October 26, 1906.] 



SCIENCE. 



519 



servations are not peculiar to the faculties 

 to which they are applied. The time has 

 already come when the professional fac- 

 ulties, and preeminently so those of the 

 technical schools, must be active, living 

 parts of their professions. There is no 

 other way by which they can either prop- 

 erly discharge their own functions or be- 

 come members of a university organization 

 strengthened and equipped to meet its 

 wide educational responsibilities which 

 make it one of the greatest conserving and 

 elevating forces of the community. 



The technical schools constituting the 

 great modern professional schools of the 

 university are integral parts of it and 

 necessary consequences of its natural evo- 

 lution. They belong to it historically and 

 naturally. They are professional schools, 

 and professional schools not only belong to 

 the university, they are the university. 

 William H. Burr. 



THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE 



ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE. 



SECTION I— ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL 



SCIENCE. 



The address of the retiring vice-presi- 

 dent, Professor Fisher, on 'Economic Sci- 

 ence,'^ was followed by an address of wel- 

 come by Professor Frank A. Fetter, ex- 

 secretary of the American Economic Asso- 

 ciation, in which the work of the section 

 was commended for its services in em- 

 phasizing the scientific method in economics 

 in contrast with the conception which gave 

 most attention to theoretical descipline. 



The discussions of Professor Norton's 

 paper (see below) by Dr. W. H. Welch, 

 of Johns Hopkins, and Dr. A. C. Abbott, 

 of the Philadelphia Board of Health, 

 added materially to the value of this ses- 

 sion. Dr. George W. Kober, of Washing- 

 ton, and Fred. L. Hoffman, of Newark, 

 sent communications on this paper, the 



^ See Science, August 31, 1906. 



latter especially criticizing the proposals 

 relating to federal control of medical insti- 

 tutions. 



Economic Advisaiility of a National De- 

 partment of Health: Professor J. 

 Pease Norton, Yale University. 

 The salvation of the civilization and the 

 race lies in the hands of exceptional men. 

 The hope of the race inheres in their 

 efficient organization for action. Organ- 

 ization consists in compelling voluntarily 

 or involuntarily each individual to do that 

 thing within his capability which has great- 

 est value for society. To do otherwise is 

 a great waste. To permit great wastes to 

 go unchecked is more than a suicidal 

 policy; for an evil more heinous than race 

 suicide is race homicide. 



There are four great wastes to-day, the 

 more lamentable because they are unneces- 

 sary. They are preventable death, pre- 

 ventable sickness, preventable conditions of 

 low physical and mental efficiency and pre- 

 ventable ignorance. The magnitude of 

 these wastes are testified to by experts 

 competent to judge. They play their part 

 in a cruel devastating destruction that is 

 almost incredible to the human mind. 



The economic reasons for establishing a 

 national department of health are five: 

 (1) To enable society to progress more 

 rapidly under the law of increasing returns 

 through increasing the per cent, of excep- 

 tional men of each degree (many of 

 whom are now lost through preventable 

 accidents), in addition to increasing the 

 total population. (2) To lessen the burden 

 of the unproductive years on the product- 

 ive years by increasing the average age at 

 death. (3) To decrease the burden of 

 death on the productive years by increas- 

 ing the age at death. If the expenses of 

 illness and death are $300 and the average 

 age at death is forty years, the average 

 death expenses average $15 on the twenty 



