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' Copyright. 1912. by American-Examiner.- Great Britain Rights Reserved. - i ' t'", v ' 1 v
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V A, Q Interesting Calculations Which'.-. Tlf
" 'J 'ralV'W theRea11? Ective Mechanism flwr
- -M J j" I Would Be, and Indicate That Man
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4
1 4
WHAT AN.ANGt' OUGHT TO
LOOK LIKE. " r
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'Tha Pint Drawing Show tha Fifteen, j
Foot Stretch of Wing, with an Average (
Width of Hire Feet, Which Science
Saya It Necenary to Raita a Creature
cf 160 Poundt. The Imntente Cheat,
So' Different, from That ef the Tradt
tional , Angel, I Composed , of the
Muaelea Necetaary for Flying.
The Second Drawing IUmtratet How
the FifteenFeet Wingi Would Appear
if .They (Took the ' Place ' of Arma, aa
They Do in the Bird. Thi, if Com
pared with Bume-Jot.e'a Angel on An.
other Part' of Thia Page, Shows How
Inadequate Would; Be the Letter's
Wings for Flying. JSuf h a Length as the
First Would,' However, Make Standing
or Sitting very Uncomfortable, and the
Angel Could Not Feed Himself.
The Third Figure Illustrate the
Enormous Development of the Back
Which Would Be Necessary if the
Wings . Spreng from ' the , Shoulder
blid.t( as They Are Ordinarily Depict
ed as Doing.
Interesting Calculations Which
Prove Their Wings Are Useless
for Flying, Show How Annoying
the Really Effective Mecnanism
Would Be, and Indicate That Man
Would Have to Be Entirely
Re-Made to Become One
consists of little else than
this bone. The same gi
gantic feature is notable
lu the "skeleton of the 'pre
historic pterodactyl, the
greatest flying creature ever
known, which weighed only
', thirty pounds, less than' a'
fifth the weight of the aver
age mau or angel. , .;
To use his thirty feet of '.
wings, the bare limit uetes
wiry to keep h'.m aloft,-the
160-pound man would have
to develop a breast bone '
which would be big enough
' to 'cover ' his chest and nt
least three-fourths of his
iibdomrn. This would. In
Its turn, demand .various
rearrangements tf his in
ternal organs and an entire
ly different length of rib.
Besides this, the mass of
muscles r .ered on - his
cheBt would make him ap-v
. . ' . "zy- ! 1-.,"1 Nyr"fv35;
."".Illy ' j- i
A
RT has given ua our idea of what angeia look
like. From the time pr the old, masters un
t , tu recently tney nave been portrayed as more
or less intelligent faced, smooth-shaven men, usually
six feet high and, weighing preiumably around HO
pounds. They hive arms and legs and an apparently
.normal body, except that a pair of wings emerge from
their shoulder blades. . .. -
There are no women angeia, although,, as will be
Been later, the bodily structure of woman is more
adapted to-angelhood than is man's.
, A number of interesting calculations and observa
tions, upon, angels, aa given ib by art,' have recently
been made by fclentists. They are important becansu
they seem to show that no angels, - built i we know
them, could possibly fly. .'Nor could man as he is
'built now possibly be a flying angel. . They seem to
show. In fact, that no mammal could fly. None is
rlgecd for' both arms and wings. '. " ,v
The main object of angels wings tould seem4o be
to fly, but science' ,?aya that-the, traditional swan ef
fect would depend uptin some muscular device utterly
unknown, to anatomy. If If Is objected that angeia
are incorporeal and not of the actual weight that they
seem to be have, in fact, no weight then, It may be
properly asked, Why the wings? In all the pictures
i these are exceedingly substantial and are shown as
the actual motive power of the angel. Thlsbelng bo
argue science, 4he whale, matter must be analyzed
; from the bsels of material, purposeful wings and this
' Implies a material body, which Is Just what It seems
! to be and which is lifted and carried through' the air
., by .these wings.' '. -- -
- By an elaborate series of calculations science has
discovered that the average 160-pound, man or angel
, would need, at the outset, wings fifteen feet in length
" to lift himself from the ground. That Is,, he iwou'd
have to measure at least thirty feet from tip to tip,
or about five times hia height.
5 But, after giving him the wjngs. the difficulties In
crease. All the higher forms of life grew from a com
'. won ancestor. At one time we were all reptilian
; The bird's ancestors were reptiles. The feathers are
only developed scales. Both gnakes and blrda atlll
lay eggs. Man grew up from hi reptilian progenitors
through a series of forefathers who went a all fojrs.
While the fore feet of the reptile were turning into
the winga of the bird, they were turning into hau ls
- for us. ' ' ' . ....'.
During. this process our bodily structure was pro
., foundly changed. , This was particularly true of the
' skeleton. Walking on all fours, the mammal did noi
teed the muscles of his chest to be enormously de
reloped. : And so they were not The breast bone,
which 1s the foundation of the chest muscles, did not
therefore, grow to any nlze In the mammal.' On the
other hand, the , action cf flying necessitates extrA
' ordinarily powerful chest muscles. The breast bone
, of the bird Is therefore the largest bone of its body,
, A glance at the comparative skeletoni cf man and
. bird, on this page, will show the enormous difference
to their sizes. ,
k Man,, with bis puny breast bone, has no fatmda'ion
upon which the muscles essential to move a thirty.
foot spread of wings could attach themselves. -The
iEgela seem to have the same breast formation a
man. The giant condor, in most respects the largest
.bird on our planet, beara a chest whose framework.
lies, it is Been, In his legs. Few men could walk up
stairs oh their hands, and no man could develop one
horsepower running upstalrB on his hands. ; And yet
It is this part of the anatomy which js the most use
ful In flying. And so 'we must assume, that, even If
angels have the fifteen feetylong wings which science
says they must have, they have not, from their pic
tures, the necessary chest mechanism to work them.
An angel with wings of such dimensions is, In fact,
far1 different, from any depicted-even in song or story,
but there is still another difference. How many
people realize that the angel as- shown in the pictures
has, really six. limbs. The bare feet, for flying, ,lke
swimming, seems to be impeded by shoes, are evl- ,
dence of tme ; pair of swings, The arms and hands
form another pair, and the winks ,form a. third paif. Y
Now' the wings of uvMrtfaref developments of the'
same group of bones that, makes the arm and' foot p
of -the human being: The wlng proper is an extension '
of the thumb and the -first finger. - The arm bones
the . humerus, the- radius and the ulna-have : disai--peared
because they were of .ia'lmportance . to the '.'
bird.' In the conventional idea of the angel the wlnga
are fixed " to the ' back of the . shoulder blades but
where is he ball and socket Joint in which they could
move? 5 What particular kind of blood supply , would
go into the .wings?". What is the muscular tissue?,
, ' If we concede the difference of wing'
' space nnd horsepower to be overcome,
still have the enormous difficulty '
ot me. proiouna moaincauons of the
whole muscular and skeletqn ,bnck to .
meet. If an ttngel has ball and socket
Joints in his shoulder-bladeB he" Is not
man-like, and If mau sliould' lu some
way develop Joints, he would cease to
be a iBan. :; : ,.'
' " " The whole truth of the. matter (s ' '
- . - that no - mmal l luilt for both wing t
end ormL, It Is seicntifically , impos
... v, Bible for wings to grow out of one's
' fil.oulder-b.ades. . ., , , n . .Vv ;','
It has been said that there are no women angels.
In the Old Masters the;- angels are almost..in- j
variably men, the exceptions, sexless. . In the winged
hierarchy of : the heaven there are no names of women. ;
Women are made saints, It seems, .but never angels.
"We read In the Talmud of the "Sons of God," but of
the "Daughters" we hear, nothing. . This is curious -because
woman,' through her physiological differences
from man, l better, adapted for flying. She has less
specific gravity; her bones are lighter and more.. hoi- -low
and closer approximating the brrd; and she i has
larger chest 'muscles.- That, she has a greater facility
all" Iknn m n l . .
Biaieiueui
. pear exactly like , a pouter pigeon, while Hercules
himself would, in comparison, seem to have no chest
"at all. ; - J : -. :
' Dr. F. A. Lucas, Director of the Museum of Natural
History in New York and an international authority
, on flying creatures,, points out that three , things are
to be considered in flying the horsepower of the crea
ture, its weight in pounds: arid its supporting .wllig
area In square feet. . . . ", ..... ' ,;'.. .
' -.The ratlca of tlic3e three' factors are not thesame
in: all birds, and they differ greatly,, although sys
tematically, with , absolute weight. -
It is an obvious mathematical law, that the area In
bodies Increases as the square of their dimensions,
while their weight increases as the 'cubb of' thelf'di-
mensions. From this it is 'an apparently plain In
ference that, the larger the creature or the machine,
the LESS the relative area of support may: "be.. It la
this law which adds another difficulty to man or an-
, gels flying, and which certilnly would se,em to pro
vent an elephant from ever; having wipgs.,. . '
r. To demonstrate: If in a soaring; bird, which we
v may suppose to weigh two pounds, we, .should flnJ
that it had two square feet of wing surface, lor. a ratio :
Just stated, that . in ' a aoarlng bird of twice the dl-',1 T lt tem sleep : on their
ior going up in ine air "man man is a
which has no place la a serious discussion
,, All this raises some very Interesting speculations
as to the annoyances of , being an angel. Tb ninety
feet , of wlug area would demand a great deal of
Bpace for each bearer. .If some one wanted to addrcs3
a hundred or more angels they would have to do it
: through a . megaphohe because they would take up
with their wings the "same, room that a crowd of sev
eral thousand men would. Again, there is the ques
tion of how they would dispose of their wings. They
positively co'uld not. sleep on their backs or on their
swies. , The .enlarged .chest .would
mensions we would have a weight, of sixteen pounds
and an area of eight square feef. This would. mean
only half a square foot of supporting area to a pound
of weight, so that, even if flight is possible in the
first case, it would be wholly improvable In the sec-,
"" ond, The difference U seen to grow greater as' we
Increase the site, for when we , have a creature of
three times the dimensions of the first bird we sholl
have twenty-seven times the area and only nine times
. ' the sustaining surface, whjch is but one-third of , a
foot to the pound, and so, science says, we cannot
have a flying creature much greater than the limit
of area of the condor, mmcj ft i endowed with cjro-
ordinary ttrcngth of icing. . . ; :
, And so we are thrust back again upon the difficulty
of ; angel motive power. . Taking the condor again ta
a standard, we have a flying creature with one-twen-itleth
cf a horsepower as an angel, seventeen pound
' weight and a supporting wing area of ten equare feet.
. Assuming the horsepower to . vary t directly, as the
weight, we find 'that the flying horsepower of the
average man weighing 160 pounds and having a ninety
square foot wing area, must be approximately one-,
half a horsepower. Now, it is a fact that the aver
age man can geuerate only one-ninth of a horsepower.
This one-ninth standard' has been proven time afier
time' in experiments at Washington, too complex to he
gone into here. It can 'be accepted as a fact.- Again,
-; . from a curve plotted by Dr. Lttcas, taklnjt as the base
1 of calculations twelve different birds of different weight,
'wing area and power, he has determined thai for a ISO-
' pound creature Bix-tenth3 of a foot of wing surface per
p6und ia required, or ninety square feet in all. This is
nine times-the wing area of. the condor, and the result
ing dimensions for the average man would be forty-five
square feet-for each wing.. Each wing, would thus
have to be fifteen feet long and average three feet in
width.-- ; ; : - . - , .
- The one-ninth horsepower that a man has would
V be utterly insufficient to raise these wing. '"A man
running upstairs at great speed, two1" or three stSpn
at a time, develops, for a few instants, as high as one
horsepower. Thia la his limit, and hia greatest Btren0-;h
stomichS.; -Doubtless they might
, i have-me kind of hooks. oh the top
of their wings and haug themselves
up at night,, llke certalti kinds of
bats." which suffer from the-same
.annoyances. , . ,. ' -
? ' It is also doublfui;' If an angel
r could alight from the air with dig
nity. Any one who ha seen a large
bird or, a monoplane either alight
or ascri" inot dc tnls. There
would el her be an enormous flapping
of wings, like a chicken Jumping
down rrom the fence, or else they
would skim down li an aeroplane"
, landing, and this would Involve run
ning very fast Indeed for a hundred
feet after they touched the earth,
in the same- way, to ascend thev
, would have to run and jump until
,the air got under their wings.
" There too. Is the problem of sit
ting down. The enormous length of'
wing, two and one-half times the
height of the nfisel,. would prevent
them from fitting on ordinary cliatm
In the, light of these calculations
that pld hvmu of ou'r childhood.
which runs, v ' 7
, . "The blessed souls stand ever In the
' , light- - I '' .
All rapture through' and ' through.'
v would have a "new! ani literal mean
lug . Any . .crowd 4 of angels would
j stand so thoroughly in the light that
n oue could possibf;- read the I'trg
vest print because of the shadow of
v their wins. . ; . -i 4 , ' .
Of course. ' all : these"' ..speculations'
are based ouljr upou ttcleutihc deduc-Uoua.
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' the Thriie Magi, ; Science Says His , Wings, lake Those of the Other Pic:1 : "
." :.; : tured Angels, A-e fob Sroall.to Carry. Him. and Are Worked bv a Mech'-1 ' ! ' Wo. !j
(. lS ' , apum " Apatoroy
' " '
mli-' Fit
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SI f II -ffl . Iff . : .. W U for It Work an the Fonndattoa of the J
Tb Skeletea of - a Cat,- Man, a
Hlrd and the Pteroda-trl.. tkc- Eitlafff
KlTin Krpttle. Made the Same Mm for
CymparUoa, The Sk,eletaii - Show
t learlr That the Mammal la .Not Built
tor Both Arma and WIbsh. The Cat
Uaa ITnctically ?.c BrrBRtbonei Maa'a
l.ery haiall. The Blrd'a b'rraatboae
Is Seea to B'- Enormoudy Ealared
for Ita Work aa the Foandatloa of the
Mana of Flylatc Muaclea. Which Mna
Itt-rl.T Larka. The M a-.nl reaeaa of the
(trroinra .Breaathane. Shows' Hon
Po-rertnl the Masrlra Whlrh Movd
the C.rrat Inc.- Meat Have Beea. The '
Ptrrodart.il rich Ml Thirty Poanda,
and Hm the Heovleat Klriaa Creature
Perhaps Which Ever Exiated. .