September 2, 1904.] 



SCIENCE. 



299 



was only fair that they should be controlled 

 by Americans. 



Among American astronomers, however, 

 strong objections were made to the part it 

 was proposed that Harvard should take in 

 the plan. For this reason two leading as- 

 tronomers declined to serve even on an in- 

 formal advisory committee. It was ex- 

 plained that this objection did not arise 

 from jealousy of Harvard, or from fear 

 that the plan would not be well carried out 

 there, but from a belief that one observa- 

 tory should not be more prominent than 

 another in such a scheme, and that the con- 

 trol of such a fund and of its expenditure 

 should be wholly independent of any one 

 institution. I believe that the selection of 

 a trustee for the care of the proposed fund 

 should be made by the donor, and had ex- 

 pected that the informal advisory com- 

 mittee would have recommended some 

 method of appointing the final committee, 

 which would have secured unprejudiced 

 action. The function of the first of these 

 committees would have been to propose a 

 plan like that described above. This want 

 has been supplied, in a great measure, by 

 my friends, Mrs. Henry Draper, Major E. 

 H. Hills, Professor Simon Newcomb and 

 Professor H. H. Turner, to whom I am 

 indebted for important suggestions in pre- 

 paring this pamphlet. 



There are certain advantages to be gained 

 by throwing the responsibility upon a single 

 individual or institution, as all mistakes or 

 failures can then be located and remedied. 

 Continued efforts will accordingly be made 

 by the writer to accomplish the desired re- 

 sults. As other observatories have not ex- 

 pressed a wish to aid astronomers elsewhere, 

 there seems to be no objection to making it 

 a part of the policy at Harvard. 



The present discussion has been pub- 

 lished to supplement that issued in 1903, 

 a copy of which will be sent to those who 

 desire it. It is believed that present con- 



ditions are unusually favorable for secur- 

 ing great progress in astronomical science. 

 It is hoped that a sum of at least $50,000 

 may be obtained for immediate expendi- 

 ture, so that a beginning may be made at 

 once, and astronomers may have an oppor- 

 tunity to show what results they might 

 obtain with unrestricted means. 



My one object is to secure a real advance 

 in astronomy. Any plan that will attain 

 this will have my hearty support, if de- 

 sired. If this advance is made, it is a 

 matter of little importance whether the part 

 taken by the Harvard Observatory, or by 

 myself, is large or small. 



Edward C. Pickering. 



July 11, 1904. 



THE CHANGING ATTITUDE OF AMERICAN 

 UNIVERSITIES TOWARD PSYCHOLOGY. 



In this adolescent period of its growth, 

 psychology may be pardoned for wonder- 

 ing if its elder brothers understand the 

 manhood it is attaining. The distortion 

 by the public prints, in their eagerness to 

 be a little more thun up-to-date, has thrown 

 numerous fads of 'mental science' out of 

 all perspective, and resulted undoubtedly 

 in the injury of psychology. At the pres- 

 ent .time, however, the general reader is 

 learning to discriminate 'yellowness' in 

 what purports to be psychological news. 

 When the Sunday special announced in 

 January of this year that the soul of a rat 

 had been observed in the laboratory of a 

 Washington psychologist, few had diffi- 

 culty in pigeon-holing the article with an- 

 other which declared, about the same time, 

 that a California physicist expected to turn 

 negroes into white men by the use of ra- 

 dimn. In the following pages the writer 

 collects certain facts which bear upon the 

 recent development of psychology in Amer- 

 ican institutions of higher learning, with 

 the hope of giving more adequate means 

 for judging the present status of this sci- 



