448 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXVIII. No. 718 



a body of ideas and conceptions which operates 

 for perception, and (6) a mathematical struc- 

 ture, which, in many cases, but by no means in 

 all, supervenes and leads easily to an elaborate 

 conclusion. These two complexes do indeed 

 constitute a new engine which helps the mind 

 as tools help the hand, and if the first (the 

 perceptive phase of physical science) were in- 

 sisted upon in our technical schools with ap- 

 proximately the same emphasis as pure mathe- 

 matics, our students would not be so ridicu- 

 lously perverted by mathematical superven- 

 tions as to calculate that a two-horse-power 

 steam engine would be required to drive a 

 willing mule. But such is the earlier stage 

 of technical education as it is to-day! 



PHYSICS TEACHING AT FAULT 



The fault, however, seems to me not to lie 

 to any great extent with our teachers of 

 mathematics. 'Pieir mode of presenting their 

 subject is, I believe, in a general way correct, 

 but I am firmly convinced that our mathe- 

 matical courses at present include a great 

 many topics which might well be omitted, and 

 a thorough drill in descriptive geometry 

 should certainly be included. I believe that 

 too much time is devoted to the study of pure 

 mathematics in our technical schools and too 

 little time to the study of elementary physics 

 and chemistry. It is certainly a fact, how- 

 ever, that a large number of our college and 

 university teachers of physics are anything 

 but enthusiastic as teachers, and the subject 

 matter which they place before their students 

 is certainly not up to the requirements of 

 modern technical education. A real fault, as 

 it seems to me, may be charged against our 

 teachers of physics. 



In the discussion of engineering education 

 before the American Institute of Electrical 

 Engineers on January 24, 1908, a great deal 

 was said concerning the place of mathematics 

 in technical education ; and the exacting char- 

 acter of technical education, which is asso- 

 ciated in most men's minds with the teaching 

 of mathematics, was emphasized as important. 

 In the old days mathematics was indeed the 

 only scientific study which could be made 



definite and exacting. Nowadays, however, 

 nearly every technical subject which is taught 

 in the engineering school can be made as 

 exacting as mathematics and, above all, the 

 elementary sciences of physics and chemistry 

 have been reduced to a basis which enables 

 these sciences to be presented in a way which, 

 in my opinion, must soon entirely revolu- 

 tionize technical education. I believe that 

 our engineers and many of our engineering 

 professors fail to realize the change which has 

 taken place in the teaching possibilities of 

 elementary physics in the last ten or fifteen 

 years, and therefore we find these men still 

 expecting our teachers of mathematics to lift 

 themselves and a large superstructure by pull- 

 ing on their boot straps, these faithful teachers 

 being held responsible for the most serious 

 faults which underlie technical education. 

 Let the heads of our technical schools look 

 rather to their teachers of physics, demanding 

 of them the best that modern science teach- 

 ing can give, and allowing them the necessary 

 time to accomplish what is desired. 



ELEMENTARY PHYSICS TEACHING NECESSARY 



I do not think we can look to our teachers 

 of mathematics to establish the simple logical 

 structure of physical science. 



Nothing is more completely established in psy- 

 chology nowadays than that ideas can not be 

 formed out of the clear sky, as it were. They 

 must be built of stuff, and tlie rational study of 

 the physical sciences especially in its earlier stages 

 is the transformation of simple intimate knowl- 

 edge into general ideas. All elemental knowledge, 

 such as the knowing how to throw a ball, how to 

 ride a bicycle, how to swim, or how to use a tool, 

 is locked in the marginal region of the mind 

 (the region of reflexes) as a very substantial but 

 very highly specialized kind of intuition, and the 

 problem of the teaching of elementary physical 

 science is the problem of how, by verbal and con- 

 crete suggestion, to drag this material into the 

 field of consciousness, where it may be trans- 

 formed into a generalized logical structure having 

 trafiic relations with every department of the 

 mind. An abstract treatment of the principles of 

 elementary physics tends, more than anything 

 else, to inhibit the influx of this elemental knowl- 

 edge from the marginal regions into the field of 

 consciousness and results in the itiilding up of a 



