptions increase 

 during a very long period; for his knowl- 

 edge grows more extensive and minute. But 

 the larger categories of conception, the sorts 

 of thing, and wider classes of relation be- 

 tween things, of which w T e take cognizance, 

 are all got into the mind at a comparatively 

 youthful date. Few men ever do acquaint 

 themselves with the principles of a new 

 science after even twenty-five. If you do not 

 study political economy in college, it is a 

 thousand to one that its main conceptions 

 will remain unknown to you through life. 

 Similarly with biology, similarly with elec- 

 tricity. What percentage of persons now 

 fifty years old have any definite conception 

 whatever of a dynamo, or how the trolley- 

 cars are made to run ? Surely, a small frac- 

 tion of one per cent. But the boys in col- 

 leges are all acquiring these conceptions. 

 JAMES Talks to Teachers, ch. 14, p. 166. (H. 

 H. & Co., 1900.) 



836. DIGESTION OF ANIMAL MAT- 

 TER BY PLANTS Reversal of the Common 

 Order of Nature Man Cannot Set Bound- 

 aries of Possibility. As we have seen that 

 nitrogenous fluids act very differently on 

 the leaves of Drosera [the sun-dew] from 

 non-nitrogenous fluids, and as the leaves re- 

 main clasped for a much longer time over 

 various organic bodies than over inorganic 

 bodies, such as bits of glass, cinder, wood, 

 etc., it becomes an interesting inquiry 

 whether they can only absorb matter already 

 in solution, or render it soluble that is, 

 have the power of digestion. We shall im- 

 mediately see that they certainly have this 

 power, and that they act on albuminous 

 compounds in exactly the same manner as 

 does the gastric juice of mammals; the di- 



