Mat 4, 1917] 



SCIENCE 



431 



been elected full professor of zoology in the 

 Scientific School. 



The following promotions have been made 

 in the department of zoology at the University 

 of California : Associate Professor S. J. Holmes 

 to a professorship; Assistant Professors J. P. 

 Daniel and Joseph Grinnell to associate pro- 

 fessorships. 



Dr. George R. Wells, associate professor of 

 psychology in Oberlin College, has been ap- 

 pointed to a new professorship in psychology 

 in the Ohio Wesleyan University, and will as- 

 sume his duties in September. A psychological 

 laboratory, housed in a separate building, has 

 been provided and is being equipped at the 

 latter institution. 



M. P. Marie, professor of pathologic anat- 

 omy at the University of Paris, has been ap- 

 pointed to the chair of diseases of the nervous 

 system, to succeed the late Professor Dejerine. 

 M. Letulle, hitherto professor of the history of 

 medicine, has been given the chair of patho- 

 logic anatomy. 



DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE 



WANT OF ADAPTATION TO THE TIME OF THE 

 PRINTING PRESS 



If the printing press is recognized as the 

 most important instrument for the diffusion of 

 knowledge, the advancement of science requires 

 that it should be used with a precision like 

 that shown in the use of the microscope or in 

 the application of statistical methods. 



It seems that this want of adaptation is 

 shown in lack of adequate provision for, and 

 in the common method of, the publication of 

 scientific literature. Gifts to local establish- 

 ments, in spite of their great value, seem silly 

 compared with a proper endowment for the 

 publication and distribution of scientific sepa- 

 rates. 



All scientific articles should be printed and 

 sold separately, so that a student could sub- 

 scribe for the literature of a certain subject. 

 This would not prevent any one from binding 

 together any papers he wished. Scientific pub- 

 lication is in a bad way, if it must be provided 

 for by requiring one to pay for matter one does 



not need, and which, as far as one is concerned, 

 is not worth shelf room. I am interested in 

 literature relating to certain bees, but that does 

 not incline me to pay for descriptions of Sar- 

 cophagidas which take up eight pages for one 

 species. In the library of the Missouri Botan- 

 ical Garden I could not find papers by one 

 author because the transactions in which they 

 were printed did not contain enough botanical 

 literature to justify purchase by that institu- 

 tion. 



A magazine publishing transient articles is 

 good enough, but one publishing important 

 contributions to science in a various mixture 

 is more or less of a burial place for such liter- 

 ature, whether one considers the persons the 

 authors are trying to reach or those desiring to 

 see the articles. That his writings should 

 reach every one who is interested in them, or 

 would profit by them, is as important for an 

 author as it is for the student to see the writ- 

 ings in which he is interested — and the inter- 

 ests of both are in line with the advancement 

 of science. 



That the publishing of heterogeneous ar- 

 ticles in journals is objectionable is shown by 

 the practise of printing author's separates. 

 But these are usually unsatisfactorily distrib- 

 uted and soon exhausted. The printing of 

 separates operates against the interests of the 

 journal when a writer avoids subscribing for it 

 on the expectation of receiving the separates 

 from their authors. For the sake of students 

 a discriminative author may be inclined to 

 publish all of his papers on a given subject in 

 the same journal, but the journal may prefer a 

 variety of papers in order to increase its sub- 

 scription list. So, also, a paper which has 

 some body to it is broken into monthly parts 

 to make room for articles on difl^erent subjects. 

 It is a question whether the magazines do not 

 encourage fragmentary and desultory methods 

 of investigation and publication. 



On account of objection to too many, or too 

 long, papers on the same subject, or simply 

 inadequate provisions for publication, descrip- 

 tions of American insects are often published 

 in foreign journals — a practise clearly opposed 

 to the interests of science. However, some au- 



