Die Kultur der Gegenwart. Physik. Leipzig und Berlin. 1915.

Following the volume on chemistry, issued in 1915 there appeared a substantial volume of 737 pages devoted to physics, in the preparation of which eminent German scholars took part, such as Warburg, Wiechert, Rubens, Wien, Lecher, Einstein, F. Braun, Gehrke, Kaufmann, Elster, Geitel, Wiener, Lummer, Planck, Voigt. Among foreign authors only two may be noted: Lorentz (Maxwell’s theory and the electron theory) and Zeemann (Magnetooptik). Accordingly, the chief interest is presented by those chapters in which the work of German authors gave direction to research and where the greater part of the work was done in Germany; branches of science that found their greatest development in England and France—for example, the doctrine of radioactivity and radioactive transformations, and further the doctrine of discharges in gases—are set forth in less detail, and less attention is given to the literature of these branches, although for contemporary science they are of outstanding importance; thus in some sections, for example, oscillations of coupled systems, individual journal articles are cited (exclusively from German journals), while in others, of enormous scientific significance—for example, the theory of the disintegration of radioactive substances—only the fundamental classical works (English and French) of Curie, Rutherford, and Soddy are cited, and the major reviews of these questions in the periodical press are not mentioned.

It is, of course, very difficult for German scholars to detach themselves completely from what is connected with German science; accordingly, even with a full desire for impartiality, the picture of the development of science is not everywhere presented correctly. In any case, together with other collections that have appeared in other countries, the Kultur der Gegenwart collection is an important aid in becoming acquainted with the successes of natural science, and one must wish that Germany’s example be followed by other countries in compiling analogous surveys1.

P. Lazarev.

1. In Russia a similar edition is being prepared, undertaken by the Moscow Scientific Publishing House attached to the Scientific Institute. ↩