SCIENCE 



Fbidat, Decembee 11, 1914 



CONTENTS 



The Outlook for Science: Professoe E. D. 

 Carmichael 833 



The Philosophy of Biology — Vitalism versus 

 Mechanism: Professor Ealph S. Lillie. 840 



The Committee of One Hundred on Scientific 

 Eesearch 846 



The Philadelphia Meeting 847 



Scientific Notes and News 847 



University and Education^ News 851 



Discussion and Correspondence : — • 



Cumulus Clouds over the Illinois Miver Val- 

 ley : John L. Rich. Cyanide of Potassium 

 in Trees : Dr. H. A. Surface 851 



and Teaching 853 



Scientific Boolcs: — 

 Lehmer's List of Prime Numiers; Natural 

 Sines: Professor G. A. Miller. Boveri 

 sur Frage der Entstehung maligner Tu- 

 moren: Professor Gary N. Calkins. 

 Park's Text-hook of Geology: Professoe 

 J. F. Kemp 855 



Botanical Notes: — 

 A Study of a Desert Basin; Vascular Plants 

 of Ohio; A Study of a Carboniferous Flora; 

 A Useful Society: Professor Chaeles B. 



Special Articles: — 



The Electric Motor Nerve Centers in the 

 Skates: Professor Uleic Dahlgeen. The 

 Effect of Storage in River Water on the Pro- 

 duction of Acid in Carbohydrate Solutions 

 by the Bacillus Coli Group: Dr. Wm. W. 

 Browne 862 



The Association of American Agricultural 

 Colleges and Experiment Stations and Be- 

 lated Organisation: Howard L. Knight. 864 



The Convocation Week Meeting of Scientifio 

 Societies 868 



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

 review sbould be sent to Professor J. McKeen Cattell, Garrison- 

 On-HudsOD, N. Y. 



TBE OUTLOOK FOR SCIENCEi- ■ 



The most remote origins of science are to 

 be sought in the early observations of primi- 

 tive races of men. At first phenomena were 

 probably registered in memory with no attempt 

 to relate them other than by means of the 

 hypothesis that they were due to the will of 

 some intelligence akin to that of man. It 

 appears that an enormous period of time 

 elapsed before men began to conceive even the 

 possibility that these phenomena were bound 

 together by laws through which they were 

 capable of explanation. A long preparation 

 of experience seems to have been necessary 

 before this conception could arise. 



But we are not to look back upon this period 

 as barren. It gave rise to one thing at least 

 of essential importance, namely, the effort to 

 relate phenomena in such a way as to make the 

 universe intelligible. It matters little what 

 particular explanation was first offered; but 

 it was a thing of profound importance to have 

 conceived the possibility of any explanation 

 at all. 



The preliminary forms of this conception 

 have probably been lost from the view of his- 

 tory. The first name which appears on the 

 record as we now have it and indeed the first 

 name in the history of European thought is 

 that of the Greek philosopher Thales. He 

 sought to go behind the great multiplicity of 

 phenomena in the hope of finding a deep unity 

 from which all difference had been evolved 

 and by means of which these phenomena might 

 themselves be explained. 



It is interesting to note particularly that in 

 this first attempt to make the universe intel- 

 ligible Thales sought to ground everything in 

 a single material cause. This he found in 

 water. How he related it to the plurality of 

 phenomena is not known. It is certain, how- 



1 An address delivered to the Indiana Chapter 

 of the Society of Sigma Xi on November 5, 1914. 



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