Arizona weekly citizen., 1888-02-04
FOOD BY SCIENTIFIC METHODS.
The Possible Results to Re Reached by
 Chertistry-The aIalthusian Speeter.

The Possible Results to Re Reached by
 Cheuistry-The aIalthusian speeter.
 Ii Is pleasant to turn from these wars and rr.mors of wars and preparation for lght!ng tO some of the contemplated vic tories of ucacc and science. The Sicmens are A famous family of German sayant5 who have made important discoveries in several departments of scientific research. One of the brothers invented the process of storing electricity The possibilities Of this invention are incalculable. We are only beginning to dimly realize is i'm portance Dr. Semen, another brother, has written a work in which he boldly states that We are on the eve of the pro duction of food by scientific methods without depending upon plant or animal reproduction and growth He says that chemistry, in conjunction with electro technits. will some day teach man 10 make the food he now obtains from the earth by q combination of the elements of whi.h such food consists and which mature supplies everywhere in the utmost abundance. In other words, science, he thinks, may at some future time lay the Mal;husien specter of overpopul3tiOn and diminishing returns from the soil.
 Another suggestion IS that the recent achievements of science. with the aid of mechanical art. upon the field of ap- piled electricity, will restore to labor the relative independence from capital 1t en- ioyed before the command of machine power by the latter rendered competition of the individual wage worker with me chanicAl production impossible They will also restore, he thinks, the greater exer else of individual intelligence in labor, in place of the mere mechanical performance compelled by the present organization of industrial production. He does not de fine hiD meaning in detail on this point, but it e evident from his other public eX- pressiuns on this fAvOrite subject, that he expects those results to be accomplished by the great cheapening of mechanical power, through its general distribution, among the mass Of workers, by electricity, so that they can free themselves from the advantage capital has now over them by exclusive command of expensive machine power.
 What vista this opens up before usl IT the chemist can take the clements of the earth about us and produce whole some and palatable food at . very triiiing cost. how changed will be the whole life of man on this planet! Poverty will be abolished. The surface Of the glObe can then become one vast city. There would be DO more slaugLtyring of animals for food, TOT tOilsome labor in the wheat and corn fields. All this may seem visionary; but suppose an old Grecian or Roman was told that some day men would travel in safety at the rate of Co miles an hour, that immense ships would blow through the ocean at 20 miles an hour, regardless of wind or waves, ur, more marvellous | still. that E message could be flashed 1 under the ocean and an answer be re- | turned in few moments. The citizen of the ancient world won!l have said that his informant was a lunatic; that such things was prodigies that man could never hope to accomplish. The telephone, through which people can keep up conversation hundreds of miles apart, would have s,emed still more incredible to those who lived in n prescienuiic age. The possibili- ties of scientific discovery are simply in- | calculable.-Dem0rest's Monthly.