Science Siftings

New Zealand Tablet, 10 July 1913, Page 49

Science Siftings

By Volt,'

The Wonders of Light. According to Dr. J. Gordon Ogden every cubic inch of this tremendous universe of ours is filled with the delicate tremulous pulsations known as light waves. Discussing some of the wonders of light, of which he gives a graphic picture, Dr. Ogden states that from aeon to aeon these quiverings have passed from world to world, from star to star, from galaxy to galaxy. Light that does not enter the eyes is, of course, invisible. Hence the blackness of a sky that is really filled with light — that passes us by in its journey through space. Modern Versus Old Violins. At a trial recently made in Paris by a number of experts, it was shown that modern violins are as good, if not better, in sound than old ones. A number of instruments -were numbered and played in a darkened room, the listeners not knowing the marks, but recording their verdict according to the numbers. When the final vote was taken it was found that the instrument having the largest number of votes was of Belgian manufacture, made last year, while the second was French, manufactured in 1911. A Stradivarius was voted as third best (although valued at thousands of pounds more than the modern violins, which took a greater number of votes), and a Grancino fourth, but the fifth and sixth were also of modern make. At What Age is a Man Strongest? It might be reasonably argued that since a man's muscles develop greatly with use, the older he grew the stronger he would become, but such is not the case. Not long ago experiments were made with some 800 men to show that the muscles of the average man go through their stages of successive increase and decline, and that whether he uses them much or little does not seem to make much difference. It was found that the average boy has a lifting power of 280 pounds. By his twentieth year, if his development is normal, his power should be increased so that he could easily exert a lifting power of 320, while his maximum power is generally reached in his thirtieth year, and is 365 pounds. After that it begins to decline, falling off eight pounds by the time he is forty. From forty to fifty the decrease is more rapid, the average lifting power at fifty being 330, only a little greater than at twenty. After fifty the decrease is so rapid and so varied that any accurate average is nearly impossible.

A Ditch-Digging Plant. The United State Government has several millions of dollars invested in excavation and construction machinery along the forty-mile stretch of the Panama Canal. If expectations are realised the enterprise of connecting the two oceans by a cut across the neck of Panama will be completed before the expiration of another twelve months and the government will have in possession the most valuable and efficient outfit in the world for reducing land grades, building dams or embankments, and otherwise preparing transportation routes, whether by land or water. What is to become of this wonderful equipments Will it be sent to the junk heap ? A Bill is now under consideration by the Senate Committee on Territories which proposes the transfer when the Canal shall have been completed of a considerable portion of the working machinery at Panama to Alaska to be used in building a railroad from the coast to the coal mines. The suggestion was advanced some time ago that the Canal machinery should be transferred to the Atlantic Coast of the United States to be used in opening the proposed inner navigation route from Boston to Key West. More recently it has been suggested that the Panama outfit be , used in the mammoth undertaking of building reservoirs and providing artificial embankments to protect the Central West from future floods.