86 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXX. No. 759 



to ascribe to the velocity of light this unique 

 position. Nature forces us to a conclusion 

 and if this conclusion is incompatible with our 

 preconceived opinions, it is the opinions that 

 must be changed. 



Not many years ago, it was supposed to be 

 possible to increase both heat and cold with- 

 out limit, but we no longer hope to attain any 

 temperature below — 273° C. To cool any body 

 to the absolute zero would require an infinite 

 amount of work. Now we find likewise that 

 it would take infinite work to bring any body 

 to the velocity of light, and just as — 273° C. 

 became recognized first as the lowest possible 

 temperature, then as the lowest conceivable 

 temperature, so we must not only regard 

 3 X W centimenters per second as the high- 

 est possible velocity, but we must so change 

 our present ideas that this shall be the highest 

 conceivable velocity in a material system. 



In closing I should like to modify one of 

 the statements in my previous paper. It was 

 there intimated that the equations of non- 

 Newtonian mechanics offered a means of de- 

 termining absolute motion through space. In 

 a recent paper by Mr. Tolman and myself 

 it is shown, on the other hand, that these 

 equations maintain their full validity no mat- 

 ter what point is arbitrarily chosen as a point 

 of rest. GiLBEET N. Lewis 



Research Labobatory of 

 Physical Chemistry, 

 Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 

 June 19, 1909 



SOME TRENDS IN HIGHER EDUCATION 



To THE Editor of Science: I was very 

 much interested in the article by Mr. Marx 

 entitled " Some Trends in Higher Education," 

 which appeared in the issue of Science of 

 May 14. While I believe that such investiga- 

 tions are of value, it seems to me that this 

 article and others of a like nature, which have 

 been appearing recently, show the need for 

 more accurate and reliable statistics relating 

 to higher education. In the great majority of 

 cases the writers have all too often been inti- 



' " The Principle of Relativity and Non-New- 

 tonian Mechanics," Proc. Amer. Acad., June, 1909. 



mately acquainted with only one institution. 

 They have realized that in the case of this 

 institution, well known to them, allowance had 

 to be made for the published statistics, but 

 they have not shown equal generosity to those 

 institutions concerning which they knew little 

 or nothing, and have accepted all statistics at 

 face value. All persons connected with uni- 

 versities know very well, for example, how 

 little trust is to be placed in the average com- 

 parative tables regarding the total number of 

 students at the various institutions of learn- 

 ing. Nearly every larger university, by means 

 of due selection and suppression, has made out 

 a good case at one time or another in the 

 attempt to show that it is the largest univer- 

 sity in this country. These methods savor 

 very much of some of the advertising indulged 

 in by insurance companies, but universities 

 and those writing about them ought to have 

 a somewhat more scientific standard. 



Mr. Marx's article is not devoid of many 

 of the faults to which I have alluded. To 

 cite just one instance: take, for example, the 

 last column of table 4 on page 784. This 

 table is supposed to give the average salary per 

 member of the instruction staff, but surely no 

 one having an intelligent knowledge of higher 

 education in America can suppose that the 

 average salary per year at Johns Hopkins is 

 $1,226, or at Northwestern $835, or at Minne- 

 sota $867, or at Toronto $881. 



It is not surprising to find the most erro- 

 neous conceptions prevailing about the admin- 

 istration of our universities, when even a re- 

 sponsible paper like Science publishes figures 

 such as these noted without further explana- 

 tion. Such looseness of statement does great 

 injustice to many an institution. In the Col- 

 lege of Liberal Arts at Northwestern Univer- 

 sity, where the salaries average lower than 

 they do in the professional schools of the same 

 institution, the instruction staff consists of 

 fifty-nine persons. Their salaries for the year 

 1909-10 will amount to $117,450. This is an 

 average annual salary of almost $2,000 per 

 individual. It is a fact that no teacher in the 

 university, who is paid at all, receives for a 

 year's work so small a sum as $835. The low- 



