The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1875-02-13
THE ROMANCE OF SCIENCE.


1.-The Conservation of Energy y is the title of
the last volume of the admirable international
Scientific Series 1t is from the hand of Balfour
Stewart, Professor of Natural Philosophy at the
Queens College, Manchester, England. The au-
thor confines himself to the physical aspects of
the subject, commencing with the inquiry, {" What
Is Energy ?" and discussing Mechanical Energy
and its change into Heat the Force and Energies
Of Nature the Law Of Conservation Transmu-
tation Of Energy the Destruction of Energy the
Position of Life. The publishers add, as an
appendix, Professor Joseph lie Conte's able and
exhaustive paper on the Correlation of the
Physical and Vital Forces - also Professor Bain's
lecture on the Correlation of the Nervous and
Mental Forces. We need hardly say that the
subject of the Correlation of Forces is largely en-
gaging the attention of the best scientific minds of
the day. Nor is it limited to the sphere of physics;
for Professor lie Conte and others have shown the
operation of the principle of Correlation in the
will doubtless show that it runs through all
nature. We quote the following from Professor
Stewards interesting and suggestive work
FOOD.
The energy Of food is analogous TO that of fuel,
and serves similar purposes. For just as fuel may
be used either for producing heat or for doing
work, so food has a twofold Office to perform. In
the first place, by it's gradual oxidation it keeps
up the temperature OF the body; and in the next
place it is used as a source of energy, on which
to draw for the performance of work. Thus a
man or a horse that works a great deal requires
to eat more food than if he does not work at all.
Thus, also, a prisoner condemned to hard labor
requires q better diet than one who does not work,
and a soldier during the fatigues of war finds it
necessary to eat more than during a time of peace.
Our food may be either of animal or vegetable
origiu-if it be the latter, it is Immediately de-
rived, like fuel, from the energy Of the suns
rays; but If il be the former, the only difference
is that it has passed through the body of an ami
NAL before coming to us; the animal has eaten
grass, and we have eaten the animal.
ORIGIN OF TnE suns HEAT.
Now, ONE might be disposed to cut the Cor
dian knot of such an inquiry by asserting that
our luminary was at first created bot; vet the
scientific mind finds itself disinclined to repose on
such an assertion. We pick up a round pebble
from the beach, and we at once acknowledge
there has been some physical cause for the shape
into which 1t has been worn. And so with re-
gard to the heat Of the sun, we must ask ourselves
it there be not some cause, not wholly imaginary,
but one which we know, or at least suspect, to be,
perhaps, still in operation, which can account for
the heat of the sun.
Now, here it is more easy to show what cannot
account for the suns heat than what can do so.
We may, for instance, be perfectly certain that it
cannot be caused by chemical action. The most
probable theory is that which was first worked
out by Helmholt and Thomson, and which attri-
butes the heat of the sun to the primeval energy
Of position possessed by its PARTICLES. In other
words, 1t is supposed that these particles originally
existed at q great distance from each other, and
that being endowed with the force of gravitation,
they have since gradually come together, while in
this process heat has been generated, just as it
would be if a stone were dropped from the top of
a cliff towards the earth.
Nor is this case wholly imaginary, but we have
some reason for thinking that it may still be in
operation in the case of certain nebule which,
ID = -
troscope, and in their general appearance, impress
the beholder with the idea that they are not yet
fully condensed into their ultimate shape and size.
If we allow that by this means our luminary
has obtained his wonderful store of high-class en-
ergy, we have yet to inquire to what extent this
operation is going on at the present moment. IL
il only a thing OF the past, or is it a thing also Of
the present? l think we may reply that the sun
cannot be condensing very fast, at least within
historical times, For if the sun were sensibly
larger than at the present, his total eclipse by the
moon would he impossible. Now, such eclipses
have taken place, at any rate, for several thou
sands of years. Doubtless o small army of me-
teors may be falling into our luminary, which
would by this fall tend to augment his heat; yet
the supply derived from this source must surely
be Insignificant. But 1t the sun be not at present
condensing so fast as to derive any sufficient heat
from this process, and if his energy be very
sparingly recruited from without, it necessarily
follows that he is in the position of a man whose
expenditure exceeds his income. He is living on
his capital, and is destined to share the fate of all
who act in a similar manner. We must therefore
contemplate a future period when he will be
poorer in energy than he IL at present, and a
period still further In the future when he will al
together cease to shine.
PROBABLE FATE OF THE UNIVERSE.
If this be the fate of the high temperature of
the universe, let us think for a moment what will
happen to its visible energy. We have spoken
already about a medium pervading space, the
Office Of which appears to be to degrade and ulti-
mately extiuguish all differential motion, just as
it tends to reduce and ultimately equalise all
difference Of temperature. Thus the universe
would ultimately become an equally heated mass,
utterly worthless as far as the production of work
is concerned, since such production depends upon
difference of temperature.
Although, therefore, in Il strictly mechanical
sense, there is a conservation OF energy, yet, as
regards usefulness or fitness for human beings,
the energy of the universe is in process of deteri-
Grafton. Universally difused heat forms what
we may call the great waste-heap of the universe,
and this is growing larger year by year. At
present il does not sensibly obtrude itself, but
who knows that the time may not arrive when we
shall be practically conscious Of its growing big
ness?
Ii will be seen that 10 this chapter VIC have re.
garded the universe, not as a collection of matter,
but rather as an energetic agent-in fact, as a
lamp Now, it has been well pointed out by
Thomson that looked at in this light, the universe
is a system that had a beginning and must have
an end for a process of degradation cannot be
eternal. If we could view the universe az a can
die not lit, then 1t II, perhaps, conceivable to re-
gard it as having been always in existence; but
If we regard Ii rather as a candle that has been
lii, we become absolutely certain that it cannot
have heen hurninO from eternity and that n Tina