The Common Sense of the Exact Sciences

Abstract

ONCE more a characteristic record of the work of a most remarkable, but too brief, life lies before us. In rapidity of accurate thinking, even on abstruse matters, Clifford had few equals; in clearness of exposition, on subjects which suited the peculiar bent of his genius and on which he could be persuaded to bestow sufficient attention, still fewer. But the ease with which he mastered the more prominent features of a subject often led him to dispense with important steps which had been taken by some of his less agile concurrents. These steps, however, he was obliged to take when he was engaged in exposition; and he consequently gave them (of course in perfect good faith) without indicating that they were not his own. Thus, especially in matters connected with the development of recent mathematical and kinematical methods, his statements were by no means satisfactory (from the historical point of view) to those who recognised, as their own, some of the best “nuggets” that shine here and there in his pages. His Kinematic was, throughout, specially open to this objection:—and it applies, though by no means to the same extent, to the present work. On the other hand, the specially important and distinctive features of this work, viz. the homely, yet apt and often complete, illustrations of matters intrinsically difficult, are entirely due to the Author himself.

The Common Sense of the Exact Sciences.

By the late W. K. Clifford. (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, and Co., 1885.)