2 20 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XXI. No. 533 



Recognizing the wisdom of this course, the International Com- 

 mittee of Weights and Measures, in October, 1880, resolved that 

 in its publications and in its ofBcial use the term litre should be 

 used to express the volume of a kilogramme of pure water at 

 maximum density. The one-thousandth part of this, that is to 

 say, the volume of a gramme of pure water at maximum density 

 is called the millimetre, and the abbreviation ml. is used to stand 

 for it. 



The litre and the millilitre, therefore, are not precisely identi- 

 cal with the cubic decimetre and the cubic centimetre. The 

 difference, however, is very small, and may safely be neglected 

 in all ordinary operations. Where a high degree of accuracy is 

 required, it will usually be found that the results are primarily 

 obtained by the mass-density method, and that no correction is 

 required. 



The International Bureau is engaged in an elaborate investiga- 

 tion of the relations of mass, volume, and density in pure water, 

 and, when the results are available, they will doubtless satisfy 

 the most exacting demands. T. C. Mendenhall. 



Washington, D.C., April 14. 



On the Teaching of Biology. 



If the article " On the Emergence of a Sham Biology in 

 America," by Mr. Conway MacMillan, printed in Science for 

 April 7th, 1893, had appeared in a special journal, it would not 

 be worth while to notice it, but since Science reaches many people 

 who are not specialists in any branch of biology, it may not be 

 a waste of time to point out some of its special merits. 



The author of the article looks over the courses offered in 

 biology in some of the leading universities of the country, and, 

 finding that botany does not receive adequate treatment, he ap- 

 parently becomes fired with the serious purpose of exposing what 

 he illogically calls a "sham " science. 



The Johns Hopkins University, which has done as much as, if 

 not more than, any other single institution in the country, for the 

 advancement of biological science in America, during the last 

 seventeen years, is stigmatized in a way which vvill highly amuse 

 those who are acquainted with its work. This institution is ac- 

 cused of dishonesty in naming its zoological courses. "Injus- 

 tice," "wrecker-light use of the word 'biology,'" "protective 

 mimicry in a university curriculum," "perpetrating a confidence 

 game upon a board of trustees," are some of the choice phrases 

 which are indulged in. These flattering remarks are not limited 

 to the institution; they extend even to its graduates. "The 

 cool effrontery of this would have surprised me had I not known 

 the marvellous, sometimes continuous, sometimes sporadic, 

 always insular capabilities of the Johns Hopkins biologist for 

 blatant philistinism in regard to things botanical." 



Of course it is not necessary to take such criticism as this seri- 

 ously. The tone of the article is so thoroughly bad, and the 

 looseness of statement so completely inconsistent with anything 

 bordering on scientific accuracy, that sober criticism is well nigh 

 impossible. 



The chief merit of the paper lies in pointing out the great value 

 which a good course in general biology, such as that given for 

 many years at the Johns Hopkins University, may possess for an 

 average student, who will follow it with a fair degree of fidelity. 

 Such a student would have learned what Lamarck, Treviranus, 

 and Bichat comprehended, and what Huxley and the school of 

 biologists who have been inspired by his teaching have striven 

 with signal success to inculcate, — that the study of biology is 

 not, as this erratic writer supposes, two disciplines, but one dis- 

 cipline, the study of living phenomena, in which the distinction 

 between plant and animal, in the widest sense, is one of secondary 

 importance. 



A student who had followed this general biological course with 

 a fair degree of success would have learned that ' ' biological 

 science is not to be set over against physical science in the 

 broadest sense," but that in this broadest sense biology is a phy- 

 sical science, coordinate with chemistry and physics. In biology 

 there is no natural cleavage into two branches, botany and 

 zoology, any more than there is a natural constriction of chem- 



istry into the studies of minerals and the compounds of carbon, 

 because the plane of division in either case would be a purely 

 imaginary one. An appreciation of this truth does not conflict 

 with the obvious fact that biologists in general find it convenient 

 to specialize either in the direction of the study of plants or the 

 study of animals. Biology is often primarily divided, for con- 

 venience, into study of living structure and study of function, or 

 into morphology and physiology, because the study of living 

 structure is one subordinate discipline, and the study of function 

 is another. For further convenience we may further classify 

 these sub-sciences, according to their subject-matter, into vege- 

 table morphology and animal morphology on the one hand, and 

 into vegetable and animal physiology on the other. 



Let an institution that sets about to teach biology do all it can 

 to put before its students the principal facts of morphology and 

 jihysiology of both plants and animals, but to pronounce its 

 work, if well done, a " sham," through its inability to cover the 

 whole field, is, to say the least, a very flagrant misuse of lan- 

 guage. The title of Mr. MacMillan's article is misleading, and 

 the whole tone of it is characterized by this glaring misuse of 

 words. He does not distinguish between a " sham " science and 

 ^ science too much "restricted" or "narrowed." Even if we 

 grant the most that is said in regard to the teaching of biology 

 at some of the institutions named, all that would be proved would 

 be that the science of biology had been too much restricted at 

 these places, not that there was any element of " sham " in it. 

 The work which the Johns Hopkins University has done for the 

 study of biology in this country proves conclusively that there 

 has been no element of "sham" in its methods. 



I find in the Johns Hopkins University Circulars for March, 

 1893, No. 104, eleven courses offered to students in the biological 

 department, including seminaries and clubs. One course is an- 

 nounced in "Cryptogamic Botany"; the rest have reference 

 almost exclusively to animal physiology and morphology. An 

 elementary course in botany has been given at this university 

 for years, and lecture courses in vegetable morphology and phy- 

 siology of a more technical nature have been oflfered from time 

 to time, showing that the study of plants is far from being ig- 

 nored. The biological work of this university, as is well known, 

 has been chiefly devoted to the study of animal physiology and 

 morphology, and the work that it has undertaken it has done 

 eminently well. Nothing could be more unjust than any infer- 

 ence that this university has encouraged its students to under- 

 value the study of plants. On the contrary, it has regretted that 

 it has had no fully equipped botanical laboratory to offer its stu- 

 dents, and it has uniformly advised them to go to institutions 

 better equipped in this department for the special study of plants. 



It is not possible for every institution to take the same color 

 with reference to the special lines of scientific investigation, but 

 this is a different thing from saying that it is not desirable fur 

 every institution to have a well-balanced curriculum. In most of 

 the smaller colleges the man at the head of his department is the 

 only teacher in it, and if he is a botanist his work will soon take 

 on a botanical tinge; if morphologist or physiologist, his special 

 work is sure to come to the front. This explains a good deal of 

 the "sham" element that Mr. MacMillan has discovered in 

 American biological teaching. 



The stimulus which comes from the association of specialists 

 in a large educational centre is undoubtedly very helpful, but as 

 soon as students commence to leave the elementary stages of 

 their work, and to enter upon special lines of investigation, their 

 sympathies immediately diverge with increasing rapidity. It is 

 therefore desirable that this loss of sympathy on the part of one 

 specialist for the work of another, should be postponed as long as 

 possible. One means of accomplishing this in a large university, 

 in the case of biology for instance, is undoubtedly to present the 

 whole subject in the fullest manner, especially in the elementary 

 courses. 



There is no doubt that every biologist, whatever the special 

 line of work to which he devotes himself, should have the same 

 training up to the point of specialization, in at least chemistry, 

 physics, morphology, and physiology. The attitude of mind which 

 Mr. MacMillan displays comes from a lack of this early corapre- 



