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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXVIII. No. 730 



a hydrant, or burst of steam from the safety valve 

 of a locomotive, what is to be said of such things 

 as these? Or let one consider the fitful motion of 

 the wind as indicated by the swaying of trees or 

 as actually visible in driven clouds of dust and 

 smoke; or the sweep of the flames of a conflagra- 

 tion! Let one think of these things and consider 

 whether it is not necessary to bring the mind to 

 some narrow view before any clear line of argu- 

 ment can be pursued relative thereto. 



Yes, it is necessary, and the simple idea of 

 flowing, or, to put it in the usual way, the 

 idea of simple flow, when properly and pre- 

 cisely defined^ constitutes the basis of the sci- 

 ence of hydraulics ; but the general public is 

 so content with ideas (theories) that they 

 project them unreservedly into objectivity and 

 that ends the matter in their minds. The 

 wind blows and water flows, they say, and if 

 one objects they claim that by blowing they 

 mean whai the wind actually does, although 

 they admit they do not hnow it all. Maybe 

 that is what they do mean, but such symbolism 

 is worse than useless in science. A physical 

 theory, or let us say rather, for the sake of 

 intelligibility, a physical idea has in every 

 case a structural content which represents 

 more or less completely a condition or thing 

 and you do know it all. A physical theory is, 

 in fact, a working model in one's head such 

 as the kinetic theory of gases, or the wave 

 theory of light. 



The general public indeed are not only con- 

 tent with simple practical ideas such as the 

 idea that the wind blows, but they are 

 theorists also in a weak and contemptible 

 sense, so many of them learn elaborate 

 theories which they never use — and think 

 themselves flne. It is a good thing, this re- 



' See pages 219-221 of Franklin and MacNutt's 

 " Elements of Mechanics," The Maemillan Com- 

 pany, 1907. This book is unique as an attempt 

 to supplement precision of ideas and definitions 

 (with due deference to the reviewer in Nature, 

 who says the book is very inaccurate and has no 

 reason to be) with suggestive allusions to the 

 subtleties of nature in order to fortify the student 

 against the confusion of boundaries between our 

 logical structures and the objective realms of 

 reality, a confusion which, to use Miinsterberg's 

 phrase, is " the gravest danger of our time." 



cent talk about truth's being availability for 

 use, and many intelligent people would be 

 surprised indeed if they could understand to 

 what extent this axiom has been driven into 

 scientific men. 



But let us go back to the man who says 

 that the wind blows and who thinks he has in 

 mind what the wind actually does, and let ijs 

 consider whether this man's interest is in the 

 kinematics of the atmosphere or in the deeply 

 laid plans of men which the wind undoes in 

 havoc and disaster. Can there be any doubt 

 as to what his interests really are, and as to 

 what he really has in mind? It is little in- 

 deed that most men know of that remarkable 

 quality of science, the quality of detachment. 

 Science leaves human values mostly to art and 

 to the arts, and the symbolism of the artist 

 and of the business man is very different from 

 the symbolism of science. It would seem, in- 

 deed, that art and business procedure can 

 project themselves unreservedly into ob- 

 jectivity and stand unabashed; but with sci- 

 ence it is not so. The ideas of flowing and 

 blowing are true because the sailor and the 

 lock-tender use them and they work; but the 

 subtlety of nature is far beyond that of sense 

 or of the understanding, and to project such 

 simple ideas unreservedly into objectivity is to 

 make an end to science. 



There is at the present time a general awaken- 

 ing in philosophy and many scientific men seem 

 to think that the world-wide talk on pragmatism 

 is simply the first, long-delayed response of the 

 great mass of men to the compelling philosophy 

 of the experimental sciences, but it seems to the 

 writer that this is by no means a complete diag- 

 nosis of the situation because some of the most 

 striking features of the present philosophical 

 movement are to be found in the transformation 

 or reversion which the philosophy of the exact 

 sciences is now imdergoing. A period of remark- 

 able activity in the physical sciences has been 

 followed by a revolution in the conduct of busi- 

 ness and industry, impressing the methods of the 

 physical sciences upon great numbers of men, and 

 the reciprocal effect is a growing domination of 

 the exact sciences by a spirit of humanism, as 

 pragmatism has been called in England. Indeed, 

 the changes which human interests as a whole are 

 creating in the philosophy of the exact sciences 



