The Opelousas courier., 1894-06-02
MARvELs OF THE FUTURE.
SOME OF THE wo.aDERru1 THINGS
PROMISED BY SCIENTISTS.

SOME OF TIE wo4fDERru1 THINGS
PROMISED y SCIENTISTS
Life to Be Prolonged by Electricity
Unwritten, Unspoken Thoughts
May BE Registered.
T7HE following interesting
forecasts of what is to happen
in the various fields of cleo
{ trical science, industrial
mechanism, chemistry, Christianity,
National progress and social condi-
lions have been collected from men
recognized as at the head of various
branches of thought and industry by
the publisher of McClure's Magazine:
Professor Edwin J. Houston, the
electrician, writes: "The edge of the
electric future is bright with lmme'
diate promise for the worlds veal.
In the nearer foreground I see a prac-
tical method for the production OF
electricity directly from the burning
of coal. This achieved, there neces-
sarily follows the universal adoption OF
the electric motor as q prime mover,
the RELOCATION of the steam engine to
the scrap heap, and the almost lmme-
date realization of the air ship as a
means of transportation.
assuming the aus of chemical
affinity to lie in the unlike electric
charges of the combined atoms, l see
the practical realization of electric
svnthesis, whereby wholesome food
products will be directly formed under
the potency of electric afinities. l
see, too, a marked advance in electro
therapeutics, whereby human life will
be prolonged and its sufferings ale.
waited. Diagnosis and prognosis will
be profoundly aided by exact electrical
measurements of the various organs OF
the human body as regards their cleo
tro-motive force and resistance. The
electro-therapist of the future will en-
ploy electric charges and currents for
restoring the normal charges and cur
rents of the body, as well as for the
stimulation of v or muscular
tissues.
Back of these achievements I discern
q practical apparatus for seeing
through a wire: i. e., a device for
looking into areceiver at one end of
metallic wire and seeing therein a
faithful reproduction of whatever OPP
tical images are impressed on a trans
mitter at the other end, even though
thousands of miles intervene. ! see
the possible use of the step-down
transformer for the preparation of a
road bed or road surface by the vitri.
fication, in stu, of clay OF other suit
able soil, by the intense heating power
of enormous currents of electricity.
"These things I believe I see with
fair distinctness. In the further back
ground I family see, dimly outlined
through the clouds, an apparatus for
the automatic registration of unwrit-
ten, unspoken thought, and its accu-
rate reproduction at any indefinite
time afterward."
Professor Robert H. Thurston, of
Cornell University, says of the devel-
opment of industrial mechanism:
"With reduced hours of struggle
for life and needs, time will be afforded
every good citizen for rest, for enjoy
ment, for thought; and all classes
may then become classes of leisure in
ample degree for their own best vel
fare. Easy lives will come to meal
comfortable and happy lives. The
world will grow better as it grows
older, after the struggle for survival
shall have ceased; and the length of
the life of the individual will be pro-
longed, while the growth of popula-
ton, now limited only by the suffer
ing consequent upon overcrowding the
present field, will be given its natural
and comfortable expansion to a limit
set by the extent to which vital powers
are expended in mental and in~telleetu,
al exertion. The family of the nation
will, like the family of the individual,
be smaller and happier as the mind,
instead of the body, comes to utilize
all physical powers"
OF the future in chemistry Professor
Ira Remsen, of John Hopkins Univer-
sity, has this to say:
"The indications of the present
seem to me to point to two conclu-
sions bearing upon the fundamental
problems of chemistry: III That the
different forms of matter are in some
way closely related, and chat the num-.
Der of elementary forms will be much
reduced by investigation. ~ That
it will be possible in the future to de.
velop a mechanics of the molecules
comparable to the mechanics of the
heavenly bodies.
Gas regards the applications of
chemistry, two probabilities also ap-
pear: Q) That the time is not far
distant when the artificial preparation
of articles of food will be accom-.
plished. ~ That the chemical study
of the substance PRESENT. in the animal
body under normal conditions, and
of those formed in the body in dis
eases, will lead to chemical methods of
treating diseases that will be thorough
~ scientific"
New Metal i'm Idaho.