MATHEMATICS OF GROWTH
This extract was created in the absence of an abstract.
Excerpt
One may orient oneself by some axioms or platitudes.
I. Science need not be mathematical.
If it is true that Galton maintained: “Until the phenomena of any branch of knowledge have been submitted to measure and number that branch cannot assume the status or dignity of science”, this axiom would make our subject non-Galtonian and might be unacceptable to any adherents of the Galton Laboratory; yet apparently one should not exclude from science classificatory subjects like systematic botany, zoology or entomology, or even one like qualitative analysis in chemistry. It is possible that certain important aspects of growth are primarily qualitative rather than quantitative.
II. Simply because a subject is mathematical it need not therefore be scientific.
When browsing in the Harvard College Library as an undergraduate I came across a most mathematical treatment of casting of horoscopes without either then or since believing that horoscopes were either better or
