The author and the publishers acknowledge with gratitude the following permissions to make use of copyright material in this work: Messrs. D. C. Heath & Company, for permission to quote from “Unified Mathematics,” by Louis C. Karpinski, Harry Y. Benedict and John W. Calhoun. Messrs. G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York and London, for permission to quote from “Organism as a Whole” and “Physiology of the Brain,” by Jacques Loeb. Messrs. Harper & Brothers, for permission to quote from “Fr

It is the aim of this little book to point the way to a new science and art—the science and art of Human Engineering. By Human Engineering I mean the science and art of directing the energies and capacities of human beings to the advancement of human weal. It need not be argued in these times that the establishment of such a science—the science of human welfare—is an undertaking of immeasurable importance. No one can fail to see that its importance is supreme. It is evident that, if such a scien

Human intellect, be it that of an individual or that of the race, forms conclusions which have to be often revised before they correspond approximately to facts. What we call progress consists in coordinating ideas with realities. The World War has taught something to everybody. It was indeed a great reality; it accustomed us to think in terms of reality and not in those of phantom speculation. Some unmistakable truths were revealed. Facts and force were the things that counted. Power had to be

Now in the second instance, a stricken building is treated just as any tree overturned by storm; the people save what they can and try to extinguish the fire. In both instances, the behavior of the populace is the same in one respect; if caught in the open by a storm they take refuge under a tree—a means of safety involving maximum danger but the people do not know it. Now in the third instance, in which the population have a scientifically correct definition of lightning, they provide their hou

With this conclusion he estranged himself, as something apart from nature, and formulated the impasse, which put him in a cul-de-sac of a double life. He was neither true to the “supernatural” which he could not know and therefore, could not emulate, nor was he true to the “animal” which he scorned. Having put himself outside the “natural laws,” he was not really true to any law and condemned himself to a life of hypocrisy, and established speculative, artificial, unnatural laws. “How blind our

In this introductory work I cannot deal fully with one of those “sciences” nor in suitable outline with each of them separately. I must be content here to deal, very briefly, with one of them by way of illustration and suggestion. Which one shall it be? Now among these life-regulating “sciences” there is one specially marked by the importance of its subject, by its central relation to the others and by its prominence in the public mind. I mean Economics—the “dismal science” of Political Economy.

The invention of the steam engine released for human use a new power of tremendous magnitude—the stored-up power of solar energy and ages of time. But we must not fail to note carefully that we to-day are enabled to use this immense new power of bound-up solar energy and time by a human invention, a product of the dead. The full significance of the last statement requires reflection. The now dead inventor of the steam engine could not have produced his ingenious invention except by using the liv

The modern vast accumulation of wealth for private purposes, justifies itself by using the argument of the “survival of the fittest.” Very well, where there is a “survival,” there must be victims; where there are victims, there has been fighting. Is this what the users of this argument mean? Like the Kaiser, they talk peace and make war. This method of doing things is not in any way new. The world has been accustomed to it for a very long while. Personally I believe that most of the masters of s

Germany was committed to a policy of indefinite industrial expansion. This artificial expansion had reached its limits. Germany was on the verge of bankruptcy. Only a victorious war could avoid a national catastrophe; she played her last card, and lost despite her gigantic power, the greatest ever displayed by any nation. The leading European states were not able to overpower her for a long time. This writing is not intended as an apology for Germany, much less to praise her or her war lords. Ge

In our relation to the past there are three wide-open ways in which one may be a fool. One of the ways is the way of ignoring the past—the way of remaining blankly ignorant of the human past as the animals are blankly ignorant of their past and so of drifting through life as animals do, without reference to the experience of bygone generations. Fools of this type may be called drifting fools or Drifters. Another way to be a fool—a very alluring way—is that of falsifying the past by idealizing it

In conclusion let me say very briefly, as I said in the beginning, that this little book has aimed to be only a sketch. The Problem of Life is old. I have endeavored to approach it afresh, with a new method, in a new spirit, from a new point of view. The literature of the subject is vast. It displays great knowledge and skill. Much of it is fitted to inform and to inspire such as really read with a genuine desire to understand. Its weakness is due to the absence of a true conception of what huma

The old word “metaphysics” is an illegitimate child of ignorance and an unnecessary word in the scientific study of nature. Every phenomenon of nature can be classed and studied in physics or chemistry or mathematics; the problem, therefore, is not in any way super natural or super physical, but belongs rather to an unknown or an undeveloped branch of physics. The problem, therefore, may be not that of some new science, but rather that of a new branch of mathematics, or physics, or chemistry, et

In many, even in most, of the cases, the analysis of these phenomena presents great technical difficulty, but why confuse our minds by being afraid of, or being a slave of words? If instead of calling wine wine , we called it by its chemical formula, would this, in any way, change the quality of wine? Of course not. All the “qualities” will remain because they are facts, and cannot be altered by words. A most pathetic picture of the havoc and chaos which wrong use of words brings into life and s

“ It was not my intention to compile a text book on power engineering; it was rather my care to avoid the treatment of any technical subject which could be found elsewhere in engineering literature; but I could not avoid trespassing in the adjoining fields of psychology and economics, for without familiarity with these sciences the mastery of power production is a futile attempt. “ I do not hold that the principles upon which the method is laid out are subject to choice or opinions, for they are