PROGRESS OP SCIENCE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 33, 29 June 1914, Page 6

PROGRESS OP SCIENCE.

IN TIIE LAST HALF-CENTURY. ADDRESS BY REV. A. B. CHAPPELL. At the meeting of the Broihwhoot yesterday, the speaker, the Rev. A, 1> Ohappell, took for hio subject "The i'ro grcfis of Science in the Last llaif-Cen tury,"' and delivered the following tul dross:— SCIENCE IS MODERN.

Tlint kind of inquiry—matter-of-fact, iclcar-eyed, precise, thorough, patient-*-, wliicli we call science is indubitably modern. Describing primitive jneji, Aeschylus tells

llow, Srat, beholding they beheld in vain. And, 'hearing, ihcard not, Ibut li'.ic .shapes in dreams Mixed all things wildly down the tedious time. In such "light, with more or 2ess of shade," men lived for untold ages', till some few Chaldeans anif early (ireeks wondered, and wrought, anil wrote. But theirs was still a dreamy, not a critical investigation. Even Aristotle's path-finding work watt often 100 credulous and metaphysical to be scientific, i and the spell of 'lll's example 1 was cast -or ] ccnturio.l over the western world, al-! though it was there that science was! destined lo arise. The fifteenth and sixteenth centuries'—days of navigation and the printing press—were a' tirab of awakening, and tlu> idea, of Jaw and order in nature had its first cfoartce of wide acceptance. The seventeenth century's attention to matluinKLtical analysis and it's use of the telescope made definite advance possible. The next cen tiirv saw progress in the'experimental sciences of physics and chemistry; electricity and oxygen were discovered, and men .first realised that matter was not destroyed when it was burnt. The nineteenth century was marked by increasing devotion to science, which became more and more specialised and progressive. The middle years of tiliat century 'were a time of .patient observation and experiment, united to generalisations reached by such a dauntless yet not reckless use of the imagination as is. in Tyndall's (phrase, "when bounded and conditioned by co-operant reason, the mightiest instrument of the physical discoverer." That enthusiasm proved contagious, and in the early sixties there came what Prince Hropotkin lias described as a "general revival of science."

COXTIXUAL ADVANCE. There has been no Tti-iiclion. Instead. wit.li gathering momentum, science ha i advanced, criticising, correcting, .'verify ing, amplifying tile, views o£ preceding days, and adding .£». tjjp store >o : f human knowledge and the worth of 'human life. Merely to give a, catalogue of its quest-, and conquests during ■ the list fifty yi iu i would'require a volume, A glance at some of the most, notable achievements. liowever, supplies ample proof „>/ tl.it • lialf-centnry's clafrn to he regarded as iv period of unexampled saiintiftc pro IOvOWLEIXjE OF THE EARTH.

Within that brief space our views of the structure of our planet-dwelling have been greatly 'modilied. Tidai in-ve-ttigaiion* tave made untenable t'!i" notion that its interim- is entirely molt,en, and Humboldt's theory of 'n common cause of volcanoes and eartli--1 quakes has vanished before a really .iiieuWHc study of earth-tremors. Jiabluge's bowl of treacle has giyen place to beautifully constructed seism ometric appliances: tbe-new bifilar pendulum devised in 18!ll can record a tKt of the earth'.-) surface 'amounting to no more than if a line 'one mile lung were lifted at vone end but a thousandth part ot an inch. . ■Movements o£ the earth's axis, fifty years ago thought to be quite stable. can now be accurately measured. Our planet's behaviour is now sleeplessly watched <by delicate automatic apparatus whose eyes are in the ends of the earth. The "new geolog;'." heralded' bv Sue**' work in Hie eighties, has explained tfie building of earth'a mountains, and' 'declared the secrets of its rocks. We have searched its ocean floors, and at sacrificing cost lrjv« ventured irtc the blizzards of it, iiei-.ir. suows.

THE STARRY IIEAVEXS Wo gaze at the starry heavens with more certitude than did our grandfathers. They were, afraid of comets: we know 'that a whole comet could he carried in a saok. The moon to them was i«r away: our best telescopes' in effect reduce thirty-five, They knew little about the sun: we have (since the ellipse of 18CS) analysed the compressed mid' vibratorygases of whice it ir, composed, examined v'ith the spectro-heliograph its detailed structure, mapped out day by day •its 'spots,' and by menus of the spectroscope have studied the flaming pro iniiLeuces of its dazzling corona. When the old llien of to-day were boys, if theiv eyes were sharp and their minds trained, they could have counted about 80(H) stars: cur improved, telescopes' reveal some hund'rcdU of 'millions, and the application of (photography t» astronomical work (made possible by the use since the late seventies of the "dry plate") makes us aware of thousands of | millions. Wo have found more than live 'hundred planets, -and with Mars—olio of the select little number with which our forefathers were somewhat distantly acquainted-we have become very familiar and-have oven .hoped to get oil 'speaking tonus. Stellar 'photography has made jossiblo that sectional charting of the pky for which tile L'aris Conference in I'SHI arranged; yhile, coupled' with .-po.c.tnnn analysis—it'lio new sense which KirchofT and iluggins have given to astronomy—it has provided the most refined method of ascertaining the dimensions and motions of the universe.

'PHYSICS AXD CHEMISTRY'. With tile ways of matter, common ■throughout that universe, recent research has JKade us more accurately iu-uiKiinteu. Cases have been liquefied, many even solidified, and the beat of the electric furnace can now melt all the solid elements and turn some of them to vapor. Tile atom—supposed in earlier days to be the simple, unbreakable basis of matter —i's now known to have sitructu.ro and motion, and to be electrically constituted. Mcndeleeff's periodic law, which stated that the properties of ail element are >1 function of its atomic weight, has had extended application. New dhemical elements have 'been discovered, , specially noteworthy being Rayleigh's and Ramsay's live inert gases—argon, neon, krypton, xenon and helium. l'jelipsiug all' else, radium 'has hern found, tile researches of the Ourios ant 'Rutherford crowning the pioneer toil of Grookes, Lenard, Rflntgen, and Boocuerel. With its trans, mutability into helium, its practically inexhaustible emanations, its univemi distribution, it has revolutionised our ideas of the sources of Wig sun's heat and compelled the physicist to grant the liislogii-it nil the time he wants for the slow evolution of life-forms on the I earth in the past.

BIOLOCV. TUc biologist hinibt'li' had been tirelessly busy in the utiil; Ijm/ ng fields of his labor. H.e .asi iit'ix u\. tare t\ i nrssed the discovery oi ,uauy new kinds of aninmis am l p.a;. ; , ;.■■■■ uuitfui ;i----\.;.-,tigat:uii »!' .4»c uiul-. r-t-i-amiing of cell di%l-:on. Lin heroic ifusal to abandon the caivh for Mi's origin, and the steady estimation of t ljelors 01 oig'.ui"- ev.iliii ui STUDY OF MIND.

In those retsnl ycj.it. p. j etiology iia • received schmtilh: and b;.i progressed apace. Ti.e localisation oi iniin function in'a wa> miii'u iliuminaiiug tiban the crude pjie i .,.ogy of uall and Spurzheim, the analysis of sense impressions, the cariyi:ig out of u-ai.tion-time and ijimihi r. .p*r:ments ,:i i. i ntul processes, toguilur ..ifcli ali tin l , research of physiologicm psy.-homg) these indicate ail new depai tli ent oi scientific act.'. it,, . Man lias made a laboratory e.vin.uuuon of I r , own mind. , . PRACTICAL RESULTS. Thus the aim of science—to know — has been enthusiastically pursued, and in its quest for knowledge it has, as a result, not a purpose, rendered much practical service. Science to-day, as never before, is seen to be worth while: it is earning its own living. It accomplishes economies on every hand, it has given us in these last fifty years highspeed telegraphy and the wonders of "wireless." It lias taught us how, in the phonograph, to catch and reproduce [ sounds at will; in the telephongrapli we can store up messages for the ab--1 sent; by means of the telautograph, we ! can transmit pictures round the world in a few seconds. It has produced the wire-wound great gun, the dirigible torpedo, and the submarine boat. California's solar-motor pumps and London's horseless carriages are alike its gifts. It has made our seas safer and swifter to sail, and has propelled us through the air. It has entertained us with animated pictures, educated us with type-setting machines, irradiated us with new illiiininants, and helped us to take photographs of the invisible and in the dark. By its aid we have tracked crime and upheld the majesty of the law. Best of all, it has reinforced us in the battle against disease. Its antitoxins are our sure defence, and its light on the white corpuscles of our blood shows the way to health. Thanks to Pasteur and Lister we have anti-septic surgery: no longer need we dread suppuration in the wounds of a compound fracture, and, instead of the peritoneum being still beyond the pale of legitimate surgery, the removal of the "appendix" is almost an excuse for a recuperative holiday. Modern science has found the germ of consumption. It has, by its knowledge of a gnat, driven yellow-fever out of Cuba, and by its exposure and expulsion of the" wily mosquito made the Panama Canal possible. 1 A GREAT IXFLUEXCE.

The bewildering magnificence of its detailed achievements, even completely chronicled, would not exhaust the story of the progress of science in the last half century, for science is_ more than the sum of the separate sciences. It is a method, and as such it has ot late extended its dominating influence into every avenue of thought; not even religion has escaped its commanding touch. It is also a mood, and the training of its workers and the enlargement of its scope have Deen contributory to what Huxlcv (himself ,in embodiment of its spirit) called "that enthusiasm for truth, that fanaticism of veracity, which is a greater possession than mere learn- ; ing. a nobler gift than the power of increasing knowledge." SCIENCE AND JIiiUGIOX.

Or. their lir.lu -t lcvrV. and in tlio'.r worthiest uxp'Onen';.''., religion ami science meet in close fellowship. They er.joy in common love truth and n practical belief in tl» fird&mental reasonableness and order of the universe, The religious man who .Testis Christ ,i'J his exemplar t.innot dose, his eye?, in i>"cjn lice agaiv.s't any rc.iult ol hrientif.c quest. nor can tue truly scientific man deny tlie validity of the phenomena of the religious life, or foolishly imagine that. all J ain<rs in 'human experience can he tested by tlie methods' of jifa own nartiouJtir department of enquiry. The; la-t fifty years of scientific' progress have strikingly doi.-.onr,-trated the futility -of conflict between science and religion. On the uplands of thought the conflict 'has given place to a harmonious quest for a truth ( that "'hall make .ian free and strong] and glad. The honest- taking of a j share in that great ciuest--the quest fori truth ns a teds of practical life, is j the borjiulcn di'ty of every man.