Biology made Simple: Too SimplePicture of Health by James ClarkeReview by: Edward J. StieglitzThe Scientific Monthly, Vol. 51, No. 3 (Sep., 1940), p. 279Published by: American Association for the Advancement of ScienceStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/17288 .

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BOOKS ON SCIENCE FOR LAYMEN 279

democratic and anti-democratic course of human history and to the recentness of democracy in order to enforce the im- mensity of the task confronting us.... We have every righlt to appeal to the long and slow process of time to protect our- selves from the pessimism that comes from taking a short-span temporal view of events-under one condition. We must know that the dependelnce of ends upon means is such that the only ulti- mate result is the result that is attained today, tomorrow, the next day, and day after day, in the succession of years and generations. Only thus can we be sure that we face our problems in detail one by one as they arise, with all the resources provided by collective intelligence operat- ing in cooperative action. At the end as at the beginning the democratic method is as fundamentally simple and as immensely difficult as is the energetic, unflagging, unceasing creation of an ever- present new road upon which we can walk together. "

F. R. MOULTON

BIOLOGY MADE SIMPLE: TOO SIMPLE'

THE human body is wondrously con- structed and its multitude of intricate and nicely balanced activities are fasci- nating subjects to all. The average " man on the street" is woefully ignorant of his own person: what he is, how he is made and how he "works. " As a result, more of us abuse our machines than use them. To describe and disc-uss the sig- nificance of human biology in such man- iier that the fundamentals are clarified to the uneducated lay reader is a splendid objective. This little book, sponsored by the American Association for Adult Edu- cation, ambitiously attempts, but does not succeed, to explain the evolution of

1 Picture of Health. By James Clarke. Illus- trated. 125 pp. $0.60. 1940. Macmillan Comnpany.

mankind, human anatomy, the physiology of muscles, digestion, metabolism, circu- lation, immunity, respiration, reflex ac- tion, thought and reproduction, all in 125 small pages.

The accomplishment falls so far short of the objective that one could hardly recognize the latter but for an explana- tory note. Though there are few, if any, absolute mis-statements of fact in the book, much of the material is so vague and idealistic that a grossly false sense of inane simplicity prevails. As reading matter for the fifth grade it could do much good. The whole style is that of a story-book f-or children. The reitera- tion of the personal pronoun becomes a burden and a bore. If the Committ;ee for Adult Education deems such phraseology as "On St. V-alentine's Day true lovers send each other a picture of a pump. That is what your heart is . . . appro- priate for adult education, it is a sad com- mentary upon their opinion of adult in- telligence in America. Much miore harm can be done by " talking down" with baby talk to those innumerable adults hungry for factual knowledge than by an occasional technical expression which may require amplification. These people want to look up, to be stimulated and bitterly resent such pap as this. Lack of education does not imply stupidity nor even lack of curiosity. If this over- simplification is intended to intrigue the curiosity of the dull ignoramus it will likewise fail, for he is sincerely convinced that he already "knows it all."

Similarly, the illustrations are detri- mental to elarity. Attempting to be simultaneously diagrammatic and sensa- tionally dramatic they merely confuse and mislead. This book can not be reconi- mended except for small grammar-school children, and for them there are far better biology texts. It is too simple.

EI)WARD J. STIEGIOTZ

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