1928-01-10 — Page 10

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UNIVERSITY DEGREE

DAY.

(Continued from Page 9.)

}

TUESDAY, JANUARY 10.

the task of measuring the size of this curth, upon which we live, only vory partially explored at that date by the Inhabitants of the Mediter- ranean and believed by most mon to be flat. The only instrument used by Eratosthenes was a gnomon, that staff go erected that the position of its shadow Indicated the hour of the day. Ho had 48 certained that at Syene, the mo- dern Assyan, on the day of the summer solstice at noon, a well was lit up through all its depth by the sun's rays, so that Syene lay on the tropfo.

If on the one hand you admit ins a humbleness of heart that few men can rival in genius the Father of Badleing, yet en the other hand you may justly strengthen your selves by reflecting that in equip, ment and in store of acquired medical and general scientific knowledge you are immeasurably better endowed than was Hippo- crates.

1

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King Dhatusena, without theodo- Iftes or levels, and guided simply by the knowledge that water flows. downhill, constructed a wonderful canal, called the Yodi-ela, winding, in and out between mountains and extending for fifty miles to the town of Anuradhapura, which it supplies with water to this day,

It is a work to which any mod orn engineer might gladly point as his masterpiece: and it was.C- hieved by human wit and patience, assisted only by the simplest and most primitive appliances.

TASTY oh yes! THRIFTY

monument to

ourselves in all this? Are we not

Unfortunately we do not know He know that the distance be- the names of the men who de- tween Syene and Alexandria was signed and supervised the cons 5,000 stadia and he made the atruction of this glorious work The Faculty of Arts.

assumption that, these two towns of fine intelligence.". But what The Faculty of Arts in this lay on the same meridian. Ac-they did has inured to the bene University at present includes the cordingly he set up. a guomon at fit of generation upon generation study of mathematics. This is as Alexandria and observed that, on of their fellow countrymen and It should be, for in art alone is the the day of the summer solstice at still stands OS O human mind truly creative and in noon, the sun cast a shadow from themselves and their King, Lesson for Hongkong. no realm of thought is this fact the gnomez at an angle equivalent more apparent than in puro to one-fiftieth of a great circle."

Members of the Congregation of mathematles. Take, for example, With these data he calculated the the Hongkong University i arithmetic and geometry. The most polar circumference of the earth there not a profound lesson for

250,000 stadiu, or about abstract construction of which to be human thought is capable is, the 29,000 miles. 1. mgr. 19 dapt to exclaim that here in the zero of arithmetic, self-identical,

His data wore inaccurate, and Hongkong University we are called incapable of differentiation and its therefore his result was not cor-upon to make bricks without straw? quantum insusceptible of increase Frect, Modern scientists have de-Do we not any that our endow

That we devrense, the very type and termined the earth's mean polar menta are insufficient? symbol of that existential identity circumference to be 24,856 milos, would achieve much more, if only which forms the substratum of But the method of Eratosthenes, we had the money? That we are thought. We construct the zero of arithmetic as having neither depending in fact on the compari- cramped for space in our buildings son of a line measured on the and restricted in our teaching" by magnitude nor position.

earth's surface with the corres- lack of equipment? Let us then restore position

"All this is true enough and sad while still abstracting extensity.ponding are of the heavens, is pre-

Our weapons may be cisely that by which modern onough: Suci construction

the

But surely it will not be- geometrical point or the unit of science with exact data has arriy- blunt.

Rather Arithmetic. Neither can be founded at a correct measurement; and come us to snap them and fling. Lany where in rerum natura; but,commend the achievement of them from our hands. when symbolized, they form the Eratosthenes to the mathematical must we stoop to build with worn- starting points of the sciences of undergraduates of the Arts Facul- out tools the house not made with plane geometry and of pure num-ty as a remarkable illustration of hands, that marvellous structure of

done

human intelligence and human in applied ber. Go further and restore ex- what can be

character which wrought with no as position. For mathematies with the simplest ap other appliances than fortitude In tensity as well example, take two geometrical pliances.

adversity, patience in observation, points and connect them in the

percipience in obscurity, daring in most direct manner possible. Such

speculation, caution in reflection, a construction we call a straight

truthfulness in all things and loy line. "

ing-kindness towards all men, is and will ever remain the noblesi.. creation which this earth can show.

:1

True Ploneers...

I need hardly dwell on the ob vious fact that in other realms of Fart-poetry, prose, history, drama, painting, sculpture-the Greeks were true pioneers and that their wonderful achievements were the work of the creative human intel-

+

Work to Bring Succour. Graduates and Undergraduates of the Hongkong University! there not a special lesson herein for you too? Men and women alike, you will most of you be enll- ed upon to do your life's work in China: and in these days there spreads a cloud of battle-dust over China, which is no dreamer's vision but a terrible reality from the sight of which we can no- where escape.

The Geometrical Line. But here again we may make various distinctions according to the nature of the extensily we restore. Thus We may concern leet with little or no help in the ourselves only with the length of way of books, libraries, museums the line neglecting" entirely its for other appliances, and with a breath. Such a thought-construc- legacy from the past that had tion is the geometrical line. Or often to be unlearned before any again we may make a thought-real progress was possible. construction such that it has But in the science of engineer- length and breadth without height. ing. the case is different. I sup Such a construction we call a plane superficies and it is the abstrac-pose the earliest efforts of human tion on which plane geometry is engineering were employed in im- proving the cave-dwellings of

It will not become you to hang Fitaly we can construct exter- primitive man and in the mana- sity of three dimensions and this facture of bunting implements. craven-like along the battle-fringe. is the fundamental construction of In both these respects the Greek or to creep away from the field of solid reometry, which no longer contributions to mankind came fight because your swords are not abstracts height from-length and comparatively late. Other races, of keener edge. Here in this Unl breadth. We все, then, that Egyptian and Mesopotamian were versity by patient, and faithful geometry.constructs its definitions, the pioneers. The Greeks perfect work you must fit yourselves in due time to bring auceour to your fel axioms and postulates and that d...

BAve 1 17 its most complicated

low-countrymen and to great cause, the cause of civiliza"; theorems the progress is by con-

tion in China, by your heroism and, if it be required of you, by the sacrifice of your lives.

based,

even

struction.

Moreover, It is the voice of the engineer which is loudest in the outery against being re- quired to make bricks without straw, and not without reason, for materials are necessary to the engineer: without them he is severely handicapped and perhaps cannot work at all; while the in- of the three lines might be parallel.vention of tools and appliances is in which ease another line crossing one of the chief glories of the en- Them would not enclose a space, or gineer.

Voyages of Exploration. Three straight lines can enclose, a spart, because we construct them to do so. But this is our own con- structive act for otherwise two

each of the lines might be in a diferent plane.

Engineering History.

Never in its history did China have more bitter need that her! sons and daughters should prove themselves

to be unselfish, honest, well-taught, well-disciplined, ourageous and trathful. Never had she greater need of that King'a son who, though wounded, sore beset and weaponless will snatch up were it only a broken sword and The figures in pure mathematics This Archimedes of Syracuse, lead men with it to salvation. are such as thought makes them, contemporary of Eratosthenos, lay your country's dire distress and, the elements of which they are to whom he dedicated his Method, be to you both a clarion-call and constructed contain only the pro-is fanume for inventing a tubular an inspiration! And may your perties with which thought has screw, still useil in pumping water, one and all, to come to the rescue training in this University fit you. Endowed them. It is for this rea and for combining pulleys so as to

on that the demonstrations of

of a civilization, once the admira- raise immense weights. Yet ovention of the world, but now falling pure mathematics possess a cer

among engineers the greatest are in ruin before our eyes! tainty and universality such, as no

"those who can transcend the other sciences have achieved.

H. E. then declared the Congre-

In other words pure mathematics imitations of her environment ration closed. is precilence the science in and who, even if they do not make which bricks are made without bricks entirely without straw, straw, or, to use a more appro- nevertheless come "pretty nehr to priate metaphor, the science in doing so.

which thought naided by any A good example of what I mean thing external to itself sets out on are the wonderful irrigation-works strange voyages of exploration constructed in Ceylon long before through uncharted seas.

western any knowledge, of gineering science came to that island,

A Greek Science.

en-

In the latter half of the fifth Mathematics has truly been called a Greek science and so far. century A:D. there reigned over king. as pure geometry is concerned, the Anuradhapura a famous mathematician's technical equip- Dhatusena, whose tragic story is ment still is almost wholly Greek. one of the most moving episodes in The first great name is that of the annals of Ceylon. Hils en- Thales of Miletus (about 624-547 gineers with local labour and the B. C.). to whom are attributed the most primitive appliance dummed theorems that a circle is bisected back the waters of the Kala-oya by any diameter; that the angles and built the marvellous reser- at the base of an isosceles triangle voirs, known as Kalawewa and are equal; that, if two straight lines Bulaluwewa, which originally had cut one another, the vertically opan area (it is said) of 40 miles in posite angles are equal; that, if circumference and extended as far two triangles have two angles and as Dambulla. The total length of one side respectively equal, the the combined dams of these two triangles are equal in all respects; teservoirs is about six miles and and that the angle in a semi- they are in places as much as 60 circle is a right angle.

feet high.

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His greatest successor Euclid of Alexandrin. whose Elementa in thirteen books, was

-

Enormous Labour.

still the work from which I was in. their construction must have Therefore, the labour involved taught geometry as a school-boy,been enormous, far exceeding any- Euclid flourished, about 300 B, C.; and, as Proclus said of him, he thing accomplished in Hongkong, "brought to irrefragable demon- where we are so justly proud of stration the things which were only our reservoirs. Much of the work Somewhat loosely proved by his has stood the test of time; and predecessors." His instrument to-day, when the reservoir is full was the creative human intellect, and one approaches it by road, little if at all aided by any tools there is a fine view from the foot or appliances.·

of a little forest-covered. hill over about eight square miles of water with distant mountains in the background.

The Size of the Earth,

But consider now the case of Eratosthenes of Cyrene, who died. Nor is this all. From, a sluice in 195 B. C., and who set himself in Kalawewa the engineers of

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