Fkbeuaey 17, 1899.] 



SCIENCE. 



251 



Society who were meeting in New York 

 were invited to hold a joint session with 

 the Psj'chologists in the Psj'chological Lab- 

 oratory in Schermerhoru Hall, for the read- 

 ing, by members of both societies, of papers 

 which might have a common interest. This 

 joint meeting was successfully carried out, 

 with President Chittenden, of the Physiolo- 

 gists, in the chair. Professor J. McK. 

 Cattell opened the session with an exhibi- 

 tion of certain new instruments of his own 

 designing, for the study of movement and 

 fatigue, and a brief description of certain 

 researches now iu progress in the psycho- 

 logical laboratory at Columbia. Among 

 other instruments was a spring ergometer, 

 intended to replace the Mosso ergograph, 

 and a dynamometer, in which the pressures 

 are contiuually added and counted, mak- 

 ing the study of muscular fatigue and the 

 effect of mental conditions on fatigue pos- 

 sible without elaborate apparatus. 



The other psychological papers presented 

 at this session were by Professors Miinster- 

 berg, Patrick and Scripture. Professor 

 Miinsterberg spoke on the ' Physiological 

 Basis of Mental Life,' pointing out certain 

 fundamental objections to current physio- 

 logical theories of brain processes, and sug- 

 gesting several modifications which would 

 account for more of the factors in psycho- 

 physiological activity than is now the 

 case. 



Professor G. T. W. Patrick reported ex- 

 periments on tastes and odors made in the 

 laboratory of the "University of Iowa upon 

 a subject with complete congenital anosenia. 

 Among other conclusions he drew the fol- 

 lowing : That what commonly passes for 

 taste sensations, so far as their discrimina- 

 tive or intellectual value is concerned, is 

 the composite result of the mingling of sen- 

 sations of smell, touch, temperature, sight 

 and taste ; the latter, however, playing little 

 or no part in the discrimination of our com- 

 mon foods and drinks. Taste sensations 



furnish rather the emotional element in the 

 total conscious effect. 



Dr. E. W. Scripture gave a lantern exhi- 

 bition of his methods of demonstrating the 

 the physiology and psychology of color, and 

 by special invitation Professor Ogden N. 

 Rood, of Columbia University, demonstrated 

 his ' Flicker Photometer.' 



Physiological papers were read by Profes- 

 sor F. S. Lee on ' The Nature of Muscle 

 Fatigue,' by Professor G. C. Huber on the 

 ' Innervation of the Intracranial Vessels,' 

 by Professor C. F. Hodge on ' Possible 

 Amoeboid Movements of the Dendritic Pro- 

 cesses of Cortical Nerve-cells ' and by Pro- 

 fessor G. W. Fitz on 'A New Chronoscope.' 



At the meeting on Friday morning Mr. 

 J. E. Lough reported experiments made at 

 Wellesley College, on the changes in rate 

 of respiration during mental activity started 

 by visual stimuli. There was in every case 

 an increase in the rate during stimulation 

 and a return to the normal afterward, the 

 amount of the increase produced by a given 

 stimulus corresponding in a general way to 

 the degree of mental activity produced. 



Dr. Robert MacDougall described re- 

 searches now in progress in the laboratory 

 at Harvard, and Dr. E. W. Scripture re- 

 . ported the work at Yale. Among other in- 

 vestigations Dr. Scripture reported interest- 

 ing i-esults from passing alternating currents 

 of high frequency through the human body, 

 producing practical aniBsthesia and anal- 

 gesia to touch and cold^ though apparently 

 not to heat. The speaker called attention 

 to the possible value of this method in jjro- 

 ducing analgesia for surgical purposes. Dr. 

 J. P. Hylan gave an account of the work 

 in the laboratory of the University of 

 Illinois, and was followed by Dr. G. V. 

 Dearborn, who described experiments on 

 recognition under objective reversal, using 

 chance blots of ink on white cards, arranged 

 in series of ten and reversed in each of the 

 four quadrants and in the mirror, and 



