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National Geographic : 1925 Jan
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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE The late Simon Newcomb showed how easily an astronomer with a low-power telescope might be deceived as to what he saw on the surface of Mars. At an astronomical convention, Dr. Newcomb made a large white disk. On this he put all sorts of irregular markings resembling those a powerful telescope re veals on Mars. Exhibiting it at a given distance from his fellow astronomers, he asked them to draw what they saw. And when everyone had finished his drawing, not one of them had the irregular mark ings on his drawing, but all had straight lines resembling the "canals" that ob servers with small telescopes believe they see, indicating that the small separating power of the eye at that distance was re sponsible for the "canals." The question naturally arises whether any other star has a system of planets like our own solar system. This is a question that perhaps can never be an swered by direct observation, for there is no present reason for hoping that any telescope can ever be built powerful enough to see such planets shining only by borrowed light. But reasoning by analogy, it is hardly probable that, among nearly two billion stars in our universe, ours should be the only one with a family of planets. We might think that our earth is the only planet with a moon, if we had to depend on our eyes. DOES LIFE EVER PASS FROM STAR TO STAR? Then comes the question of interplane tary and interstellar communication of life. Biology has demonstrated that there are forms of life that go into a deep sleep when placed in a high vacuum and sur rounded with temperatures approaching that of space. With all that is now known of cosmic dust and its movement through space, there is certainly reason for believing that suspended life, in its lowest forms, might pass from planet to planet or even from dark star to dark star. Much the greater difficulty would come in finding a suitable environment for the waking bit of life on a new planet or an other dark star. The astronomer and the physicist, in their quest of the truth about the consti tution of matter, employ theory and ex periment with startling success. Now gathering a mass of clearly related facts, now formulating a theory that will ex plain these facts and their relationships, now putting that theory to the acid test of proof that in no other way could the accumulated facts be explained, they march on, pushing back the horizon here, lifting the veil of mystery there, and, step by step, getting that knowledge of the behavior of matter which enables the applied scientist to manipulate it for the promotion of human good. Last summer, at Mt. Wilson, Dr. and Mrs. Charles G. Abbot gave the world a spectacular demonstration of how closely applied science may follow in the wake of theory and experiment. Dr. Abbot, following his studies of the sun, had de vised a solar cooker-a sort of trap in which to catch sunbeams and make them take the place of mundane fuel in cooking and baking. He was so successful that piping hot things came to their table all season done to a turn by heavenly fires 93,000,000 miles away. TIE TASK THAT CHALLENGES If the human race expands from 1925 to 2035 in the ratio that it expanded from 1804 to 1914, the earth will no years hence have a population of more than four billion souls. To feed them, to house them, to pro vide them with transportation and cloth ing, and to meet the other multiplying needs of a civilization growing ever more complex, is the task that confronts the applied scientist. But ahead of him must ever go pure science, laying the founda tions of truth upon which must be built the superstructure of human progress. Mt. Wilson, Yerkes, Lick, and the other great observatories of the earth are help ing to lay these foundations. And upon their success and the success of their congeners in other fields depends the wel fare of our children's children and the other billions of people whom the centu ries are adding to our population. 122
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