PROFESSOR STOKES, F.R.S., ON MODERN SCIENTIFIC THOUGHT.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1082, 13 March 1883, Page 3

PROFESSOR STOKES, F.R.S., ON MODERN SCIENTIFIC THOUGHT.

The announcement that Her Majesty the Queen had graciously signified to the Victoria ( Philosophical) Institute of London her consent to receive the volumes of its ' Transactions,' gave additional eclat to a crowded meeting of its members, hold on the 15th of January at the Hall of the Society of Arts, The Institute, founded to investigate all scientific questions, including any s<ud to militate against religious belief, announced that nearly 1000 Home, Indian, Colonial and American members had now joined. Dr Stokes, F.R.S., Secretary and Fellow of the Royal Society, and Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge University, read the paper of the evening. In it he, as a scientific man, repudiated the idea, sometimes given expression to, that the progress of science would disprove the truth of Revelation, adding that the progress of science constantly showed the reverse to be the case. The Book of Revelation and the Book of Naturp, rightly understood, had never yet clashed. Truth was only in danger from a want of knowledge; we often had evidenee of that, and the progress of accurate scientific research and its full encouragement were therefore of the greatest value. Professor Stokes then proceeded to review the hypothesis of Darwin, remarking ' there may, I will not say must, be nothing atheistic in the belief that great numbers of species were evolved under the operation of laws known or conceivable from some preceding condition of a simpler character ; in case,' he added, with marked emphasis, 'we should find reasonable scientific evidence in tavor of an affirmative answer' ; but the entire tenor of his paper went to demonstrate that such evidence was not at present forthcoming. After showing from the principles of vision that ' useful ends are brought about by means/ he went on to argue,—

'We should expect a priori that, as the wisdom of the designing mind must be immeasureably above our own, so contrivance should, as a rule, extend far beyond what we can traoc. We should expect, therefore, on purely theistic grounds, that the doctrine of evolution, assumed for trial, would bd a useful and ordinarily trustworthy guide in our scientific researches ; that it might often enable us to go back one step and explain how such or such a result was brought by natural laws from such or such an anterior and so might lead us to extend our knowledge of the operation of natural causes. But this is a very different thing from assuming it as an axiom, the application of which may be extended step by step indefinitely backwards.'

As for Mr Darwin's theory of ' ancestral derivation and survival of the fittest,' Dr Stokes said it was one which 1 from its nature can bardly, if at all, be made a subject of experimental investigation, or even of observation in the records of the past/ and, therefore must ' rest mainly on the estimate which uis.y befoimedout of its own probability,' though doubtless,' Professor Stokes added, ' an underlying feeling that the

phenomenon was in some way explicable by natural causes lias contributed not a little towards its propagation.' Still the most lie could say on behalf of Darwinism was that it was •highly ingenious as an hypothesis.' ' I think,'-he added, ' a large number ot scientific men would admit that it is very far indeed from being admissible to the rank of a well-established theory,' and though ' true pjspibly, as accounting for permanent or sub-permanent differences between allied forms, yet not conceivably bridging over the great gulf which separates remote forms oi life.' [Those who have read Frofessor Nicholson's ' University Text book on Paleontology ' will recognise this as his final opinion also.] Professor Stokes, referring to the question of the creation of man, said, — '' In the account of the creation •it is distinctly stated that man was separately | created,' in the image of God,' what- . ever that may imply. Nor is this a ! point in which, by a ol I interpretation, we might say the langurge was merely figurative ; that we can afford to understand it so, for that Scripture was not given us to teach us science. Our whole ideas respecting the nature of sin and the character of God are, as it seems to me, profoundly affected according as we take the statement of Scripture straightforwardly, which implies that man was created with special powers and privileges, arid in a state of innocence from which he fell, or if we suppose that man came to be what he is by degrees, by a vast number oi infinitesimal variations from some lower animal, accompanied by a correspondingly continues variation in his mental and moral condition. On this latter supposition, God was made to be responsible for his present moral condition, which is but the natural oatgrowth of the mode of his creation. As the lower animals, little change would apparently be made from a theological point of view, if wo were to interpret as figurative the language which seems to assert a succession of creative acts. But the creation of man and his condition at creation are not confined to the account given in Genesis, They are dwelt on at length, in connexion with the scheme of redemption by St Paul, and are more briefly referred to by our Lord Himself in connexion with the institution of mar-

riage.' As against these statements 'bo express, so closely bound up with man's highest aspirations,' we have nothing more to adduce on the side of science, says Professor Stokes, ' then a hypothesis of continuous transmutation incapable of experimental investigation, and making sucb demands upon our imagination as to stagger at last the initiated.'

A modified theory of Darwinism, as applied to the creation of man, was thus dealt with :

' Some hare endeavored to combine the statements of Scripture with a modified hypothesis of continuous transmutation, by supposing that at a certain epoch in the world's history mental and moral powers were conferrer 1 by divine interposition on some animal that had been gradualJy modified in its bodily structure by natural causes till it took the form ot man. As special interposition and special creation are here recognised, I do not see that religion has anything to lose by the adoption of this hypothesis, but neither do I see that science has anything to gain. Once admit special divine interposition, and science has come to the end of her tether. Those who find the idea helpful can adopt it ; but for my part this combination of the natural aud the supernatural seems somewhat grotesque, and I prefer resting in the statement of a special creation.' A discussion ensued, in which many Fellows of the Royal Society took part, including Sir J. Risdon Bennett, VicePresident of the Royal Society, Sir J. Fayrer, K.C.5.1., Professor Lionel Beale, Mr J. E. Howard, Dr John Rae, and others.

Several applications to join the Tstitute were received.