Other formats

    Adobe Portable Document Format file (facsimile images)   TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

Salient. An organ of student opinion at Victoria University, Wellington. Vol. 23, No. 9. Wednesday, November 9, 1960

Science Report

Science Report

"There are some people who measure everything. It is a detestable habit."

Antony Hope, "The Dolly Dialogues."

Farthest Galaxy

With the aid of the 200inch telescope, Rudolph Minkowski of the Mount Wilson and Palomar Observatories has photographed a spot of light that appears to originate six billion years from the earth, and thus represents by far the most distant celestial object yet detected. Thought to be either a single galaxy or two galaxies in collision, the object exhibits a red-shift indicating that it is receding from the earth at a velocity of 90,000 miles per second—almost half the speed of light.

According to the evolutionary, or "big-bang" hypothesis, the universe originated in a vast explosion six to 12 billion years ago. Thus the light now recorded by Minkowski may have started near the "beginning of time."

Amazing Telepathy Results

Salient's science reporter has recently revealed some amazing telepathic experiences which have befallen him. He writes:

"Only last week I was standing in front of a Varsity notice board when I had a distinct premonition that Mr Desborough was standing behind me. I Knew this, with all the certainty of which the human mind is capable. Without a moment's hesitation I spun round on one heel to find myself face to face with—Fred, the caretaker!

"Another remarkable instance occurred in Mercer Street. I was walking past a tobacconist when a voice, as noble and dignified as the Lord's Himself, said "Buy an Art Union ticket." With trembling fingers I paid over my half-crown. Sure enough, when the results came out I discovered an amazing similarity between the winning ticket and mine. If one added the digits of both tickets and subtracted seven from mine, the sums only differed by two!

"A final experience which convinced me of the truth of telepathy occurred in a dream of a friend of mine. An angel had appeared and pronounced that 'An event of world shaking importance will happen on the front steps of Victoria tomorrow, at twelve thirty sharp.' Armed with notebook and camera I stood in pouring rain for an hour at the appointed place. Need I add—no result."

The strong moral, of course, is that the scientist does not aim at verification of his theories. His most powerful tool, in fact, is just the opposite—falsification. Negative research is often the most illuminating!

The Sound Of Cocktails

A major theory of group-dynamical psychobiophysics has been overthrown. Some months ago William R. MacLean of the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn predicted that the noise-level at cocktail parties should show a discontinuity at a critical point, when speech at a conversational level is rendered unintelligible by the arrival of additional guests. At that point each speaker would raise his voice, leading to an abrupt increase in noise level.

This prediction has now been put to the test by Legget and Northwood of the National Research Council, Canada. Their verdict: not true. Large parties, at least, simply become noisier and noisier, up to a peak of 80 to 85 desibels; a level "not quite high enough to cause permanent impairment of hearing."

Legget and Northwood obtained recordings and other data from eight parties given by professional societies and other organisations. The number of guests at each ranged between 100 and 700. Seven were cocktail parties. The exception was a coffee party. "It was exceptional, also" they write in The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America,"in that the participants were librarians, i.e., a group dedicated professionally to maintaining quiet … Despite this handicap, they managed to hold their own with the true cocktail party-goers."

Data from one party had to be discarded because of the observer's too liberal interpretation of instructions "not to allow observational work to interfere unduly with other duties." Records from the other seven revealed a straight-line increase in noise as guests arrived, with no evidence of an abrupt transition.

Can you bend this into a fish-hook, Mrs. Brown? Dad says you can twist anything with your tongue!

Can you bend this into a fish-hook, Mrs. Brown? Dad says you can twist anything with your tongue!

The two specialists in alcoholic acoustics concede that the MacLean effect might occur at parties with about 50 guests. The experimenters reluctantly abandoned a scheme to set up artificial parties with this number, because "even assuming that guests and observers would donate their services, there is a residual financial problem that has not yet been solved."