SS 
- Washington. 
° 
January 25, 1917 
tions are experimentalists, and those who explain them 
are often mathematicians, such exceptions would never 
have been explained if the mathematicians had taken 
up Hume’s.attitude. Actually the belief of most people 
in most laws itself depends on testimony. Hence the 
arguments for and against an alleged miracle are argu- 
ments of testimony against testimony. Strictly, in 
accordance with his view of belief and induction, 
Hume had no right to talk about what we ought to 
believe as to matters of fact, but only to discuss the 
causes of our beliefs. And love of the wonderful is as 
good a cause of belief in a miracle as constant experi- 
ence is a cause of belief in a natural law. 
Mineralogical Society, January 16.—Mr. W. Barlow, 
resident, in the chair.—A. Holmes and Dr. H. F. 
arwood: The basalts of Iceland, Faroe Islands, and 
Jan Mayen. The basalts described fall into four well- 
marked types based on the presence or absence of 
olivine and the porphyritic or non-porphyritic char- 
acter of the structure. They resemble the Greenland 
basalts previously described by the authors, and the 
whole series is closely matched by the basalts of Skye 
and Co. Antrim. Chemically the most striking feature 
of the lavas is their high content of titanium dioxide, 
which in the seven analyses made varies from 2-36 to 
5°68 per cent. The olivine-free rocks are remarkable 
for their abundance of titaniferous magnetite. In the 
olivine basalts this mineral is less abundant, and much 
of the titanium is presumably in the pyroxene, which 
in the olivine varieties only is of a purple-brown tint. 
A peculiarity of the olivine basalts is their comparative 
richness in alkalies, a feature that brings them into 
relationship with the titaniferous-olivine basalts of the 
western Mediterranean described and analysed by 
The Arctic province, however, is distin- 
guished by the abundance of alkali-poor basalts, which, 
in spite of the fact that their silica percentages are 
low, are thoroughly over-saturated rocks.—Prof. H. 
Hilton: The use of the orthographic projection in 
crystallography. The method of preparing a projec- 
tion and its use in the drawing of crystals were ex- 
plained, and the advantages of this projection of the 
sphere were pointed out.—J. V. Samojloff: Palzo- 
physiology, the organic origin of some minerals occur- 
ring in sedimentary rocks. In connection with the 
exploration of the phosphate deposits of Russia, the 
occurrence of barytes has been noted over a wide area 
in the Governments of Kostroma, Kazan, and Simbirsk, 
and also farther to the north-east in the basin of the 
Pechora River. The mineral occurs as nodules in the 
clays and marls of the Upper Jurassic, and is confined 
to the Oxfordian-Sequanian horizon, though extending 
up to the Kimmeridgian in some of the districts. 
Nodules of barytes have been dredged from the sea- 
floor off the coast of Ceylon, and granules of barium 
sulphate have been detected in the bodies of certain 
marine organisms, namely, the Xenophyophora. If, 
therefore, during the Upper Jurassic period such organ- 
isms, capable of extracting barium salts from sea- 
water, were more abundant, they would account for 
the accumulation of barium jn these strata, where the 
barytes occurs as a primary mineral. Similarly, the 
mineral celestite has been found over a very wide area 
in Turkestan in the beds of Upper Cretaceous age. 
The presence of strontium sulphate has been detected 
in the skeletons of the Acantharia. a group of the 
Radiolaria. It is conceivable that similar organisms 
were relatively more abundant during the Cretaceous 
period, and that their remains gave rise to the deposits 
of celestite. Although the iron compound hemoglobin 
plays an important function in the blood of present- 
day animals, yet cases are known amongst the Crus- 
tacea and Mollusca in which the copper compound 
hemocyanin performs the same function, and vana- 
NO. 2465, VOL. 98] 
NATURE 
423 
dium has been detected in the blood of the Ascidia. 
During former periods of the earth’s history these, and 
perhaps some other, metals may have been pre- 
dominant in the blood of animals then living. In this 
connection the persistent occurrence in the Permian 
strata of copper minerals and ores associated with 
abundant animal remains is significant. Similarly, 
there may have been at different periods variations in 
the chemical composition of the ash of plants. The 
recurring presence of minerals of primary origin in 
certain sedimentary strata therefore suggests that there 
may have been varying physiological processes during 
past periods, and for this new branch of palzontology 
the name ‘“palzophysiology” is suggested.—E. S. 
Simpson: Tapiolite in the Pilbara Goldfield, Western 
Australia. The mineral, which was discovered at 
Tabba-Tabba Creek and Greens Well, lying in a large 
area of granite intersected by pegmatite veins and 
greenstone dykes and bosses, occurs in fairly well- 
defined crystals, which analysis proved to contain little 
niobium. At the first locality the crystals displayed 
the forms 100, oof, III, 101, 320, and were twinned 
as usual on to1, and often distorted; while at the 
second they displayed the forms 100, 111, 101, 320, and 
showed twinning about 106 and 301, as well as tot. 
A curve was prepared showing the specific gravity ob- 
taining in the tetragonal isomorphous series of meta- 
tantalates and metaniobates of iron, manganese, and 
calcium. 
Mathematical Society, January 18.—Prof. H. M. Mac- 
donald, president, in the chair.—G. H. Hardy and Ze 
Ramanujan: Asymptotic formule in combinatory 
analysis.—Prof. M. J. M. Hill: The singular solutions 
of ordinary differential equations of the first order.— 
H. Bateman: The nature of a moving electric charge 
and its lines of electric force.—Prof. L. J. Rogers: 
The expansion of the variables of a hypergeometric 
equation in terms of the ratio of two solutions.—Prof. 
H. J. Priestley: A problem in the theory of diffraction. 
Paris. 
Academy of Sciences, December 26, 1916.—M. Camille 
Jordan in the chair.—G. Bigourdan: The first scien- 
tific societies of Paris in the seventeenth century. The 
meetings at the Bureau d’Adresse.—E. Branly: The 
electrical conductivities of air and mica.—H. Le 
Chatelier : Cristobalite. In a previous paper the author 
has shown the existence of a form of silica, X, char- 
acterised by a point of transformation at 215° C., and 
probably identical with cristobalite. Further work has 
proved the correctness of this view, and crystals of this 
form of silica have been detected in various artificial 
products. The paper is illustrated with eight photo- 
micrographs.—C. Richet and H. Cardot : The influence 
of small rises of temperature for short periods of time 
on the course of fermentation. A study of the effect 
of short periods of heating on the lactic fermentation. 
—M. de Sparre: Water hammer in a main formed of 
two sections of different diameters.—E. Ariés: A form 
of the temperature function in the Clausius equation of 
state. A discussion of the best means of determining 
n in the equation 
ee ey 
v—a T"v+B)” 
from experimental data.—C. E. Guillaume : The homo- 
geneity and expansion of invar. In spite of the many 
causes affecting the expansion of invar, it has been 
proved possible to make ingots so homogeneous as to 
make certain that the specimen tested and the 
specimen - utilised have identical coefficients of 
expansion.—J.  P. Morat and M. Petzetakis: The 
experimental production of retrograde ventricular 
extrasystoles and of inverse rhythm by inversion of the 
conduction of stimulations in the heart.—S, Mangeot : 
