SCIENCE NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2817, 4 March 1908, Page 76

SCIENCE NOTES.

—In the Strand the other night we (Science Sittings) happened to walk behind a. well-dressed and bulky man strolling leisurely along smoking a cigar, when sud Idenly on the back of his coat there glowed in green illuminated letters tho words " Pure whisky." Then again in white letters under that the name of a popular biand of "Scotch." Ac we stared the light went out, the letters vanished, and he was again an ordinary Strand passenger wearing a long dark overcoat. This is evidently London's latest word in advertising. — The photograph of a most curious object was taken in the Northern Territory of Australia during a recent tour of the Governor-General. It represents a "Nature's compass" that is as true as the compass by which a sailor guides the ship on the seas. This Nature compass i 6 a tall, elongated sandhill built by the " magnetic " ant. These hills, of which there are many thousands in the Northern Territory, always face absolutely north and south. They are very narrow from east to west, measuring but 2ft or 3ft, but their length from north to south is often 10ft or even 15ft. > . ' — Hypnotism, is saiai to be practised \ among insects. A hypnotist tells us that a queen bee can- hypnotise her whole hive whenever she wants to. She makes a curious humming sound, and within a moment or two every bee in the colony falls into a hypnotic trance. The death's-head hawkmoth is also a hypnotist of great power. This creature, indeed, makes its living out of hypnotism. Entering a hive, it makes a sound not unlike the queen bee's note, and, the bees immediately sinking into slumber, the moth proceeds to plunder at its leisure. —An investigation has recently been made to determine the absolute sensitiveness of the ear. By experiments with a telephone and alternating currents of frequencies 250 and 500 per second determinate pressure variations were produced by the ear. The telephone was standardised by steady currents, and the relation between current and pressure ascertained. The experiments lead to the conclusion that the normal ear can respond to a pressure variation of about four tenmillionths of a millimetre of mercury. —In a paper recently presented to the French Academy of Sciences. M. Tassart points oui an interesting connection between petroleum layers and seismical phenomena. A thorough examination of the location of petroleum fields has brought out the following facts:— (l) All petroleum fields situated in recent strata are confined within regions of maximum seism ical .activity or in their immediate vicinity. (2) Petroleum, fields are but rarely found 'an- ancient strata- within seismical zone?. (3) . Those petroleum fields which are situated outside of such zones belong to ancient strata', and were formerly the seat of a lively seismical activity. A Paris correspondent writes: — Here is another discovery to check the modern's good conceit of himself. In making excavations'in the choir of an ancienr church in Alsace the* tomb of a certain knierht who was bailiff of Balbroun about 1560 was opened. There lay his skeleton in good preservation, and the left arm appeared untouched by time — merely rusty ! It was found to be an arm of steel wonderfully contrived, wilh a perfectly-formed hand, the whole full of springs, rendering the artificial member almost as flexible ac «. ratural arm and hand. The fingers are worked by springs moved by a knob .^et in the palm of the hand. The thumb has a spring all to itself. — Sir David Gill, the astronomer, in an interview in Great Thoughts, was asked as to whether there was any scientific basis for aetroloey. He replied': "Not the remotest. How is it possible that there could be any? ... I regard all tho predictions of astrology as the purest rubbiah." It wmild be impossible. Sir David added, to avoid predictions being fulfilled now and again if they were made on a , sufficiently wide basis. But "the charlatans who make these predictions know -v cry Iwell that they are only humbugging the public, and the public is the most gullible creature it is possible to imagine. Look at the people who are running after cranks of various kinds, and you will see that people can 'be gulled upon any subject whatever. One has only to be impudent enough and persistent enough, and people Will believe you," — Oxygen has become the almost universal remedy in cases of poisoning by gasea, such ac coal gas, acetylene, foul air from sewers, after-damp of mines, etc.. but its application is sometimes a difficult matter for the', 'inexperienced bystander. A new apparatus by TDr Brat, made ■in Westphalia, is designed to clear the lungs and act more- or lees automatically in giving artificial respiration. The portable form consists of a fair-sized oxygen cylinder, a chest containing a small airpump, levers and other parts, and the usual face mask ; for the patient. When able to do so, the j patient breathes the oxygen without help, j If necessary, the attendant gives a rhythmical motion to the pump valve and the liberated oxygen actuates the pump, withdrawing air from, the lungs. Respiration is thus restarted or supported. — The United State* is a long wav ahead of any other nation in the matter of marine fish-culture, the only country coming anywhere near it in this respect being Norway, which was, indeed, the pioneer. This is accounted for by the fact that in many countries it is believed to be an impossibility to make any marked increase in the mynbers of sea-fishes by artificial culture. This, however, is far from being the view entertained by the Government of the United " States, which carries on fish-culture and crab and lobster propagation to an enormous extent in species hatcheries, and laboratories. The fishes regularly cultivated — by collecting and artificially fertilising the spawn — are cod, flounders, pollak, and, to a less degree, mackerel, bass, etc., while lobsters are "eared at several stations, more especially )he- one recently established at Boothby aarbour. — Professor T/owell, continuing his Vrticles in the Century Magazine, dilates m the success of his expedition to the . aides for the purpose specially of photoraphing the planet Mare. One of the i jproductions illustrating the (article shows tle Amherst telescope in position at Ali*iiza, Chile, surrounded by the members t>f the expedition; fho other reproductions jbow prints from some of tho plates >bljuuedj each plate containing from 60 to

] 90 images of the planets, and, alongside, . , drawings made at the same time by Proj fessor Lowell, located som« 6000 mike ! away, show how faithfully the photographs confirm the visual observations made at the Lowell Observatory. On the best series of j photographs, obtained on July 25, are to be seen delicate canaliform markings which \ entirely refute the suggestions that such j markings, previously recorded visually, are merely subjective phenomena. Professor j Lowell states that the results greatly exceed his most sanguine expectations, andl ] concludes his article with the following paragraph: — "That life there is foxinded on no assumption, but on massed evidence , that is conclusive, and the reader should realise that opposition to the idea that | we now have proof of life on Mars is not based on reason, but on emotion, however speciously cloaked. All scientific objec- ■ lions have been met and shown untenable , as to temperature, snow, etc., but human ' prejudice, as with the Copernican system ; or the origin of species, time alone can dispel."