SCIENCE 



Friday, April 28. 1916 



CONTENTS 

 Mathematics in Nineteenth Century Science: 

 Propessok Henry S. White 583 



Seeing Yourself Sing: Peofessoe Carl E. 

 Seashoke 592 



Orville A. Derby: Db. John C. Brannee .... 596 



Paris-Washington Longitude 596 



Scientific Notes and News 598 



University and Educational News 599 



Disoitssion and Correspondence: — 



Those Fur Seal Bones: George Archibald 

 Clark. Materials in a Ton of Kelp, The 

 Toxicity of Bog Water: George B. Eigg. 

 Exhibition of the Boyal Photographic So- 

 ciety: De. lO. E. K. (Mees. The Carnegie 

 Foundation: J. McKeen Cattell 600 



Scientific BooTcs: — 

 Kingsbury on the Telephone and Telephone 

 Exchange: Professor A. E. Kennellt. 

 Washburn's Introduction to the Principles 

 of Physical Chemistry : Professor Charles 

 A. Kraus. Guyer on Being Well Born: 

 Peofessoe Wm. E. Kellicott 603 



Notes on Canadian Stratigraphy and Paleon- 

 tology: Kietlet F. Mathee 607 



Special Articles: — 



The Theory of the Free-martin: Peofessoe 

 Prank E. Lillie. A Chemotropic Besponse 

 of the House Fly: C. H. Richaedson 611 



Societies and Academies: — 



The American Society of Ichthyologists and 

 Herpetologists: Eobeet C. Muepht. The 

 Indiana Academy of Science: A. J. Bignet. 617 



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

 reyiow sbould bi gent to Professor J. McKeen Cattell, Garrison- 

 on-HudsoD, N. Y. 



MATHEMATICS IN NINETEENTH 

 CENTURY SCIENCE 1 



The treasures of one age are tlie rubbish 

 of the next age. Ideas, like things mate- 

 rial, are mostly transient. The present 

 possesses hut little of that which the past, 

 with infinite labor, has acquired. Our esti- 

 mate of values changes from century to 

 century, and often with reason: what was 

 once useful is found under later conditions 

 to be wasteful, and new knowledge piles old 

 machinery upon the scrap-heap. 



Considered in this light, the science of 

 even one hundred years ago looks anti- 

 quated to a schoolboy of to-day. But what 

 of the exceptions? Not all knowledge is 

 novel, and there are indispensable truths 

 and fundamental principles that were dis- 

 covered thousands of years ago. Most of 

 our exact science is, however, new since the 

 time of Galileo, Bacon and Newton; and 

 it is probably not far from the truth to say 

 that three fourths of the knowledge at 

 present constituting exact science was dis- 

 covered in the course of the nineteenth 

 century. 



Every generation must either advance, 

 or lose much of what it has inherited ; only 

 as it is used for finding new knowledge is 

 the value of the old science understood. I 

 speak to-night to a group of younger stu- 

 dents of science, into whose hands are com- 

 mitted from the past whatever they can 

 use of accumulated knowledge; and who 

 have announced, by the hadge of Sigma Xi, 

 their devotion to the highest ideal in sci- 

 ence, that of increasing its definite content 



1 Address before the Syracuse Chapter of the 

 Sigma Xi, March 15, 1915. 



