Evening star., 1924-12-17

During the last few days the center
Of pure science"-the Carnegie In
stitution In Washington-hasS been
crowded with visitors. The interest
Of the public in the uitrascientific
demonstrations there on exhibition
has been stimulated by the presence
of eminent specialists undertaking to
translate into words of one syllable
the problems and achievements of
their laboratories--a difficult task for
a technician.
Today everybody is a semi-scient-
list; what 10 commonplace to the
masses would have baffied the high
brows Of century ago.
81 D ~
The Carnegie demonstrations were
put upon a plane as practicable as
possible. For example, there was a
machine for testing calories-heat
| units or energy units in food. by
measuring with exactness the amount
of oxygen necessary to burn up
certain portion OF food. Our diges-
tion 10 merely a furnace -oxidiSing OF
food and recombining it's elements
| into blood and tissue. 1t was shown
| that half a doughnut contains just
enough energy to equal the physical
power required to climb the Wash
ington Monument.
II the electric elevator be used to
make the ascent, the electricity re-
quired 10 energy--the energy pro-
duced by oxidizing coal, just as
physical energy 10 produced by oxf-
dizing food, and In this case, the same
amount OF energy.
Coal is energy first brought to earth
| in sunbeams, which are here con-
verted into vegetation. From vege-
tation the energy is stored in coal
and later converted into electricity.
Those same sunbeams which grew
| into vegetation and being mixed with
oxygen, became electric energy, might
have been turned into grain, and the
grain into -four and pork and lard
and the -four and lard into doughnuts
Hence, whether doughnuts or coal, II
| Is the same energy, and the same
amount either in coal or dough car
| ries the man to the top. - t
| X X r, fe-..
Some one with more imagination
| than science has said that the earth
| has neither exports nor imports,
aside from occasional .meteorites.'
Yet the sun Is constantly unloading
upon. the docks of the earth great
| cargoes of energy. Every half a
| square yard of the earth's surface re-
| ceives sufficient sun-energy every six
| hours to feed a man day. Nature
laughs at the. futile efforts, OF man to
equal her efficiency in trapping and
| storing that energy, though even ma
ture stores but small portion. Men
have invented sun engines, yet the
| best are but toys compared with the
power-storage plants of vegetation.
! Men discovered the use OF coal only
100 years ago; now we are burning,
every year, what II took nature a
| century to store. More recently we
have discovered petroleum and gaso-
| line, but at the present rate IL Will all
be gone in rs years-or all that can
be found available. -.
| II we knew how to capture the solar
| energy which falls upon earth every
sfx hours, each acre would produce in
| the crop growing period. 30 days.
harvest of 1,476.s3 tons of coal. Like
| Newton. scientists are wandering
| upon the shore OF O. great ocean,
| gathering a she'll now and then, but
| the vast deep is unknowable.
| "a y
! One apparatus at the Carnegie ck-
| hibit measured the evaporation of
moisture from plants: another showed
blood lowing through the lungs OF a
| living frog: another showed metals
| actively crystallizing; another, demon
strated the currents OF electricity
| ffowing through the earth. There
| were also pictures of archaeological
| discoveries showing the civilizations
which had fiourished and vanished
| Thousands of years ago.
| ~ y
There were machines of incon-
Iceiveoie- 4delicacy --~ a. setsmograph
which would detect an earth tremor
In the uttermost parts of the globe.
There was q thermocouple which
would measure the temperature of