Do we—don't we—what do we—know?

Abstract

I ESCAPE from Wonderland to find myself in a land still stricken, where Nature has to be taken in lumps. The effect is a little shocking, to one who has been preaching the use of The Looking Glass. Reflexion at the end of the year, indeed, always, tells me that I am a miserable sinner but NATURE (December 19), in a review article on electrical precipitation, makes me out to be a reprobate of a truly awful type. According to one J. S. G. Thomas, whose acquaintance I, unfortunate, do not enjoy, I have dared to “question Simpson's theory” of the development of electricity in thunder clouds, proposed in 1909. Could any crime be more heinous than that of which I am declared guilty: that of bringing in hydrone in explanation of the thunder storm? Apart from the fact, that I have dared no explanation, it is a little difficult to leave the said fair one out, with water, water, everywhere. Even in water, the fundament does do something, I presume.