Page Content (OCR)
[p. 204] Pastorff-- "Uniform intensity" turns our way as much as against us--or some day some brain will conceive a way of beating Newton's third law--if every reaction, or resistance, is, or can be, interpretable as stimulus instead of resistance--if this could be done in mechanics, there's a way open here for someone to own the world--specifically in this matter, "uniform intensity" means that Lescarbault saw no ordinary sun spot, just as much as it means that no spot at all was seen upon the sun. Continuing the interpretation of a resistance as an assistance, which can always be done with mental forces--making us wonder what applications could be made with steam and electric forces--we point out that invisibility in Brazil means parallax quite as truly as it means absence, and, inasmuch as "Vulcan" was supposed to be distant from the sun, we interpret denial as corroboration--method of course of every scientist, politician, theologian, high-school debater. So the text-books, with no especial cleverness, because no especial cleverness is needed, lead the reader into contempt for the amateur of Orgeres, and forgetfulness of Leverrier--and some other subject is taken up. But our own acceptance: That these data are as good as ever they were; That, if someone of eminence should predict an earthquake, and if there should be no earthquake at the predicted time, that would discredit the prophet, but data of past earthquakes would remain as good as ever they had been. It is easy enough to smile at the illusion of a single amateur-- The mass-formation: Fritsche, Stark, De Cuppis, Sidebotham, Lescarbault, Lummis, Gruthinson, De Vico, Scott, Wray, Russell, Hind, Lowe, Coumbray, Weber, Standacher, Lichtenberg, Dangos, Hoffman, Schmidt, Lofft, Steinheibel,