Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 25.djvu/773

Rh use of our senses presents peculiar difficulties to scientific investigation. Some kinds of information with regard to their surroundings are of such paramount importance to successive generations of living beings that they have learned to interpret indications which, from a physical point of view, are of the slenderest character. Every day we are in the habit of recognizing, without much difficulty, the quarter from which a sound proceeds, but by what steps we attain that end has not yet been satisfactorily explained. It has been proved that when proper precautions are taken we are unable to distinguish whether a pure tone (as from a vibrating tuning-fork held over a suitable resonator) comes to us from in front or from behind. This is what might have been expected from an a priori point of view; but what would have been expected is that with almost any other sort of sound, from a clap of the hands to the clearest vowel-sound, the discrimination is not only possible but easy and instinctive. In these cases it does not appear how the possession of two ears helps us, though there is some evidence that it does; and, even when sounds come to us from the right or left, the explanation of the ready discrimination which is then possible with pure tones is not so easy as might at first appear. We should be inclined to think that the sound was heard much more loudly with the ear that is turned toward than with the ear that is turned from it, and that in this way the direction was recognized. But, if we try the experiment, we find that, at any rate with notes near the middle of the musical scale, the difference of loudness is by no means so very great. The wave-lengths of such notes are long enough in relation to the dimensions of the head to forbid the formation of anything like a sound shadow in which the averted ear might be sheltered.

In concluding this imperfect survey of recent progress in physics, I must warn you emphatically that much of great importance has been passed over altogether. I should have liked to speak to you of those far-reaching speculations, especially associated with the name of Maxwell, in which light is regarded as a disturbance in an electro-magnetic medium. Indeed, at one time, I had thought of taking the scientific work of Maxwell as the principal theme of this address. But, like most men of genius, Maxwell delighted in questions too obscure and difficult for hasty treatment, and thus much of his work could hardly be considered upon such an occasion as the present. His biography has recently been published, and should be read by all who are interested in science and in scientific men. His many-sided character, the quaintness of his humor, the penetration of his intellect, his simple but deep religious feeling, the affection between son and father, the devotion of husband and wife, all combine to form a rare and fascinating picture. To estimate rightly his influence upon the present state of science, we must regard not only the work that he executed himself, important as that was, but also the ideas and the spirit which he