NA TURE 



[September 19, 1901 



THE DENVER MEETING OF THE 

 AMERICAN ASSOCIATION. 

 'T'HE American Association held its fiftieth annual 

 *■ meeting at Denver, Colorado, during the week 

 beginning August 24, under the presidency of Prof. 

 Charles S. Minot, of Harvard University. This is the 

 first time that the Association has met west of the banks 

 of the Mississippi River, and the meeting consequently 

 marks a somewhat important epoch in the development 

 of science in America. The central and western States 

 have occupied somewhat the same position towards the 

 Atlantic seaboard as this part of the country held in 

 relation to Europe until about twenty-five years ago. 

 Until the development of the eastern universities, the 

 scientific men of the United States were largely trained 

 abroad and looked chiefly to Great Britain and the 

 Continent for their scientific models. Up to the present 

 time the central and western States — engaged in sub- 

 duing Nature on a scale hitherto unattempted — have 

 depended on the Atlantic States for their education, their 

 science and their literature. The development of the 

 universities in the central and western States during the 

 past ten years has, however, been remarkable. Of the 

 forty universities in the world having more than 2000 

 students, seven — Michigan, Chicago, North-Western, 

 Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois and California — are 

 situated in this region ; and these institutions are not 

 mere schools, but universities and centres for the ad- 

 vancement of science, rivalling Leipzig or Cambridge in 

 their standards and in their productiveness The time 

 has obviously come when men of science in the vvest can 

 meet on equal terms their colleagues in the east, and 

 this event was signalised by the meeting of the Associa- 

 tion at Denver, midway between the Atlantic and Pacific 

 coasts. The meeting, though not so largely attended as 

 is usual further to the east — the members from either the 

 Atlantic or Pacific coasts had 2000 miles to travel — was 

 successful both on its social and scientific sides. Hos- 

 pitality is the virtue of a new country, and the people 

 of Denver were prepared to entertain the Association by 

 social functions and excursions in a way that is not usual 

 in the United States. 



Before the ten sections into which the Association is 

 divided some two hundred and twenty papers were pre- 

 sented, and while perhaps none of them was of such 

 importance as to deserve special notice, they represented 

 on the whole a high level of scientific work. The address 

 of the retiring president. Prof R. S. Woodward, of 

 Columbia University, appears in the present issue of 

 Nature. Public addresses on topics suited to the place 

 of meeting were made by Prof C. R. Van Hise, who 

 discussed the nature of ore deposits, and by Mr. Gifford 

 Pinchot, chief of the Bureau of Forestry, who considered 

 questions of irrigation and forestration. 



Owing to a change in procedure by which the chairmen 

 of sections give their addresses when retiring from office, 

 there were this year only five such addresses. Before 

 the section of chemistry, Prof J. H. Long, of North- 

 Western University, took as the subject of his address the 

 development of the teaching of chemistry in the United 

 States ; before the section of mechanical science and 

 engineering, Mr. John A. Brashear, acting Chancellor of 

 the Western University of Pennsylvania, described the 

 plans, drawn up at Mr. Carnegie's request, for a great 

 technical college at Pittsburg which would call for an 

 endowment of from 10,000,000 to 20,000,000 dollars ; before 

 the section of zoology. Prof. Charles B. Davenport, of the 

 University of Chicago, discussed the quantitative study 

 of variation — a subject to which he has devoted special 

 attention, being associated with Profs. Pearson and 

 Weldon in the newly established journal Biomclrika ; 

 before the section of anthropology, Mr. Amos W. Butler, 

 of the Indiana State Board of Charities, described the 

 methods used under his direction for the care of the feeble 



NO. 1664, VOL. 64] 



minded in the State of Indiana, with scientific deductions 

 on heredity and the like ; before the section of social and 

 economic science. Prof. C. M. Woodward, of Washington 

 University, St. Louis, and a leader in the introduction of 

 manual training into the schools of the United States, 

 discussed what he called "The change of front in edu- 

 cation." A new section of the Association, devoted to 

 physiology and experimental medicine, was organised 

 and will hold its first meeting for the reading of papers 

 next year. 



The business transacted at the meeting was of unusual 

 importance. The first report was made in regard to the 

 plan of sending the weekly journal, Science, free of charge 

 to all members of the Association. It is apparently work- 

 ing well, for this and the efficiency of the present per- 

 manent secretary, Dr. L. O. Howard, has resulted in an 

 addition of about 1500 permanent new members, chiefly 

 scientific men, in the course of the year. The .'American 

 Association is becoming a centre for national scientific 

 societies, and hereafter the societies devoted to the 

 special sciences will be represented on the council of the 

 ."Association. Efforts have recently been made to secure' 

 for America a convocation week for the meetings of 

 scientific and learned societies, and the leading univer- 

 sities have agreed to set aside for this purpose the week 

 in which January i falls. The .'\merican Association 

 will hold a meeting in mid-winter at Washington at the 

 beginning of the year 1903, when there will be a congress 

 of at least twenty scientific societies. The next meeting 

 of the .'Association will, however, be at Pittsburg at the 

 beginning of next July. It will be presided over by the 

 eminent astronomer, Dr. Asaph Hall. 



Address by Prof. R. S. Woodward, President of 

 THE Association. 



The Progress of Science. 



A constitution.'^l provision of our Association stipu- 

 lates that " It shall be the duty of the President to give 

 an address at a General Session of the Association at the meet- 

 ing following that over which he presided.'' Happily for those 

 of us who must in turn fulfil this duty, the scientific foresight of 

 our predecessors .set no metes and bounds with respect to the 

 subject-matter or the mode of treatment of the theme that might 

 be chosen for such an address. So far, therefore, as constitu- 

 tional requirements are concerned, a retiring president finds 

 himself clothed for the time being with a degree of liberty which 

 might be regarded as dangerous were it not for an unwritten 

 rule that one may not hope to enjoy such liberty more than once. 

 But time and place, nevertheless, as well as the painful personal 

 limitations of any specialist, impose some rather formidable re- 

 strictions. One may not tax lightly, even, in a summer evening, 

 the patience of his audience for more than an academic hour, 

 the length of which in most cases is less than sixty minutes. 

 One must confine himself to generalities, which, though 

 scientifically hazardous, serve as a basis for semi-popular 

 thought ; and one must exclude technical details, which, though 

 scientifically essential, tend only to obscure semi-popular presen- 

 tation. Courtesy, also, to those who are at once our hosts and 

 our guests requires that, so far as possible, one should substitute 

 the vernacular for the "jargon of science," and draw his figures 

 of speech chiefly from the broad domain of every-day life rather 

 than from the special, though rapidly widening, fields of scientific 

 activity. 



Between this nominally unlimited freedom on the one hand, 

 and these actually narrow restrictions on the other, I have 

 chosen to invite your attention for the hour to a summary view 

 of the salient features of scientific progress, with special reference 

 to its effects on the masses, rather than on the individuals, of 

 mankind. We all know, at least in a general way, what such 

 progress is. We are assured almost daily by the public Press 

 and by popular consent that the present is not only an age of 

 scientific progress but that it is preeminently the age of scientific 

 progress. And with respect to the future of sciendfic achieve- 

 ment, the consensus of expert opinion is cheerfully hopeful and 

 the consensus of public opinion is extremely optimistic. Indeed, 

 to borrow the language sometimes used by the rulers of nations. 



