Jl'LY 2, 190!) 1 



SCIENCE 



23 



and states: " Of course there is life on Mars; 

 there is no doubt about it." 



Lowell has been fortunate in being able to 

 personally build and maintain an observatory, 

 which has been the means of advancing the 

 science of astronomy in a number of lines. 

 See asks what Blackwelder has done in com- 

 parison. This question implies that only those 

 whose personal fortunes have enabled them to 

 do what Lowell has done should criticize his 

 work, since those familiar with the scientific 

 results of both will hardly see cause on such 

 lines for invidious comparison. 



Blackwelder casually mentions, to the ex- 

 tent of one sentence, " Lowell's implicit belief 

 in the Laplacian hypothesis which now, to say 

 the least, is on the defensive," a remark which 

 calls forth a column from See embracing such 

 statements as, " K Professor Blackwelder will 

 study my own (See's) paper carefully, and the 

 work now in press (by See) when it appears, 

 he will find that most of the recent specula- 

 tions on cosmogony are not worth the paper 

 they are written on." 



See further states that he has proved in four 

 memoirs " that the oceans are gradually dry- 

 ing up and the land increasing, as Lowell 

 maintains. Therefore Lowell is right and 

 Blackwelder wrong; and that too in a subject 

 which he represents as his own." This state- 

 ment is highly amusing, to say the least, to 

 those cognizant of recent work on paleogeog- 

 raphy, especially if they have also read See's 

 voluminous publications on mountain build- 

 ing and related subjects, and noted that they 

 center about the old hypothesis of a free down- 

 ward permeation of ocean water. A hjrpoth- 

 esis which is not open to direct proof, and 

 though still advocated by certain physicists 

 and geologists is distinctly relegated to a sub- 

 ordinate role by many economic geologists and 

 such leaders in the more philosophic side of 

 the earth-science as Suess, Chamberlin and 

 Van Hise; partly because of the theoretical 

 difficulties attending an effective downward 

 diffusion of ocean water through the zone of 

 rock flowage, but much more because of the 

 failure of the hypothesis to account for many 

 of the facts now known to geologists. These 



point rather to a directly opposite view, which 

 is well expressed by the words of Suess, " vol- 

 canoes are not fed by infiltration from the sea, 

 but the waters of the sea are increased by 

 every eruption." 



The voluminous nature of See's writings on 

 the subject is due to a dressing out of this old 

 and, to say the least, doubtful hypothesis with 

 many speculative additions, with much repeti- 

 tion of well-known facts and theories, and 

 with specific applications in such frequent 

 obvious discord with modern teaching of the 

 principles of physiography and known details 

 of geologic structure and history, that no geol- 

 ogist has felt called upon to comment. In the 

 words of See, " geologists have discreetly kept 

 silent." 



On every topic See cites his own work as 

 the authoritative utterances on the subject, 

 and in the last paragraph denounces, as the 

 worst evil of American science, " this clique 

 and faction business, by which a man who is 

 not in the ring never can get justice or fair 

 consideration." Since no group of geologists 

 or, so far as the writer is aware, no single 

 geologist of recognized standing has followed 

 and promulgated the special views in the 

 teachings of See and Lowell, this clique and 

 faction evidently includes the several hundred 

 working geologists of America. To those who 

 are familiar with the situation, this gives the 

 key to the whole of See's article on " Fair 

 Play and Toleration in Science." It is a 

 vicarious castigation in which Blackwelder 

 stands to receive the blows for a host of un- 

 named men of science, because they have not 

 accepted See's memoirs at the valuation which 

 he places upon them. Is vicarious atonement 

 " fair play and toleration in science " ? 



Joseph Barrell 

 New Ha\'en, Conn., 

 June 15, 1909 



DETERMINATION OF THE COEFFICIENT OF 

 CORRELATION 



To THE Editor of Science: I should like 

 to make a few remarks on Dr. Franz Boas's 

 letter on this subject in your issue of May 21. 

 There is some danger, I think, unless we see 



