The Seven Follies Of Science [2nd Ed.] - free ebook by John Phin

THE SEVEN FOLLIES OF SCIENCE

A POPULAR ACCOUNT OF THE MOST FAMOUS SCIENTIFIC IMPOSSIBILITIES AND THE ATTEMPTS WHICH HAVE BEEN MADE TO SOLVE THEM. To which is Added a Small Budget of Interesting Paradoxes, Illusions, and Marvels. SECOND EDITION...

27 minute read

Read Chapter

PREFACE

In the following pages I have endeavored to give a simple account of problems which have occupied the attention of the human mind ever since the dawn of civilization, and which can never lose their interest until time shall be no more. While to most persons these subjects will have but an historical interest, yet even from this point of view they are of more value than the history of empires, for they are the intellectual battlefields upon which much of our progress in science has been won. To a

4 minute read

Read Chapter

THE SEVEN FOLLIES OF SCIENCE

he difficult, the dangerous, and the impossible have always had a strange fascination for the human mind. We see this every day in the acts of boys who risk life and limb in the performance of useless but dangerous feats, and amongst children of larger growth we find loop-the-loopers, bridge-jumpers, and all sorts of venture-seekers to whom much of the attraction of these performances is undoubtedly the mere risk that is involved, although, perhaps, to some extent, notoriety and money-making may

37 minute read

Read Chapter

II THE DUPLICATION OF THE CUBE

his problem became famous because of the halo of mythological romance with which it was surrounded. The story is as follows: About the year 430 B.C. the Athenians were afflicted by a terrible plague, and as no ordinary means seemed to assuage its virulence, they sent a deputation of the citizens to consult the oracle of Apollo at Delos, in the hope that the god might show them how to get rid of it. The answer was that the plague would cease when they had doubled the size of the altar of Apollo i

3 minute read

Read Chapter

III THE TRISECTION OF AN ANGLE

his problem is not so generally known as that of squaring the circle, and consequently it has not received so much attention from amateur mathematicians, though even within little more than a year a small book, in which an attempted solution is given, has been published. When it is first presented to an uneducated reader, whose mind has a mathematical turn, and especially to a skilful mechanic, who has not studied theoretical geometry, it is apt to create a smile, because at first sight most per

10 minute read

Read Chapter

1. ABSURDITIES

In this class may be included those inventions which have been made or suggested by honest but ignorant persons in direct violation of the fundamental principles of mechanics and physics. Such inventions if presented to any expert mechanic or student of science, would be at once condemned as impracticable, but as a general rule, the inventors of these absurd contrivances have been so confident of success, that they have published descriptions and sketches of them, and even gone so far as to take

27 minute read

Read Chapter

2. FALLACIES

Fallacies are distinguished from absurdities on the one hand and from frauds on the other, by the fact that without any intentionally fraudulent contrivances on the part of the inventor, they seem to produce results which have a tendency to afford to certain enthusiasts a basis of hope in the direction of perpetual motion, although usually not under that name, for that is always explicitly disclaimed by the promoters. The most notable instance of this class in recent times was the application of

5 minute read

Read Chapter

3. FRAUDS

But while the inventors of these schemes may have been honest, there is another class who deliberately set out to perpetrate a fraud. Their machines work, and work well, but there is always some concealed source of power, which causes them to move. As a general rule, such inventors form a company or corporation of unlimited "lie-ability," as De Morgan phrases it, and then they proceed by means of flaring prospectuses and liberal advertising, to gather in the dupes who are attracted by their sedu

31 minute read

Read Chapter

VI THE FIXATION OF MERCURY

his is really one of the processes supposed to be involved in the transmutation of the metals and might, therefore, perhaps, with propriety, be included under that head. But as it has received special attention in the apocryphal works of Hermes Trismegistus, who is generally regarded as the Father of Alchemy, it is frequently mentioned as one of the old scientific problems. Readers of Scott's novel, "Kenilworth," may remember that Wayland Smith, in his account of his former master, Demetrius Dob

4 minute read

Read Chapter

VII THE UNIVERSAL MEDICINE AND THE ELIXIR OF LIFE

ove of life is a characteristic of all animals, man included, and notwithstanding the fact that an occasional individual becomes so dissatisfied with his environment that he commits suicide, and also in the face of the poet's assertion that "protracted life is but protracted woe" most men and women are of the same way of thinking as Charmian, the attendant on Cleopatra, and "love long life better than figs." And the force of this general feeling is appealed to in the only one of the Mosaic comma

4 minute read

Read Chapter

ADDITIONAL "FOLLIES"

In addition to the seven "Follies," of which an account has been given in the preceding pages, there are a few which deserve to be classed with them, although they do not find a place in the usual lists. These are known as...

12 minute read

Read Chapter

PERPETUAL OR EVER-BURNING LAMPS

art of the sepulchral rites of the ancients consisted in placing lighted lamps in the tombs or vaults in which the dead were laid, and, in many cases, these lamps were carefully tended and kept continually burning. Some authors have claimed, however, that these men of old were able to construct lamps which burned perpetually and required no attention. In number 379 of the "Spectator" there is an anecdote of some one having opened the sepulcher of the famous Rosicrucius. There he discovered a lam

4 minute read

Read Chapter

THE ALKAHEST OR UNIVERSAL SOLVENT

he production of a universal solvent or alkahest was one of the special problems of the alchemists in their general search for the philosopher's stone and the means of transmuting the so-called inferior metals into gold and silver. Their idea of the way in which it would aid them to attain these ends does not seem to be very clearly stated in any work that I have consulted; probably they thought that a universal solvent would wash away all impurities from common materials and leave in absolute p

1 minute read

Read Chapter

PALINGENESY

his singular delusion may have been partly due to errors of observation, the instruments and methods of former times having been notably crude and unreliable. This fact, taken in connection with the wild theories upon which the natural sciences of the middle ages were based, is a sufficient explanation of some of the extraordinary statements made by Kircher, Schott, Digby, and others. By palingenesy these writers meant a certain chemical process by means of which a plant or an animal might be re

10 minute read

Read Chapter

A SMALL BUDGET OF PARADOXES, ILLUSIONS, AND MARVELS

his subject has now found its way not only into semi-scientific works but into our general literature and magazines. Even our novel-writers have used suggestions from this hypothesis as part of the machinery of their plots so that it properly finds a place amongst the subjects discussed in this volume. Various attempts have been made to explain what is meant by "the fourth dimension," but it would seem that thus far the explanations which have been offered are, to most minds, vague and incompreh

12 minute read

Read Chapter

HOW A SPACE MAY BE APPARENTLY ENLARGED BY CHANGING ITS SHAPE

he following is a curious illustration of the errors to which careless observers may be subject: Draw a square, like Fig. 19, and divide the sides into 8 parts each. Join the points of division in opposite sides so as to divide the whole square into 64 small squares. Then draw the lines shown in black and cut up the drawing into four pieces. The lines indicating the cuts have been made quite heavy so as to show up clearly, but on the actual card they may be made quite light. Now, put the four pi

1 minute read

Read Chapter

CAN A MAN LIFT HIMSELF BY THE STRAPS OF HIS BOOTS?

think it was the elder Stephenson, the famous engineer, who told a man who claimed the honor of having invented a perpetual motion, that when he could lift himself over a fence by taking hold of his waist-band, he might hope to accomplish his object. And the query which serves as a title for this article has long been propounded as one of the physical impossibilities. And yet, perhaps, it might be possible to invent a waist-band or a boot-strap by which this apparently impossible feat might be

2 minute read

Read Chapter

HOW A SPIDER LIFTED A SNAKE

ne of the most interesting books in natural history is a work on "Insect Architecture," by Rennie. But if the architecture of insect homes is wonderful, the engineering displayed by these creatures is equally marvellous. Long before man had thought of the saw, the saw-fly had used the same tool, made after the same fashion, and used in the same way for the purpose of making slits in the branches of trees so that she might have a secure place in which to deposit her eggs. The carpenter bee, with

4 minute read

Read Chapter

HOW THE SHADOW MAY BE MADE TO MOVE BACKWARD ON THE SUN-DIAL

n the twentieth chapter of II Kings, at the eleventh verse we read, that "Isaiah the prophet cried unto the Lord, and he brought the shadow ten degrees backward, by which it had gone down in the dial of Ahaz." It is a curious fact, first pointed out by Nonez, the famous cosmographer and mathematician of the sixteenth century, but not generally known, that by tilting a sun-dial through the proper angle, the shadow at certain periods of the year can be made, for a short time, to move backwards on

53 minute read

Read Chapter

HOW A WATCH MAY BE USED AS A COMPASS

everal years ago a correspondent of "Truth" (London) gave the following simple directions for finding the points of the compass by means of the ordinary pocket watch: "Point the hour hand to the sun, and south is exactly half way between the hour hand and twelve on the watch, counting forward up to noon, but backward after the sun has passed the meridian." Professor Ball, in his "Mathematical Recreations and Problems," gives more complete directions and explanations. He says: "The position of th

2 minute read

Read Chapter

MICROGRAPHY OR MINUTE WRITING AND MICROPHOTOGRAPHY

inute works of art have always excited the curiosity and commanded the admiration of the average man. Consequently Cicero thought it worth while to record that the entire Iliad of Homer had been written upon parchment in characters so fine that the copy could be enclosed in a nutshell. This has always been regarded as a marvelous feat. There is in the French Cabinet of Medals a seal, said to have belonged to Michael Angelo, the fabrication of which must date from a very remote epoch, and upon wh

22 minute read

Read Chapter

OBJECTS APPARENTLY SEEN THROUGH A HOLE IN THE HAND

he following curious experiment always excites surprise, and as I have met with very few persons who have ever heard of it, I republish it from "The Young Scientist," for November, 1880. It throws a good deal of light upon the facts connected with vision. Procure a paste-board tube about seven or eight inches long and an inch or so in diameter, or roll up a strip of any kind of stiff paper so as to form a tube. Holding this tube in the left hand, look through it with the left eye, the right eye

1 minute read

Read Chapter

LOOKING THROUGH A SOLID BRICK

very common exhibition by street showmen, and one which never fails to excite surprise and draw a crowd, is the apparatus by which a person is apparently enabled to look through a brick. Mounted on a simple-looking stand are a couple of tubes which look like a telescope cut in two in the middle. Looking through what most people take for a telescope, we are not surprised when we see clearly the people, buildings, trees, etc., beyond it, but this natural expectation is turned into the most start

1 minute read

Read Chapter

THE CHESS-BOARD PROBLEM

n Arabian author, Al Sephadi, relates the following curious anecdote: A mathematician named Sessa, the son of Dahar, the subject of an Indian Prince, having invented the game of chess, his sovereign was highly pleased with the invention, and wishing to confer on him some reward worthy of his magnificence, desired him to ask whatever he thought proper, assuring him that it should be granted. The mathematician, however, only asked for a grain of wheat for the first square of the chess-board, two f

1 minute read

Read Chapter

THE NAIL PROBLEM

gentleman took a fancy to a horse, and the dealer, to induce him to buy, offered the animal for the value of the twenty-fourth nail in his shoe, reckoning one cent for the first nail, two for the second, four for the third, and so on. The gentleman, thinking the price very low, accepted the offer. What was the price of the horse? On calculating, it will be found that the twenty-fourth term of the progression 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, etc., is 8,388,608, or $83,886.08, a sum which is more than any horse,

38 minute read

Read Chapter

A QUESTION OF POPULATION

he following note on the result of unrestrained propagation for one hundred generations is taken from "Familiar Lectures on Scientific Subjects," by Sir John F. W. Herschel: For the benefit of those who discuss the subjects of population, war, pestilence, famine, etc., it may be as well to mention that the number of human beings living at the end of the hundredth generation, commencing from a single pair, doubling at each generation (say in thirty years), and allowing for each man, woman, and ch

1 minute read

Read Chapter

HOW TO BECOME A MILLIONAIRE

any plans have been suggested for getting rich quickly, and some of these are so plausible and alluring that multitudes have been induced to invest in them the savings which had been accumulated by hard labor and severe economy. It is needless to say that, except in the case of a few stool-pigeons, who were allowed to make large profits so that their success might deceive others and lead them into the net, all these projects have led to disaster or ruin. It is a curious fact, however, that some

2 minute read

Read Chapter

THE ACTUAL COST AND PRESENT VALUE OF THE FIRST FOLIO SHAKESPEARE

even years after the death of Shakespeare, his collected works were published in a large folio volume, now known as "The First Folio Shakespeare." This was in the year 1623. The price at which the volume was originally sold was one pound, but perhaps we ought to take into consideration the fact that at that time money had a value, or purchasing power, at least eight times that which it has at present; Halliwell-Phillips estimates it at from twelve to twenty times its present value. For this circ

2 minute read

Read Chapter

ARITHMETICAL PUZZLES

good-sized volume might be filled with the various arithmetical puzzles which have been propounded. They range from a method of discovering the number which any one may think of to a solution of the "famous" question: "How old is Ann?" Of the following cases one may be considered a "catch" question, while the other is an interesting problem. A country woman, carrying eggs to a garrison where she had three guards to pass, sold at the first, half the number she had and half an egg more; at the s

1 minute read

Read Chapter

ARCHIMEDES AND HIS FULCRUM

ext to that of Euclid, the name of Archimedes is probably that which is the best known of all the mathematicians and mechanics of antiquity, and this is in great part due to the two famous sayings which have been attributed to him, one being "Eureka"—"I have found it," uttered when he discovered the method now universally in use for finding the specific gravity of bodies, and the other being the equally famous dictum which he is said to have addressed to Hiero, King of Sicily,—"Give me a fulcrum

3 minute read

Read Chapter