WEBVTT - John Venn 0:00:01.360 --> 0:00:04.280 Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:14.080 of iHeartRadio. Hello and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly 0:00:14.160 --> 0:00:17.119 Frye and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. I bet it's a 0:00:17.160 --> 0:00:19.319 safe bet that most people listening have heard of a 0:00:19.440 --> 0:00:24.959 Venn diagram. Seems likely, yeah, But the creator of the 0:00:25.040 --> 0:00:28.000 concept of the Venn diagram, whose name was John Vin, 0:00:28.360 --> 0:00:31.960 actually developed a much more complex set of relational diagrams 0:00:31.960 --> 0:00:36.320 than the simplified ones that we often reference casually or 0:00:36.440 --> 0:00:40.040 even see used in like, you know, newscasts or whatever, 0:00:40.600 --> 0:00:43.640 but perhaps even more interesting. Although he is an important 0:00:43.680 --> 0:00:47.360 figure in the fields of mathematics and logic, he eventually 0:00:47.440 --> 0:00:51.080 left that work behind to write historical accounts of the 0:00:51.120 --> 0:00:54.080 places and people that were important in his life. I 0:00:54.160 --> 0:00:57.840 love this about him. He was also an inventor, not 0:00:57.960 --> 0:01:00.200 of a lot of stuff, but of something really interesting. 0:01:01.000 --> 0:01:03.080 So he's just a fun person to talk about. So 0:01:03.120 --> 0:01:06.839 he is in the spotlight today. John Vin was born 0:01:06.880 --> 0:01:10.880 on August fourth, eighteen thirty four, to parents the Reverend 0:01:11.000 --> 0:01:15.800 Henry Vin and Martha Sykes Ven. He was their first child. 0:01:16.360 --> 0:01:19.480 He was born at Kingston upon hull Port in the 0:01:19.520 --> 0:01:25.080 East Riding of Yorkshire. In northeastern England. Martha died when 0:01:25.120 --> 0:01:27.720 John was pretty young, and at the age of twelve 0:01:27.800 --> 0:01:31.160 he attended Sir Roger Chumley's School in London, which is 0:01:31.240 --> 0:01:35.280 known more commonly as the Highgate School. This was a 0:01:35.440 --> 0:01:39.360 really interesting time to attend Highgate, as the headmaster at 0:01:39.360 --> 0:01:43.679 the time, the Reverend John Bradley Dine, significantly expanded the 0:01:43.720 --> 0:01:47.880 course offerings there to start, including mathematics and modern languages. 0:01:48.720 --> 0:01:51.880 Since then would eventually become well known as a mathematician. 0:01:51.960 --> 0:01:55.160 He seems to have benefited from this newer course of study. 0:01:55.720 --> 0:01:59.520 John went to secondary school at City of London Academy, Islington. 0:02:00.680 --> 0:02:04.040 Reverend Henry Ven, John's father, was rector of the Drypool 0:02:04.120 --> 0:02:07.400 Parish when John was born, and he was also secretary 0:02:07.440 --> 0:02:10.240 to the Society for Missions in Africa and the East. 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:13.720 And he was not the only activist Anglican priest in 0:02:13.760 --> 0:02:18.880 the family. Henry's father, the Reverend John Vin, a lot 0:02:18.919 --> 0:02:21.080 of John Ven's were trying to separate him out. Was 0:02:21.280 --> 0:02:24.480 very influential in the church and had been the leader 0:02:24.520 --> 0:02:27.360 of a group called the Clapham Sect which lobbied for 0:02:27.440 --> 0:02:30.919 progressive causes and change within the church, as well as 0:02:30.919 --> 0:02:34.640 without and the Clapham sect supported the abolition of slavery 0:02:34.720 --> 0:02:39.080 and advocated for prison reform, among other causes. In John 0:02:39.160 --> 0:02:43.720 Ven's obituary in the Royal Society's Proceedings publication, it was written, quote, 0:02:43.919 --> 0:02:47.720 no one could have had a more uncompromisingly clerical ancestry 0:02:47.720 --> 0:02:52.639 and upbringing than had Ven his five or six immediate ancestors, 0:02:52.680 --> 0:02:55.600 whose lives he gave in his notable book The Annals 0:02:55.600 --> 0:02:59.680 of a Clerical Family were vicars or rector's, occupying positions 0:02:59.720 --> 0:03:03.200 of importance in the Church. When it was time to 0:03:03.240 --> 0:03:07.240 move on to higher education, Ben attended Gonvillin Keys College 0:03:07.280 --> 0:03:10.520 at the University of Cambridge, so often simply referred to 0:03:10.639 --> 0:03:14.120 as Keyes. There he earned a degree in math and 0:03:14.240 --> 0:03:17.520 ranked sixth among his fellow students in the final exam 0:03:17.560 --> 0:03:20.880 in eighteen fifty seven, but it was just the beginning 0:03:20.880 --> 0:03:24.160 of a long relationship with the school. Ben went on 0:03:24.240 --> 0:03:27.399 to a fellowship at Keys, and when that was completed 0:03:27.400 --> 0:03:30.400 in eighteen sixty two, he was hired as a lecturer. 0:03:31.320 --> 0:03:35.720 But Ben wasn't only a mathematician. During that same time period, 0:03:35.920 --> 0:03:38.880 he became ordained as a priest in the Church of England. 0:03:39.280 --> 0:03:42.720 Just like his father and grandfather and forebears. Starting in 0:03:42.760 --> 0:03:46.160 eighteen fifty nine. After becoming a clergyman, he worked for 0:03:46.200 --> 0:03:50.000 a brief period exclusively in the church at Chesnent, Herstfordshire 0:03:50.360 --> 0:03:53.360 and Mortlake, Surrey, but then he decided to go back 0:03:53.360 --> 0:03:57.720 to keyes and mathematics, although he did retain his clergy status. 0:03:58.320 --> 0:04:00.960 As a lecturer, Ben taught an the discipline known as 0:04:01.120 --> 0:04:05.480 moral science, meaning he talked about logic and probability. This 0:04:05.640 --> 0:04:08.200 led to him serving as an examiner for the Moral 0:04:08.360 --> 0:04:13.040 History Tripos. Tripos Is are academic exams, and Cambridge is 0:04:13.080 --> 0:04:16.880 often cited as the place this term started. The origin 0:04:16.960 --> 0:04:19.320 of the word isn't known with certainty, but it might 0:04:19.360 --> 0:04:23.599 have come from the tripod stool that examiners used sitting 0:04:23.680 --> 0:04:27.400 on them during the test. Ven's own works would inform 0:04:27.440 --> 0:04:31.039 these exams later, a guide for students preparing for exams 0:04:31.080 --> 0:04:34.560 that was written in eighteen ninety one recommended reading several 0:04:34.600 --> 0:04:37.960 of Ven's books for the logic and methodology section of 0:04:38.000 --> 0:04:41.239 the test. But even when he was lecturing and serving 0:04:41.320 --> 0:04:45.280 as examiner himself, he said to have shifted the tripos 0:04:45.320 --> 0:04:50.200 in developing the exam to reflect developing concepts in probability theory. 0:04:51.160 --> 0:04:54.479 He eventually stepped aside as examiner because he wanted to 0:04:54.520 --> 0:04:58.760 focus on studying and writing about the school's history. He 0:04:58.800 --> 0:05:01.920 also wrote about his own res boots in genealogy, publishing 0:05:02.000 --> 0:05:05.280 that previously mentioned book Annals of a Clerical Family, which 0:05:05.320 --> 0:05:08.440 traced the Ven family history to Devin, with a likely 0:05:08.480 --> 0:05:12.719 earlier origin in Somerset. In his writing, John noted that 0:05:12.760 --> 0:05:15.279 the name Ben had first been spelled with an F 0:05:15.480 --> 0:05:18.400 instead of a V, but had changed at some point, 0:05:18.520 --> 0:05:20.839 and that the change was most likely to align more 0:05:20.880 --> 0:05:24.000 closely with the common pronunciation that was used in the 0:05:24.000 --> 0:05:28.040 West Country. A few years into his career teaching at Keys, 0:05:28.480 --> 0:05:31.880 Ben published a book titled The Logic of Chance that 0:05:31.920 --> 0:05:36.240 was in eighteen sixty six. Economist John Maynard Keynes is 0:05:36.279 --> 0:05:39.960 often quoted as praising Ben's book, saying it was quote 0:05:40.000 --> 0:05:44.440 strikingly original and considerably influenced the development of the theory 0:05:44.480 --> 0:05:48.440 of statistics. The book sought to shift the way people 0:05:48.520 --> 0:05:52.960 looked at probability, specifically by incorporating the idea of frequency 0:05:53.080 --> 0:05:58.120 into mathematical prediction models, meaning how often a thing might happen. 0:05:58.960 --> 0:06:03.279 He worked against the assay based probability interpretations that presumed 0:06:03.400 --> 0:06:07.160 causality when looking at effects, which was why he felt 0:06:07.240 --> 0:06:12.320 that longer runs of observation would offer greater insight. He 0:06:12.360 --> 0:06:14.719 also made the case that the margin of error on 0:06:14.800 --> 0:06:18.239 probabilities had to shift in proportion to the data set. 0:06:18.839 --> 0:06:22.160 Smaller data sets would have larger margins of error, and 0:06:22.240 --> 0:06:26.520 vice versa. These concepts were applied to scenarios like gambling 0:06:26.760 --> 0:06:30.520 and birth outcomes. In the book, The Logic of Chance 0:06:30.560 --> 0:06:33.760 became an important text in probability, and it had three 0:06:33.880 --> 0:06:37.279 editions printed between its original eighteen sixty six published date 0:06:37.520 --> 0:06:40.880 and eighteen eighty eight. This was a paradigm shift in 0:06:40.920 --> 0:06:44.400 its time. We know that, of course having more data 0:06:44.440 --> 0:06:47.480 means you have better models of probability, but prior to 0:06:47.560 --> 0:06:50.599 Ven's book, most of probability theory was based on the 0:06:50.640 --> 0:06:54.880 idea that the right formulas would be accurate predictors regardless 0:06:54.920 --> 0:06:57.560 of the data set, but that of course led to 0:06:57.640 --> 0:07:02.280 unpredictable outcomes. Then approach came to be known as frequentism. 0:07:02.800 --> 0:07:05.200 And in addition to being a big statement about how 0:07:05.279 --> 0:07:09.040 logic and probability should be applied, Then made another interesting 0:07:09.040 --> 0:07:11.640 statement with the book right out of the gate, because 0:07:11.680 --> 0:07:13.960 he said in the preface that he wanted the information 0:07:14.080 --> 0:07:17.280 in it to be accessible. Writing of probability quote, I 0:07:17.320 --> 0:07:20.440 am convinced moreover that it can and ought to be 0:07:20.480 --> 0:07:24.800 rendered both interesting and intelligible to ordinary readers who have 0:07:24.960 --> 0:07:28.960 any taste for philosophy. The year after The Logic of 0:07:29.040 --> 0:07:34.040 Chance was released, John Ven got married to Susannah Carnegie Edmondstone. 0:07:34.960 --> 0:07:38.520 Susannah was born in Marlborough in eighteen forty three, and 0:07:38.720 --> 0:07:41.160 like John, she was the child of an Anglican priest 0:07:41.360 --> 0:07:45.280 that was the Reverend Charles welland Edmondstone. After the two 0:07:45.320 --> 0:07:49.080 of them got married, they settled into married life in Cambridge. 0:07:49.240 --> 0:07:52.160 They eventually had a child named John Archibald, but that 0:07:52.240 --> 0:07:55.680 wasn't until sixteen years into the marriage, so Susannah would 0:07:55.680 --> 0:07:58.120 have been about forty at the time that she gave birth, 0:07:58.480 --> 0:08:02.520 which is an unusual situation for the time. Susannah is 0:08:02.560 --> 0:08:05.280 interesting in her own right because she was hardly idle 0:08:05.360 --> 0:08:08.040 in her time as a wife. Before John Archibald was born. 0:08:08.640 --> 0:08:11.680 She was in fact a novelist. As her husband was 0:08:11.720 --> 0:08:15.280 publishing books on probability, she was penning titles like The 0:08:15.320 --> 0:08:18.840 Gwillians of Bryn Gwillian, which was published in eighteen seventy six, 0:08:19.200 --> 0:08:21.440 and that told the story of a family of children 0:08:21.480 --> 0:08:24.160 who are raised by their father and governess after their 0:08:24.200 --> 0:08:27.720 mother dies. She wrote several more novels, and she also 0:08:27.760 --> 0:08:31.120 worked with John on some of his historical writing. All 0:08:31.160 --> 0:08:35.000 of her novels except the last, were initially published anonymously. 0:08:36.000 --> 0:08:39.160 Her last work of fiction, The Husband of One Wife, 0:08:39.480 --> 0:08:42.319 came out in eighteen ninety four, and that book tells 0:08:42.320 --> 0:08:45.800 the story that seems to mirror Susannah's own life. It's 0:08:45.840 --> 0:08:48.200 about a young woman who gets married and moves to 0:08:48.240 --> 0:08:51.400 Cambridge to live with her husband. We're about to get 0:08:51.440 --> 0:08:54.480 to the diagrams, but before we do, we will pause 0:08:54.600 --> 0:09:07.240 for a sponsor break. In eighteen eighty one, John Ven 0:09:07.280 --> 0:09:11.200 published another book, this one titled Symbolic Logic, and it 0:09:11.280 --> 0:09:13.640 was in this work that he introduced the concept of 0:09:13.760 --> 0:09:17.880 ven diagrams as part of set theory. Ven diagrams, as 0:09:17.920 --> 0:09:22.080 many listeners already know, often use overlapping circles to represent 0:09:22.160 --> 0:09:26.679 sets of data. The region that overlaps represents a commonality 0:09:26.720 --> 0:09:29.920 among those sets of data. This is the most basic 0:09:29.960 --> 0:09:33.720 way this concept is used in casual conversation, although it's 0:09:33.800 --> 0:09:36.840 really a visual way to parse information and figure out 0:09:36.880 --> 0:09:41.280 logic problems, and some ven diagrams can be much more complex, 0:09:41.400 --> 0:09:44.280 but all of them show the way that sets intersect 0:09:44.559 --> 0:09:49.360 and join together. For example, you might be given the 0:09:49.400 --> 0:09:52.120 information that out of a group of people, five are 0:09:52.160 --> 0:09:56.440 tall and three have green eyes, two are tall and 0:09:56.640 --> 0:10:00.240 also have green eyes, and five members of the group 0:10:00.360 --> 0:10:04.880 are neither tall nor have green eyes. Using a Venn 0:10:04.920 --> 0:10:08.240 diagram with two overlapping circles, you could assign the number 0:10:08.280 --> 0:10:11.040 two to the overlap section and label each of the 0:10:11.080 --> 0:10:14.640 circles remaining areas one for the tall people, one for 0:10:14.679 --> 0:10:18.440 the green eyed people. You've also accounted for two of 0:10:18.480 --> 0:10:20.839 the tall people in the overlap, so you know there 0:10:20.880 --> 0:10:24.480 are three more tall people, and the number goes into 0:10:24.480 --> 0:10:28.920 the circle labeled tall. We've accounted for two green eyed people, 0:10:29.040 --> 0:10:31.160 and you know that there's three, so a one goes 0:10:31.200 --> 0:10:35.679 into the circle labeled green eyes. The number five, representing 0:10:35.720 --> 0:10:39.640 the five people who have neither attribute, sits outside those 0:10:39.679 --> 0:10:43.200 two circles. To figure out how many people there are 0:10:43.360 --> 0:10:45.559 in total in the group, you'd add each of the 0:10:45.640 --> 0:10:48.160 numbers you'd written down together. So the two people who 0:10:48.200 --> 0:10:51.160 are tall and green eyed, plus the three people who 0:10:51.160 --> 0:10:54.720 are only tall, plus the one person who only has 0:10:54.840 --> 0:10:57.880 green eyes, plus the five people who have neither of 0:10:57.920 --> 0:11:00.840 those attributes, so you know there are eleven people total. 0:11:02.000 --> 0:11:05.080 There can also be ven diagrams with three circles, and 0:11:05.120 --> 0:11:09.160 those are used to represent syllogisms. Those are logic arguments 0:11:09.160 --> 0:11:11.520 in which two premises are a given and then a 0:11:11.559 --> 0:11:16.360 conclusion is reached using deductive reasoning. A simple example would 0:11:16.400 --> 0:11:19.319 be to say, all sneakers are shoes. That's premis ie. 0:11:19.920 --> 0:11:24.040 Premise two is that some sneakers are blue. Therefore, your 0:11:24.080 --> 0:11:28.120 deductive reasoning leads you to some shoes are blue. The 0:11:28.160 --> 0:11:30.679 three circles overlap in a way that a central section 0:11:30.760 --> 0:11:34.480 of the diagram is simultaneously part of all three circles. 0:11:34.800 --> 0:11:39.160 Those are the some blue shoes. Syllogisms were not new 0:11:39.240 --> 0:11:41.600 to John Ven. They go all the way back to Aristotle, 0:11:41.920 --> 0:11:45.160 and though his writings about them do not contain diagrams, 0:11:45.640 --> 0:11:48.920 some logicians over the years have suspected that he may 0:11:48.960 --> 0:11:52.360 have used them to work his ideas out. So the 0:11:52.440 --> 0:11:56.080 Ven diagram is a way to visually represent the existence 0:11:56.280 --> 0:12:00.880 and non existence of variables within sets. But this isn't 0:12:00.920 --> 0:12:03.280 really something that he came up with out of nowhere. 0:12:04.120 --> 0:12:08.760 Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz of Leipzig, Germany lived in the seventeenth 0:12:08.760 --> 0:12:11.840 and early eighteenth centuries, and he studied the use and 0:12:12.120 --> 0:12:16.840 viability of diagrams to solve logic queries. He thought that 0:12:16.880 --> 0:12:20.040 Aristotle's concepts on the matter needed some more work, but 0:12:20.120 --> 0:12:23.000 to be clear, he was drawn to that work because 0:12:23.080 --> 0:12:27.600 he thought Aristotle's concept was compelling, writing quote, I hold 0:12:27.679 --> 0:12:31.000 that the invention of the form of syllogisms is a 0:12:31.200 --> 0:12:36.080 most beautiful of the human spirit. Leibnus's work started to 0:12:36.120 --> 0:12:39.760 include the use of circles and linear progression to work 0:12:39.840 --> 0:12:42.880 through syllogistic concepts, which when you look at them, are 0:12:42.960 --> 0:12:48.240 very clearly a precursor of the ven diagram. Leibniz did 0:12:48.240 --> 0:12:52.599 eventually favor using lines that created boxes as part of 0:12:52.640 --> 0:12:56.240 their logical grouping. Yeah, he got away from circles, but 0:12:56.440 --> 0:13:00.280 circles were favored by another logician, Leonard Euler, who was 0:13:00.280 --> 0:13:04.120 born in Basel, Switzerland in seventeen oh seven. Although he 0:13:04.200 --> 0:13:07.040 favored using circles to work out logic puzzles, he was 0:13:07.240 --> 0:13:09.720 very clear that the shape was not the important thing, 0:13:10.160 --> 0:13:13.359 noting in writing quote these circles, or rather these spaces, 0:13:13.720 --> 0:13:16.120 for it is of no importance what figure they are of, 0:13:16.600 --> 0:13:20.720 are extremely commodious for facilitating our reflections on this subject, 0:13:21.040 --> 0:13:24.520 and for unfolding all the boasted mysteries of logic which 0:13:24.559 --> 0:13:27.920 that art finds it so difficult to explain. Whereas by 0:13:27.920 --> 0:13:30.640 means of these signs, the whole is rendered sensible to 0:13:30.720 --> 0:13:34.400 the eye. We may employ, then spaces formed at pleasure 0:13:34.720 --> 0:13:39.520 to represent every general notion. And Euler's diagrams were well 0:13:39.559 --> 0:13:43.120 known in his time, although he wasn't applying mathematics or 0:13:43.160 --> 0:13:46.520 specifically algebra to them the way that then eventually would. 0:13:46.720 --> 0:13:50.640 They were just ways of grouping ideas. There were other 0:13:50.720 --> 0:13:55.120 mathematicians and logicians who worked in the manipulation of visual 0:13:55.200 --> 0:14:00.320 diagrams to work out logic, both numerical and theoretical, but 0:14:00.480 --> 0:14:04.480 John Ben's criticism of those who had come before led 0:14:04.559 --> 0:14:08.120 him to work out his approach. He wrote, for example, 0:14:08.200 --> 0:14:12.559 of Uller's work that it wasn't robust enough, stating quote, 0:14:12.600 --> 0:14:15.960 any system which merely exhibits the mutual relations of two 0:14:15.960 --> 0:14:20.320 classes to one another is not general enough. We must 0:14:20.320 --> 0:14:23.640 provide a place and a notation for the various combinations 0:14:23.680 --> 0:14:28.360 which arise from considering three, four or more classes. In fact, 0:14:28.400 --> 0:14:32.520 we must be prepared for a complete generalization. Ben also 0:14:32.680 --> 0:14:36.640 created way more complex diagrams than just two and three 0:14:36.760 --> 0:14:40.400 circle ones, and some of those are developing ideas put 0:14:40.440 --> 0:14:43.560 forth by the other two men we just talked about. 0:14:44.480 --> 0:14:48.120 Ben's book Symbolic Logic was also a defense and expansion 0:14:48.200 --> 0:14:50.600 of the work of George Boole, who had died twelve 0:14:50.640 --> 0:14:54.000 years earlier at the age of forty nine, and specifically 0:14:54.120 --> 0:14:59.800 his approach to algebraic mathematical logic. Boolean algebra represents relationships 0:15:00.080 --> 0:15:04.280 tween objects or ideas, so it works differently than ordinary algebra. 0:15:04.480 --> 0:15:08.000 For example, it doesn't require numeric quantities, but it can 0:15:08.160 --> 0:15:12.760 operate with variables like truth or falsehood. Boolean algebra is 0:15:12.880 --> 0:15:15.880 important because it's the foundation of things like probability and 0:15:15.920 --> 0:15:19.960 geometry of sets, but perhaps mostly so because in modern 0:15:20.040 --> 0:15:23.520 daily life it has impacted the way computer circuits are designed. 0:15:24.080 --> 0:15:27.320 In eighteen eighty three, Ben decided to resign from his 0:15:27.440 --> 0:15:31.360 position as an Anglican clergyman. He'd come to the decision 0:15:31.400 --> 0:15:35.800 that Anglicanism didn't really align with his beliefs anymore, although 0:15:35.840 --> 0:15:38.120 he did continue to be a part of the Church. 0:15:38.880 --> 0:15:41.600 According to an account written by his son Quote, it 0:15:41.640 --> 0:15:44.720 had long ceased to be regarded as an anomaly for 0:15:44.800 --> 0:15:49.320 a clergyman to preach the then circumscribed evangelical creed and, 0:15:49.480 --> 0:15:53.680 at the same time, without the slightest insincerity, to devote 0:15:53.760 --> 0:15:59.640 himself actively to philosophical studies, yet finding himself still less 0:15:59.720 --> 0:16:04.280 in sympathy with the orthodox clerical outlook, then availed himself 0:16:04.320 --> 0:16:09.240 of the clerical disabilities Act of a naturally speculative frame 0:16:09.280 --> 0:16:12.000 of mind. He was wont to say later that, owing 0:16:12.160 --> 0:16:16.480 to subsequent change and accepted opinion regarding the thirty nine articles, 0:16:16.840 --> 0:16:21.000 he could consistently have retained his orders. He remained, indeed 0:16:21.080 --> 0:16:25.880 throughout his life a man of sincere religious conviction. That 0:16:26.040 --> 0:16:29.440 same year, also eighteen eighty three, John Vin was elected 0:16:29.480 --> 0:16:32.840 to the Royal Society, and he received his science doctorate 0:16:32.840 --> 0:16:36.960 from Cambridge. Six years after these events, in eighteen eighty nine, 0:16:37.040 --> 0:16:41.080 he published The Principles of Empirical or Inductive Logic, and 0:16:41.120 --> 0:16:43.840 the opening of the Principles makes clear that ven has 0:16:43.880 --> 0:16:46.760 been troubled by the way concepts of logic have been 0:16:46.800 --> 0:16:50.880 poorly defined in communication about them, and that not practicing 0:16:51.040 --> 0:16:56.400 clear establishing rules regarding logic arguments have hurt the field overall. 0:16:56.960 --> 0:16:58.560 This kind of a long quote, but I want to 0:16:58.600 --> 0:17:00.920 include it because it gives you grit insight into the 0:17:00.920 --> 0:17:04.560 way he thinks about things. Quote. Since logic, as conceived 0:17:04.600 --> 0:17:07.560 and expounded in this work is not an ultimate science 0:17:07.960 --> 0:17:10.720 in the sense of being concerned directly with really first 0:17:10.720 --> 0:17:14.560 principles of any kind, we find ourselves obliged, on a 0:17:14.600 --> 0:17:17.679 general survey of our province, to take for granted that 0:17:17.720 --> 0:17:20.359 a great deal has already been decided for us in 0:17:20.480 --> 0:17:23.840 various directions. In other words, we have to demand a 0:17:23.920 --> 0:17:27.440 variety of postulates, drawn partly from the region of metaphysics, 0:17:27.720 --> 0:17:31.919 partly from those of psychology, physical science, grammar, and so forth. 0:17:32.440 --> 0:17:35.600 Some of these postulates will be readily accepted. Others will 0:17:35.600 --> 0:17:38.400 be admitted by those who have had any philosophic training. 0:17:39.119 --> 0:17:42.040 Some might take it have hardly yet been duly appreciated 0:17:42.119 --> 0:17:46.439 or even recognized. This being so, it would seem convenient 0:17:46.480 --> 0:17:49.520 that the more important of these postulates should be prominently 0:17:49.880 --> 0:17:54.320 and definitely stated at the outset. For one reason or another, however, 0:17:54.400 --> 0:17:57.440 such a course seems seldom adopted, and the result has 0:17:57.480 --> 0:18:01.760 been disadvantageous in more ways than one. This neglect to 0:18:01.800 --> 0:18:05.080 state the postulates has, for instance, brought down upon the 0:18:05.160 --> 0:18:09.760 logician charges of inconsistency and shortsightedness, which might as fairly 0:18:09.800 --> 0:18:13.080 be brought against the representatives of most other sciences, but 0:18:13.160 --> 0:18:16.639 which sounded damaging when he had to meet them alone. 0:18:16.680 --> 0:18:19.280 It has also tended, as I shall trust to show 0:18:19.280 --> 0:18:22.560 in the sequel, to encourage mistaken views as to the 0:18:22.560 --> 0:18:26.639 functions and province of the science. Whilst the general objections 0:18:26.680 --> 0:18:29.240 to such an emission on the grounds of method are 0:18:29.280 --> 0:18:34.040 too obvious to need reinforcement. In a moment, we'll discuss 0:18:34.080 --> 0:18:36.680 how Ven seemed to sort of turn on a dime 0:18:36.920 --> 0:18:39.440 in terms of his interests and projects in the late 0:18:39.480 --> 0:18:42.760 eighteen eighties. First, though, we'll hear from the sponsors that 0:18:42.880 --> 0:18:55.679 keep the show going. So before the break, we mentioned 0:18:55.680 --> 0:18:58.439 that in eighteen eighty nine John Ven published The Principles 0:18:58.480 --> 0:19:02.280 of Empirical or Inductive Life, and even before that in 0:19:02.320 --> 0:19:04.600 eighteen eighty eight, as he was working on the book, 0:19:05.160 --> 0:19:07.359 then seemed to have decided that it was going to 0:19:07.440 --> 0:19:10.920 be his last work in logic and probability theory, because 0:19:10.960 --> 0:19:14.520 he donated all of his personal Library on those subjects 0:19:14.520 --> 0:19:18.639 to the Cambridge University Library and after that then ventured 0:19:18.640 --> 0:19:21.320 into publishing non mathematical works at the end of the 0:19:21.400 --> 0:19:24.840 nineteenth century, although they were books related to his work 0:19:24.840 --> 0:19:28.800 in education. He published The Biographical History of Gonville and 0:19:28.880 --> 0:19:32.360 Keys College thirteen forty nine to eighteen ninety seven in 0:19:32.440 --> 0:19:36.119 eighteen ninety seven. This was a four volume project and 0:19:36.160 --> 0:19:39.760 it included portraits of various people related to the school's history, 0:19:40.000 --> 0:19:43.560 as well as additional illustrations. He also wrote an entry 0:19:43.600 --> 0:19:47.840 for the Cambridge College series titled Simply Gonvillin Keys College. 0:19:48.520 --> 0:19:53.119 Ben wrote several books that mentioned Keys, including Early Collegiate Life, 0:19:53.280 --> 0:19:55.760 which walked through some accounts of what it was like 0:19:55.840 --> 0:20:00.040 in its early days, laid out as narrative sketches. The 0:20:00.119 --> 0:20:02.800 published lists of students who had been admitted to the 0:20:02.840 --> 0:20:07.200 college in the fifteen hundreds and sixteen hundreds. Then worked 0:20:07.200 --> 0:20:09.800 with his son John Archibald to assemble a list of 0:20:09.840 --> 0:20:15.720 Cambridge alumni, which was also published as Alumni Cantabrigenses. This 0:20:15.800 --> 0:20:19.720 included biographies of students and graduates, and it chronicle things 0:20:19.840 --> 0:20:24.320 like students who had held offices in various organizations. An 0:20:24.440 --> 0:20:28.399 unnamed colleague was quoted in Ven's obituary as saying, quote, 0:20:28.440 --> 0:20:31.040 it is difficult for anyone who has not seen the 0:20:31.040 --> 0:20:34.240 work in its making to realize the immense amount of 0:20:34.280 --> 0:20:39.639 research involved in this great undertaking. Apparently, Ven's research for 0:20:39.680 --> 0:20:43.040 this book involved going through the archives and records of 0:20:43.080 --> 0:20:46.840 not just the school, but also various churches to correctly 0:20:46.880 --> 0:20:50.480 list all of the available details of each alumnus's life. 0:20:50.680 --> 0:20:54.199 Like he would go to an alumnus's hometown church and 0:20:54.280 --> 0:20:56.600 go through all of their records and do that for 0:20:56.720 --> 0:20:59.480 all of these people on this list. It was like 0:21:00.000 --> 0:21:05.119 he must have loved research. An obituary for Ben that 0:21:05.160 --> 0:21:09.160 appeared in the British Medical Journal described his output about 0:21:09.240 --> 0:21:12.600 Keys this way quote. The works which he wrote about 0:21:12.600 --> 0:21:17.040 the college are somewhat voluminous and are characterized by thoroughness, 0:21:17.760 --> 0:21:21.320 but are for the most part full of human interest. 0:21:21.880 --> 0:21:24.679 As a rule, they are pleasant reading, though in parts 0:21:24.720 --> 0:21:29.960 they are necessarily statistical statistics. Asie, he clearly had a 0:21:30.000 --> 0:21:32.320 deep love for the school, where he had been both 0:21:32.320 --> 0:21:35.720 a student and a teacher, and his dedication was recognized. 0:21:35.760 --> 0:21:38.639 He was made president of Gonville and Keys College in 0:21:38.720 --> 0:21:42.399 nineteen oh three. In nineteen oh nine, there is this 0:21:42.600 --> 0:21:46.080 wonderful and curious moment in Ven's life story, and we're 0:21:46.119 --> 0:21:48.480 going to talk about it kind of to a disproportionate 0:21:48.480 --> 0:21:50.760 amount because it is one of those things that is 0:21:50.800 --> 0:21:54.040 both charming and surprising, but it also shows how broad 0:21:54.080 --> 0:21:58.440 the interests of his life were. He invented a bowling machine, 0:21:58.960 --> 0:22:01.600 not in the sense of the sport of bowling that 0:22:01.640 --> 0:22:04.400 we know it today in the US, but bowling as 0:22:04.400 --> 0:22:07.040 it relates to cricket. So for our listeners who are 0:22:07.080 --> 0:22:10.560 more familiar with baseball, bowling is similar to pitching. I'm 0:22:10.600 --> 0:22:13.200 sorry for any cricket officionados who are like, it's much 0:22:13.240 --> 0:22:15.879 more complex and nuanced than that. We're just going for 0:22:15.960 --> 0:22:20.600 wide strokes here. According to the saffron Walden Weekly News 0:22:20.640 --> 0:22:24.199 from June eleventh, nineteen oh nine, quote, the preliminary of 0:22:24.200 --> 0:22:27.040 what promises to be a sensation in the cricket world 0:22:27.280 --> 0:22:31.200 took place on Fenners on Thursday week. Doctor Vin, president 0:22:31.200 --> 0:22:33.440 of Keyes College, who is a Fellow of the Royal 0:22:33.480 --> 0:22:37.080 Society and a Doctor of Science, has, in conjunction with 0:22:37.160 --> 0:22:41.480 his son mister Javen, invented and patented a bowling machine 0:22:41.800 --> 0:22:45.320 which in all probability will supersede the drudgery of bowling 0:22:45.359 --> 0:22:49.800 at the practice nets. At the event mentioned in the article, 0:22:50.080 --> 0:22:53.520 a number of cricketers visiting from Australia were able to 0:22:53.560 --> 0:22:56.080 observe and test this machine, and they found it to 0:22:56.119 --> 0:22:59.960 be quite impressive. The write up continues, quote the mission 0:23:00.280 --> 0:23:03.679 can bowl any kind of ball at any variation of 0:23:03.800 --> 0:23:08.080 pace or length, and can produce a deadly break either 0:23:08.119 --> 0:23:12.240 from the leg or off side of the wicket. Batsman 0:23:12.359 --> 0:23:15.680 wishing to practice any particular kind of stroke or perfect 0:23:15.800 --> 0:23:18.440 himself in dealing with any kind of ball, may set 0:23:18.480 --> 0:23:20.920 the machine up at one end of the pitch and 0:23:21.000 --> 0:23:24.879 practice to his heart's content. And the Australians found it 0:23:24.920 --> 0:23:27.760 to be formidable. Apparently it got the better of one 0:23:27.800 --> 0:23:32.600 of their star players. Yes, some descriptions of this suggest 0:23:32.640 --> 0:23:37.080 that this was kind of a feather in the cap 0:23:37.280 --> 0:23:41.040 of England in terms of cricket reputation, to have vested 0:23:41.480 --> 0:23:44.399 the Australians with a machine made by an Englishman. This 0:23:44.600 --> 0:23:47.760 article describes the machine's design, noting that quote it is 0:23:47.800 --> 0:23:50.840 not beautiful to look at, but its utility seems to 0:23:50.840 --> 0:23:54.720 be undeniable, and it notes quote above, an ungainly base 0:23:55.040 --> 0:23:58.560 equipped with strong springs and cords towers a gaunt iron 0:23:58.720 --> 0:24:01.880 arm having at its summit a grip of four fingers 0:24:01.920 --> 0:24:06.080 which rotate in either direction. The article also mentions that 0:24:06.119 --> 0:24:08.480 people had been trying to invent a bowling machine for 0:24:08.520 --> 0:24:11.360 cricket practice for quite a while, but no one had 0:24:11.359 --> 0:24:14.159 been able to create one that could consistently deliver the 0:24:14.160 --> 0:24:17.359 wide array of pitches that a human could until the 0:24:17.480 --> 0:24:20.280 VENs did it. And they had, according to the paper, 0:24:20.359 --> 0:24:24.360 patented this machine in England, the US and Australia. So 0:24:24.400 --> 0:24:26.240 it seemed like they might be on the verge of 0:24:26.280 --> 0:24:30.600 a huge business opportunity, but that didn't happen. We're going 0:24:30.640 --> 0:24:32.440 to loop back to this machine in just a bit. 0:24:33.240 --> 0:24:37.280 Van wrote a biography of the school's second founder, titled 0:24:37.359 --> 0:24:40.880 John Keyes, which was published in nineteen ten for Keys's 0:24:41.080 --> 0:24:45.720 four hundredth birthday. John ven died on April fourth, nineteen 0:24:45.760 --> 0:24:48.320 twenty three, at the age of eighty nine. He had 0:24:48.400 --> 0:24:51.399 served as president of Gonville and Keys College right up 0:24:51.480 --> 0:24:55.120