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Science Fiction Forward, v. 1, issue 1, September 1940

Page 14

Page 14. SCIENCE FICTION FORWARD

"EYES TO SEE WITH, AND EARS TO HEAR---."

     What is this you ng upstart called science?
     Science emerged from alchemy not more than three hundred year ago, and gas since made several startling claims about this universe we live in. Science said that the world was round, when everybody could see that it was indubitably flat; science said that the earth made yearly trips about the sun, and daily twists on its axis; when everybody knew that any planet graced by God's Chosen could be no less than the Center of All Things, and that the sun, stars and planets meekly circumscribed about it. Science claimed that man descended from a lesser beast, and pious prayers rocketed toward heaven in such multitudes far beyond the capacities of even an Infinite Being to manage.
     What is the meaning of these audacious contradictions? Why this youth offensively pulling the aged beard?

     When the ancient alchemists discovered that gold, silver, platinum, and a few more elements were not affected by immersion in certain vitriolic liquids, as much as iron, tin, and many more of the commoner metals, they noted this fact with mild surprise and classified the two groups as "noble" metals and "base" metals, respectively. A wild effort went on for a few centuries to change base metals into noble metals, but Count Cegliostro and all, they failed. In these vain attempts, however, great masses of facts accumulated, totally unimportant and irrelevant to the gold-makers. One day a scholar, probably having nothing better to do, decided to have a good laugh. He dug a few dusty manuscripts out of his trunk and surveyed them with a casual eye.
     To each of the alchemists, bent on his search for the Philosopher's Stone, these manuscripts represented only failure. The factbthat tine, when left standing in a solution of oil of citroil, disappeared was merely annoying. When the piece of aluminum which he had dunked in nitric acid dwindled away to nothing, he tore his hair and mumbled a few runes. It was failure to them.
     But our scholar had before him the combined experiments of them all, and he was quite agitated and entranced as he noticed that when these metals were arranged in a certain order, any one of the would take the place in a compound of any of those below it, but could not touch those above!
     today we know this arrangement as the "electromotive series", and many of our modern processes would never have come into being without it.

     It has been substantially the same in innumarable cases. From chaos, came order. From seemingly dissociated data came laws which opened the door a little wider. First there were facts, a hodgepodge of isolated observations. Some bright boy looked them over and made a shrewd guess. Then came such a flood of corroborating data as he never dreamed possible, and science had taken one more staide ahead.
     Science had now reached a stage where certain fundamentals are seen to underlie all the phenomena of nature. Science is convinced that our senses give a true picture of the cosmos, that matter exists outside of the ability to perceive it, and that all things are interconnected. Science finds that order exists in the house of Nature, that cause and effect follow each other. Upon this philosophical basis is the whole immense structure of science built, and there is such an overwhelming bulk of fact, fact, facts which uphold and augment these ideas, that

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Page 14. SCIENCE FICTION FORWARD "EYES TO SEE WITH, AND EARS TO HEAR---." What is this you ng upstart called science? Science emerged from alchemy not more than three hundred year ago, and gas since made several startling claims about this universe we live in. Science said that the world was round, when everybody could see that it was indubitably flat; science said that the earth made yearly trips about the sun, and daily twists on its axis; when everybody knew that any planet graced by God's Chosen could be no less than the Center of All Things, and that the sun, stars and planets meekly circumscribed about it. Science claimed that man descended from a lesser beast, and pious prayers rocketed toward heaven in such multitudes far beyond the capacities of even an Infinite Being to manage. What is the meaning of these audacious contradictions? Why this youth offensively pulling the aged beard? When the ancient alchemists discovered that gold, silver, platinum, and a few more elements were not affected by immersion in certain vitriolic liquids, as much as iron, tin, and many more of the commoner metals, they noted this fact with mild surprise and classified the two groups as "noble" metals and "base" metals, respectively. A wild effort went on for a few centuries to change base metals into noble metals, but Count Cegliostro and all, they failed. In these vain attempts, however, great masses of facts accumulated, totally unimportant and irrelevant to the gold-makers. One day a scholar, probably having nothing better to do, decided to have a good laugh. He dug a few dusty manuscripts out of his trunk and surveyed them with a casual eye. To each of the alchemists, bent on his search for the Philosopher's Stone, these manuscripts represented only failure. The factbthat tine, when left standing in a solution of oil of citroil, disappeared was merely annoying. When the piece of aluminum which he had dunked in nitric acid dwindled away to nothing, he tore his hair and mumbled a few runes. It was failure to them. But our scholar had before him the combined experiments of them all, and he was quite agitated and entranced as he noticed that when these metals were arranged in a certain order, any one of the would take the place in a compound of any of those below it, but could not touch those above! today we know this arrangement as the "electromotive series", and many of our modern processes would never have come into being without it. It has been substantially the same in innumarable cases. From chaos, came order. From seemingly dissociated data came laws which opened the door a little wider. First there were facts, a hodgepodge of isolated observations. Some bright boy looked them over and made a shrewd guess. Then came such a flood of corroborating data as he never dreamed possible, and science had taken one more staide ahead. Science had now reached a stage where certain fundamentals are seen to underlie all the phenomena of nature. Science is convinced that our senses give a true picture of the cosmos, that matter exists outside of the ability to perceive it, and that all things are interconnected. Science finds that order exists in the house of Nature, that cause and effect follow each other. Upon this philosophical basis is the whole immense structure of science built, and there is such an overwhelming bulk of fact, fact, facts which uphold and augment these ideas, that