Show HOW MAN IS VANISHING that it Is ia eay easy to provell prove nonsense by the employment of figures is ia illustrated by the following lowing tol from the san francisco morning cam call A french statistician who has been studying the military and other records has found that in 1610 the average height of man in europe was 5 feet 9 inches that in 1790 it was 5 feet 6 inches in 1820 it was 5 feet 6 inches and a fraction at the present time it is 5 feet 3 inches it is easy to deduce from these figures a rate of regular and gradual decline in human stature and then apply this w working backward and forward forwar ct to the p past t and to 10 the future by this calculation it is determined that the staure stature of the first man attained the surprising average of 16 feet 9 inches goliath was a quite degenerate offspring of the giants coming down to later time we find that at the beginning of our era the average height of man was 9 feet and in the time of charlemagne it was 8 feet 8 inches but the most astonishing result of this scientific study comes from the application of i he same inexorable law of diminution to the he future the calculation shows that by the year A athe D ahe stature of the average man will be reduced to 15 inches one of the premises from which the statistician argues may be true yet the conclusion is ia an absurdity one might just so as well argue that because the mean temperature in a given locality is 18 in march 40 degrees in april 60 50 degrees and in may 60 degrees decrees therefore in january it must have been 20 degrees and in december it will be ISO degrees above zero and yet much of this kind bind of reasoning is on important questions passed off as |