Citizens Say

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 956, 26 April 1930, Page 10

Citizens Say

(To the Editor.)

THE POET LAUREATESHIP Sir, —- According: to a cable message London newspapers have put forward the names of men likely to be nominated for the Poet Laureateship. Rudyard Kipling has been suggested, Sir William Watson, Alfred Noyes, John Drinkwater, even Henry Chappell. But there is no one to fill the job in the full Tennysonian tradition. I think the suggestion of another paper, the “Daily Express,” that the post of “public poet” be left vacant is best. Surely a position that carries with it a useful pension and yet permits the holder to ignore national occasions connotes a waste of public money, and should be abolished. HOPEFUL. BABIES IN THEATRES Sir,— May I risk the wrath of an army of foolish young mothers by protesting against the popular habit of taking babies into crowded picture theatres, especially at night? The presence of these infants in theatres is a common sight and, as often as not. they spoil the enjoyment of* adults by crying. But apart from this —a view that possibly may be construed as unfair—there is the Question of health. No child of tender years should be kept out after 7 p.m. at latest, except in unavoidable circumstances, let alone subjected to the cold of cold night air after breathing the warm air of a theatre. The whole problem is one of maternal selfishness. If a woman undertakes the responsibility of motherhood and cannot have her baby looked after in the evenings she should stav at home. PLUNKETITE. AIR DEFENCE Sir.— Mr. W. P. Endean’s o£t-repeated cry that the old foot-sloggers, the infantry, won the war and that a change in the present defence system was not desirable, is not without a flaw. It must be, of course, policy talk. While not actually outlining anything of a definite nature concerning defence, the United Party has at least given every indication of making a change which, if carried out on the lines inferred in the various official messages from headquarters, should mark the dawn of a more adequate defence at less cost. An indication of concentration on an air force and its reserves is gratifying. Apart from their uselessness to an isolated Dominion, infantry tactics in warfare change like the wind, and it is probable, as was the case with the Great War, that the compulsory and much-dreaded training undertaken by the New Zealand youth of today would be useless in another outbreak of war. But this is the era of aircraft, both in commerce and defence, and while concentration upon it by the Government would provide the only sound defence for the country it would mean the building up of a business or industrv which is too important to be hindered

as it is, by lack of Government enterprise. And politicians, so many of whom lack the education of travel, need not drag upon foresight but merely follow the more experienced in other Dominions, who handle the defence question without a single murmur of dissatisfaction from the multitudes. Elsewhere the versatility of the airplane is fully realised and as a means of defence and general transport it is rapidly going to the fore. JOYSTICK. CREDIT, NOT CRITICISM Sir, — One of the worst exhibitions of bad taste I have seen was at the Tepid Baths the other evening, when the in-ter-umversity swimming carnival was held. borne youths actually counted out a diver who was not connected vith the championship contests, but was apparently a member of a team «K J ,Ti a Swimming Club, which assisted the tournament committee to make its carnival a success. This a ?: XUlty . dive in Attempting difficult action. It was a dive which was more likely to fail than to succeed, yet the competitor was singled f ?, r derision. I should point out that these young men were not eonnected with the cheer-leading group of Auckland University College stud ents. It was incredibly bad firm and an apology should be due to a performer who volunteered his services for the universities. vices ror CLAUDE DUVAL, FORECASTING Sir, — " """* Among- the concluding events of th*» that n LvT?, 10t " d perioa »f disturbance letter* was &en P ?? Th^ 6 my last “eating such occurrences has a' scTent?S. ai to some f<frth e t„ to t^ Pan or iS as 23 h sf° n °- dint C "'i ntry ’ and! d alcor a ding 8C t ° 0 Ve p T ec b e y s my* time to write, ?„" p^ declared That'' WraKse ing scientists, using utterly ot fa,[' Cad ' argument, ridiculed ii y fallacious scientific world al ce t ptei <i^ i and the ions. Today it their opinproved by experience C e Pted fact, monly understood, that not Com * nection does exist—and h a conthe discovery has enn'i V l6 cre dit for derided it. Before those who explained to him how it^ agse died ' 1 polarity and to the owing to other planets that his ?£t rference of times seemed at fault 3 thC ° ry some - As a matter of fart themselves do not 2^,^ (Continued in next column.)

ciably affect any terrestrial phenomena. But, the “prominences.” or tongues of flame, which arise from the same cause as sun-spots, and which, shoot upward from the rear, or western side, of sun-spots (whether incipient, veiled, mature or decadent) have very much to do with all affairs of this world. They rise to heights sometimes as great as 300,000 miles, through the denser part of the sun’s non-condpct-ing atmosphere, and act as excellent conductors for the spasmodic escape of electricity from the always more or less surcharged sun. We find, too, that these electrical discharges not only cause atmospheric storms upon this and other planets, but that they induce terrene disturbances and profoundly affect all life and health, and every kind cf terrestrial phenomena. Than this there is no more important and fruitful ground for scientific research. It is an old and a true saying: “Eyes have they and see not.” Let me venture to give an example of the many things by which nature has been trying in vain to teach us; arriving at it theoretically, and unable to test it thoroughly by experiment, I have now asked physicists abroad to help me do so. Many will have noticed that when water is escaping through the plughole of a bath or basin it acquires the form of a vortex or whirlpool. Bui, how many have observed that in the same locality the whirl is always in the same direction? Don’t ask a physicist his opinion as to this. His textbooks have no reference to it; lie will only laugh at you. Try it for yourself; it is well worth investigating. In science, base all your theory upon nature, not nature upon your theory. Remember that books are always imperfect; nature never is so. Let your mind be simple and receptive, free from rigidity and baneful self-satisfaction’ I say that the vortical movement is primarily due to the earth’s rotation; that electricity is involved; that in each vortex there is a magnetic field, with polarity dependent upon the direction of the whirl, and that, for the same fundamental reason, the movement is like that of primary cyclones, clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere, anti-clockwise in the Northern. The rotation of any liquid or vaporous body—e.g., the sun—is not equiangular as has been thought, but differential. It inevitably involves a very definite and remarkable circulation throughout the body; and that circulation must include, inter alia, a system of inflowing currents in its lower latitudes. Accordingly we find in the equatorial half of each solar hemisphere these necessary and systematic inrushes, their positions, their number and their volume varying throughout each solar period of 11 years-odd-These inrushes suck in part of the overlying electrified photosphere (vapour) and often the atmospheric gases from still higher levels, frequently causing the dark cavities we call sun-spots. And in all primary sunspots we find the vortical movement and magnetic fields above-mentioned. All indrawn vapour becomes more intensely hot, expands and bursts out again in tongues or pillars of incandescent gas. In its outrush from th* vortex it is affected by the spiral form °L. latter just as a projectile affected by the rifling of a gun, anwe prominence therefore shoots forth a spiral movement the reverse of that with which the vapour had bee® sucked in: the lower portion of a prominence often resembles a spirally iluted column. Electrical force filter* through the solar atmosphere at al* times, and in all latitudes, but always tar more so in low latitudes than in high. The tremendous sudden di*cnarges from prominences, however. are ""’hat react upon the earth so produce the most striking phenomena, (To be continued) JS. JL jnmA