SCIENCE 



A WEEKLY JOURNAL DEVOTED TO THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE, PUBLISHING THE 



OFFICIAL NOTICES AND PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION 



FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE. 



Friday, March 11, 1904. 



COVTET^TS: 

 The American Association for the Advance- 

 ment of Science: — 

 The Message of Non-Euclidean Geometry: 

 Professor George Bruce Halsted 401 



The Society for Plant Morphology and Phys- 

 iology: Professor W. F. Ganong 413 



Scientific Books: — 



Still another Memoir on Palwospondylus : 

 Professor Bashford Dean. Catalogue of 

 Keyboard Musical Instruments: Charles 

 K. Wead 425 



Scientific Journals and Articles 427 



Societies and Academies: — 



The Philosophical Society of Washington: 

 Charles K. Wead. The Chemical Society 

 of Washington: A. Seidell. The Elisha 

 Mitchell Scientific Society: Alvin S. 

 Wheeler 428 



Discussion and Correspondence: — 



Convocation Week: Professor Charles E. 

 Bessey, Professor Geo. F. Atkinson, Dr. 

 W. J. Holland. The Raphides of Calcium 

 Oxalate: Db. H. W. Wiley. The Term 

 ' Bradfordian ' ; F. A. R 429 



Notes on Fluorescence and Phosphores- 

 cence: W. S. Andrews 43-5 



Paleontological Notes : — 



Pleurocoelus versus Astrondon ; The Armor 



of Zeuglodon: F. A. L 436 



Fossil Fishes in the American Museum of 

 Natural History 437 



Scientific Notes and News 437 



University and Educational Neics 440 



MSB. intended for publication and books, etc.. intended 

 for review stiould be sent to the Editor of Science, Sarri- 

 son-on-Hudaon, N. Y. 



THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE 

 ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE. 

 THE MESSAGE OF NON-EUCLIDEAN 

 GEOMETRY." 



1. MATHEMATICS AND ITS HISTORY. 



The great Sylvester, once told me that 

 he and Kronecker, in attempting a defini- 

 tion of mathematics, got so far as to agree 

 that it is poetry. 



But the history of this poesy is itself 

 poetry, and the creation of non-Euclidean 

 geometry gives new vantage-ground from 

 which to illuminate the whole subject, from 

 before the time when Homer describes Pro- 

 teus as finger-fitting-by-fives, or counting, 

 his seals, past the epoch when Lagrange, 

 confronted with the guillotine and asked 

 how he can make himself useful in the new 

 world, answers simply, 'I will teach arith- 

 metic. ' 



Who has not wished to be a magician like 

 the mighty Merlin, or Dr. Dee, who wrote 

 a preface for the first English translation 

 of Euclid, made by Henricus Billingsley, 

 afterward, Aladdin-like, Sir Henry Bill- 

 ingsley, Lord Mayor of London? 



Was not Harriot, whose devices in alge- 

 bra our schoolboys now use, one of the 

 three paid magi of the Earl of Northum- 

 berland? Do not our every-day numerals 

 stand for Brahmin and Mohammedan, com- 

 ing first into Europe from the land of the 

 sacred Ganges, around by the way of the 

 pyramids and the Moorish Alhambra? 



* Address of the vice-president and chairman 

 of Section A, American Association for the Ad- 

 vancement of Science, St. Louis meeting, De- 

 cember, 1903. 



