Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1892-01-21
THE UNCERTAINTY OF CONCLUSIONS.
The Subject Discussed by Prof. Mentlenhan
Before the Philosophical Society.

| The Subject Discussed by Prof. MentienhaIl
Before the Philosophical Society.
About two hundred people gathered in the
lecture hall of tho Columbian University last
evening to hear the annual address Of the re-
| firing president of the Philosophical Society,
Prof. T. c. Mendonhall Of the coas. survey.
Tho topic OF his paper, the delivery Of which
occupied about half an hour. was The Uncer-
tainty of Conclusions" The speaker was in
troduced by Prof. Ct. X. Gilbert.
Prof. Mendenhall opened his discourse by
citing an interesting case of judicial conviction
on a charge Of murder on circumstantial evil
dence, the conclusions of which were afterward
proven to be wholly false through a confession
by the real murderer. The reasoning of the
prosecuting witnesses, he said. the charge of
the Judge and the findings of the Jury had been
amply justified by the facts in the case-an
actual one of recent happening in the west
and there had been no fault in their logic. vet
the conclusions had been entirely insufficient
owing to the law of the uncertainty of con-
cluslons
He spoke Of The exact sciences as those whose
conclusions are capable of being verified by
experiment and went on to discriminating re-
view OF them, placing mathematics in the lead
as the one science OF precision. Even astron-
omy, he alleged, was at fault in some of its
conclusions, an instance being noted of long
series of experiments that were conducted IN
inns city some months ago for the purpose of
determining the accurate stellar parallax. No
time or pains were spared to make the results
satisfactory, ard yet after the calculations had
been made the final determination was q mega
tive that could only be accounted fI by some
sort OF a curvature in space that would cause
a man looking straight forward to sec the back
OF his own head a more recent fact has been
discovered, however, that affords a reasonable
explanation of the absurdity and the data so
carefully obtained may yet DO OF the greatest
use and valuc.
In his review of the sciences Prof Menden-
hall spoke of meteoroiogy and alluded in \
pleasant manner to the "cloud compelling
Joke OF the pas. summer. He paid some
humorous attention to the formation of new
industry and alluded wittily to the organiZa-
ton IN tie west of the Interstate Artificial
Rain Company, li;nited." In his discussion of
the character of the anti-drOught propaganda
he remarked that it was noteworthy fact that
most OF the public bcnefactors who had allied
themselves to the movement were designated
as professors. who did not adhere SO closely to
their lines of science that they found it incon-
slstent with their professional attainments to
do the county sprinkiing at so much per acre.
The prospects, he said, are that the business
will be overdone.
He utilized this instance of popular misap-
prehersion of the ends and aims of pure science
IS a reason why there should be n better ac-
quaintance between the intelligent public and
the real scientific workers of the day, that the
former might know the vast amount OF real
inquiry into the secret of nature that Is being
conducted, and thus be less liable to the impo-
sitions of charletans.
In his concluding remarks he said that the
main difficulty in logical thought is that people
60 not sufficiently realize that there may be
another way of explaining events than that
which they adopt This fault he alleged to be
at the bottom OF most cases of conviction on
circumstantial evidence, and he spoke of tho
presence in the world of a large class of people
who do not want to be disturbed. but who plant
themselves in one position, where they insist
the truth must lie, and do not advance to
another position until actually forced to do So
They do not realize that the truth may be both
here and there at the same time.