438 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. II. No. 40. 



good poetry, but science is founded upon 

 the rock of evidence, and we all believe 

 many things which are inconceivable, such 

 as the truth that the image in our eyes is 

 upside down, and we justly repudiate many 

 opinions which are not onlj' quite con- 

 ceivable but also quite incapable of disproof. 



Many persons have found the oj^inion 

 that all nature is conscious and endowed 

 with volition, that the morning stars sing 

 together, that the waters laugh, that the 

 wind bloweth where it listeth, and that trees 

 talk; not onlj^ conceivable but worthy of 

 belief, and it is qviite clear that we cannot 

 oppose any belief of this sort, or convert 

 the sailor who believes the wind obej's his 

 whistle, bj' evidence. 



The path of scientific progress is strewn 

 with beliefs which have been abandoned 

 from lack of evidence, as burst shells 

 strew a battlefield, and it is our boast that 

 they are abandoned and not lugged along 

 the line of march. 



As a shell which has failed to burst is 

 now and then picked up on some old battle- 

 field bj^ some one on whom experience is 

 thrown away, and is exploded by him with 

 disastrous results in the bosom of his ap- 

 proving family, so one of these abandoned 

 beliefs is sometimes dug up by the head of 

 some scientific family to the intellectual 

 confusion of those who accept him as their 

 leader. 



We need not concern ourselves with the 

 beliefs of the unscientific, but the utterances 

 of the heads of learned societies are public 

 acts, approved by the majority of the mem- 

 bers. They come before the public with 

 authority, and they are regarded by the 

 world as the expressions of the mature judg- 

 ment of American men of science. 



In a recent number of Science (p. 210) 

 a ' President ' quotes the opinion ' of a 

 chemist, a physicist and a biologist,' to the 

 effect that they cannot conceive how the 

 problems of biology are to be referred to 



mechanical energy and physical matter; 

 and he tells us furthermore that " it can be 

 stated without fear of refutation that every 

 physiological investigation shows with ac- 

 cumulating emphasis that the manifesta- 

 tions of Uviug matter are not explicable only 

 with the forces of dead matter." 



The assertion that this is shown by every 

 or by any physiological investigation is 

 flatly contradicted by most of the investi- 

 gators; but the assertion that it can he 

 stated withmtt /ear of refutation that so and so 

 is true is a pretty safe one, although a mo- 

 ment's reflection will show that there is no 

 end to the things which may be stated with- 

 out fear of refutation; that Mars is inhabited, 

 for example, or that we are sui-rounded by 

 good and evil spirits. 



Another i-ecent number of Science (p. 

 125) contains the statement, by one who is 

 many times a President, that when proto- 

 zoa move towards the light they ' seek ' 

 oxygen, and that in order to ' seek ' it " they 

 have to be aware that thej^ need it, and 

 must have some knowledge of the fact 

 when they get it." 



When we ask how the President knows 

 all this we receive this most remarkable 

 and characteristic answer: "It is impossi- 

 ble at present to assign any other cause to 

 some of the movements of even the amoeba." 



A child can see that lack of proof is not 

 evidence, and while it is impossible to prove 

 that an amoeba or an oak tree is not con- 

 scious and is not endowed with volition, 

 the statement that they are so endowed is 

 not science but poetrj^ until some better 

 evidence tlian lack of proof is adduced. 



Even if positive evidence were found, 

 even if it were proved that all nature is 

 conscious, this would not be proof that con- 

 sciousness and volition are or can be causes 

 of structure. 



If we admit, as I think we must, that, 

 for all we know, an oak tree may have voli- 

 tion and may do as it likes, Avhat evidence 



