122 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. LIII. No. 1362 



THE WASHINGTON CONFERENCE ON 



THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE 



The conference upon the History of Science, 

 initiated by the American Historical Associa- 

 tion at its annual meeting a year ago in Cleve- 

 land, proved such a success that the program 

 committee devoted another session to the sub- 

 ject this December at "Washington. Simul- 

 taneously the History of Science Section, 

 which has recently been formed under the aus- 

 pices of the American Association for the Ad- 

 vancement of Science, was meeting in Chicago, 

 thus demonstrating the widespread interest in 

 this promising field. This widespread interest 

 was further evidenced at Washington by the 

 variety of learned occupations represented by 

 the speakers who included, in addition to pro- 

 fessors of science and history, a librarian, a 

 college president, and the head of an institu- 

 tion for research. 



Robert S. Woodward, president of the Car- 

 negie Institution of Washington, presided as 

 almost his last official act before retiring from 

 his long tenure of that ofSce. In his introduc- 

 tory remarks he welcomed the attitude of the 

 American Historical Association towards the 

 history of science, emphasized the need of 

 breaking down the artificial barriers which 

 divide learning into different departments, and 

 recalled a scheme dating back to 1907 but 

 never executed for a general history of the 

 inductive sciences by a number of collabora- 

 tors under the direction of the Carnegie In- 

 stitution. 



In a paper on " Recent Realignments in the 

 History of Medieval Medicine and Science," 

 Dr. Fielding H Garrison, librarian. Surgeon 

 General's Office, warned against past exaggera- 

 tion of medieval ecclesiastical hostility towards 

 science, and against deriding the science of 

 that period. In British libraries alone Mrs. 

 Singer has found 30,000 scientific manuscripts 

 from the medieval period, of which some 15,000 

 are medical. Dr. Garrison went on to com- 

 pare the general character of medieval science 

 and medicine with that of other periods in- 

 cluding our own, and to appraise its relations 

 to them. The rapid progress of scientific dis- 



covery in more recent times was convincingly 

 illustrated by a paper on " Developments in 

 Electro-Magnetism during the Past Hundred 

 Years," by Professor Arthur E. Kennelly, of 

 Harvard University, who traced the achieve- 

 ments of Ampere, Farraday, and others, and 

 showed the far-reaching influence and enor- 

 mous importance of developments in electro- 

 magnetics in well-nigh every other field 

 whether of scientific theory or of applied 

 science and practical invention : as, for ex- 

 ample, the effect of the theory of electrons 

 upon chemistry and the earlier atomic theory. 



Professor James Harvey Robinson, of the 

 New School for Social Research, discussed 

 with characteristic satirical wit and literary 

 force to the delight of the large audience 

 " Free Thought, Yesterday and To-day," from 

 the standpoint of the student of intellectual 

 history, comparing more especially the ways of 

 thinking of the Deists and other eighteenth 

 century philosophers with our own, and bring- 

 ing out how the rules and methods of " the 

 intellectual game " had profited by the scien- 

 tific advance of the last century. 



Because of the lateness of the hour Lyon G. 

 Tyler, president emeritus of the College of 

 William and Mary, did not read his paper 

 upon " Science in Virginia." It is to be hoped 

 that not only it but also the other papers which 

 were read may be speedily published and rend- 

 ered available for a larger audience. 



Lynn Thorndike 



Western Reserve University, 



SCIENCE 



A Weekly Journal devoted to the Advancement of 

 Science, publishing the official notices and pro- 

 ceedings of the American Association for 

 the Advancement of Science 



Published every Friday by 



THE SCIENCE PRESS 



LANCASTER, PA. GARRISON, N. Y. 



NEW YORK, N. Y. 



Enleied in the posl-ofSce »l Lancuster. Pa., as Kcoad da« matter 



