Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 61.djvu/389

Rh the competent specialist will see that the correct technical terms are employed and that explanatory foot-notes are given in all doubtful cases. Here, however, the French word that means addition is sometimes rendered as 'unite' and the word that means subtraction is rendered 'draw from.' What is the meaning of such expressions as 'manner of relating past events with the probability of causes,' 'to conclude the order of preference,' 'diminution of subsistences,' etc.? We are told that stars are 'called double, on account of their conjunction 'and that laws are the ratios which connect particular phenomena together.' The strange expression 'salubrity of the sun' only ceases to be puzzling upon reference to the original, where we learn that sol is the word which the translators suppose to mean 'sun.' On one page 'primary number' is used six times where prime number should have been employed. Expectation is a common term in the theory of probability, but the translators prefer the word 'hope.' DeMoivre is a name well known to American mathematicians but the translators call him 'Moivre,' as Laplace properly did. For the same reason, no doubt, Pliny appears as 'Pline,' but it is hard to understand what reason or fact justifies the statement that 'the duration of the rotation of Saturn is 0.427 minutes.'

In the concluding paragraph of the essay occurs the well-known statement of Laplace that the theory of probability is really only common sense reduced to calculation. The translators, however, calmly tell us that 'the theory of probabilities is at bottom only common sense reduced to calculus.' Alas, that American scholarship and American science should have fall upon them the blot of such poor work. No doubt, the translators put forth this book, really believing it to be a creditable production; they honestly think that they are good linguists and that they have a good knowledge of the subject matter of Laplace's essay. Such a state of mind can only be due, we think, to grave defects in the methods of instruction in the schools and colleges where these men were educated, methods not worse probably than those in many others. Lastly, what shall be said of publishers who issue such crude material and thereby bring disgrace upon American scientific literature! Here was an opportunity where both translators and publishers might have won credit and advanced mathematical learning, for a good translation of this essay, well annotated, would furnish excellent collateral reading to many students of probability and least squares. Nathaniel Bowditch honored himself and American science by his magnificent translation of Laplace's 'Mecanique celeste,' and thereby astronomical learning was advanced in all lands. The translation of this essay on probabilities, however, brings no credit to any one, but much disgrace to many, and the only possible reparation that the publishers can make is to immediately withdraw the book from the market.

note with regret, the deaths of Dr. John Daniel Runkle, professor of mathematics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology since its foundation and president from 1870 to 1878; of Professor J. B. Johnson, dean of the College of Engineering of the University of Wisconsin; and of M. Hervé Faye, the eminent French astronomer.

coronation honors in Great Britain have been announced, in spite of the postponement of the coronation. A new order of merit has been established which includes in its list of twelve original members the names of four distinguished men of science, namely, Lord Rayleigh, Lord Kelvin, Lord Lister and Sir William Huggins. Among those who have been knighted