SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. III. No. 77. 



The only complete category of our thinking, 

 our professors of philosophy tell us, is the 

 category of personality, every other cate- 

 gory being one of the abstract elements of 

 that. And this systematic denial, on Sci- 

 ence's part, of personality as a condition of 

 events, this rigorous belief that in its own 

 essential and innermost nature our world is 

 a strictly impersonal world, may, conceiv- 

 ably, as the whirligig of time goes round, 

 prove to be the very defect that our de- 

 scendants will be most surprised at in our 

 own boasted Science, the omission that, to 

 their eyes, will most tend to make it look 

 perspectiveless and short. 



But these things lie upon the knees of 

 the gods. I must leave them there, and 

 close now this discourse, which I regret that 

 I could not make more short. If it has 

 made you feel that (however it turn out 

 with modern Science) our own Societj', at 

 any rate, is not 'perspectiveless,' it will 

 have amply served its purpose ; and the 

 next President's address may have more 

 definite conquests to record. 



William James. 



TSE FORM OF THE HEAD AS INFLUENCED 

 BY GROWTH. 



The change in the shape of the head which 

 accompanies growth has been but very 

 slightly investigated either in this country 

 or abroad. The meagreness of results may 

 be indicated by the fact that Topiuard's 

 Elements d' Anthropologic contains only a 

 note upon the subject, with no data.* A 

 recent investigation upon the students of the 

 Massachusetts Institute of Technology may 

 be of interest as bearing upon this question. 

 The measurements covered 485 students, 

 grouped as follows : 215 in the first- year 

 class ; 69 in the second ; 66 in the third, and 

 136 in the graduating class. 



From the comparison of the measure- 

 ments of the length and breadth of the heads 



of these students so divided into classes, it 

 appears that between the period of entrance 

 and of graduation, that is to say from the 

 ages of 18-19 to 2.3-24 years, the develop- 

 ment of the head is almost entirely in respect 

 of its length . The average breadth of the 

 head remaining constant at or near 152 mm., 

 the length varies from an average of 195.13 

 mm. in the first-year to 196.35 in the fourth- 

 year class . The intermediate classes occupy 

 a position midway between the two, indicat- 

 ing that this is not a result of chance. If 

 this tendency be a general one, it means 

 that the cephalic index in our American 

 population of this class tends to decrease at 

 this particular time of life. The cephalic 

 index, for example, of the first-year stu- 

 dents averages 78.6 and that of the fourth- 

 year averages 77.2, the second and third 

 years being 77.7. This is rendered specially 

 significant by the fact that Drs. West and 

 Porter have shown a slight decrease of 

 cephalic index in American school children 

 between the ages of 5 and IS ; at Worces- 

 ter, for example, the average index falling 

 between 79 and 78.* If we assume that in 

 both cases we are dealing with similar 

 populations the hypothesis of a progressive 

 decrease of cephalic index, with growth, 

 of our American people would seem to be 

 well founded. 



In Europe, Zuckerhandl, compai'ing the 

 index of 156 children and 197 adults of the 

 same (Austrian) race, found that the chil- 

 dren were narrower-headed than adults as 

 a rule ; and Holl confirms this result. | Dr. 

 Meis declares that from his experience the 

 children among the Germans are more do- 

 licho-cephalic than the adults. J Schaaf- 

 hausen finds that in many cases the length 



* Arcliiv fiir Anthropologie, XXII., pp. 19 and 34 ; 

 and Eeport of Antbropological Congress at Chicago, 

 p. 57. 



t Mitt, der Anth. Gesell. in Wieu. XIV., 1884., p. 

 137; and Ihid XVIII., p. 4. 



XIIUI, XX., 1890, p. Z^seq. 



