The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-12-09
ATOMS AND WORLDS.
Great Electrical Discoveries Not of
Recent Date.


Recent Date.
Boston Herald.
The realms of the inconceivably minute
and the inexpressibly vast were unfolded
yesterday afternoon to the Twentieth Gen.
fury Club in an account of what physical
science had done in comparatively few CEN
turtles toward solving the problem of the
physical universe. 1t was an "off day. at
the club, and though business men are not
always suspected of liking for philosoph-
ical subjects, especially on the occasion of a
great football match, they attended in un-
usually large numbers and showed a keen
interest in the Observation-Disclosures of matter
the conservation of energy, the extent of
the material universe and the relation of
matter to ether. The speakers were DR..
Webster, of Clark University, and Profess
sor Dolbear. of Tufts College.
DR.. Webster began his talk by mentioning
the difficulty there always is in interesting
the public in scientific subjects and by in
stancing how much that interest usually
confined itself to such sensational features
as liquid air." the "Roentgen rays" and
''radium."
1t Is a great mistake, he went on to say.
to suppose that these developments of cleo
tricity are all very recent. The chief things
found out about electricity were discovered
sixty or seventy years ago by Michael Far
aday, prince among natural philosophers.
and by our own Joseph Henry, originally q
schoolmaster at Albany, and afterward the
first director of the Smithsonian Institution
at Washington.
During the nineteenth century there is no
decade which does not bristle with capital
discoveries In physics We had first the ao-
Then came the discoveries in electricity
afterward the two CONGRATULATIONS in 'ener-
getics." We reached the principle of the
conservation of energy, which had come out
of the conservation OF mass of the pre-
ceding century. From the knowledge that
matter cannot be destroyed came recogni-
ton of the fact that energy or work cannot
be destroyed. Sadi Carnot, in France. had
already found, by experiments with the
steam engine, that there was conservation
of energy, but Ii took the work Of Joule an
Englishman, to prove the principle
In light there has been a similar adj
vance. Newton believed in the emission
theory; Huyghens, Dutchman, held. that
light was wave motion: Young and Fres-
mel developed this view as a theory OF wave
motion in ether: Maxwell held that the
phenomena of both light and electricity
were due to ether vibrations-wave motions
in the ETHEREAL medium" and this view
was experimentally proved by the German
the Nobel prize of $4,000 is going this wear
TO Marconi, who is using the work of Hertz
but ii was Hertz who made the original
discovery.
possible to know whether a star is moving
toward or from us by the change of its
color since color depends on the velocity
of light, which is greater when an object is
approaching than when II is receding. He
also explained the researches into the phe-
nomena of vacuum tubes which have led
Mr.. j. j. Thomson 10 conclude that the
atom" which used TO be thought the
smallest material object in the universe
absolutely indiyisible, it's name implies
is really made Up of at least 1000 smaller
units. which called ''corpuscles'' or
"electrons.- The discovery of various
radioactive bodies. including uranium and
radium was also mentioned. but the speak
er did not offer any theory as to the action
involved In conclusion DR.. Webster spoke
of the Nobel and the Carnegie endowments
given to encourage science urging that the
Carnegie method OF encouraging the men
at work instead of waiting till they made
some discovery was the better method. He
finally said:
I'm America a man is Away. asked:
What is the good of II? What will you
get for IL? What will IL capitalize for?
Now. + cannot imagine any possible good
In determining the velocity of light but
they do II. and thank God they do. even IL
they don't get dollar fer II. The great
ness of a country is not measured by it's
industrial products. by the number of tons
OF steel we export to Europe, or by the
bushels of wheat we raise. II II deter
mined by Its intellectual product in art In