Shapley Tells of Astronomy Advances Made During Year

A new theory on the origin of the solar system was one of the subjects discussed in a lecture given by Harlow Shapley, director of the Observatory and Paine Professor of Practical Astronomy, at a meeting of the American Association of Variable Star Observers last Saturday in the Faculty Club.

Reviewing the whole field of astronomical advances made during the last year by astronomers all over the country. Shapley talked on a theory of R.A. Lyttleton of Princeton University who has suggested that formerly the sun had a companion star.

"This companion, after being partially disrupted by the close passage of a third star, long ago deserted the neighborhood, leaving in the sun's gravitational care the debris of the creative encounter. The present planets, formed from the eruption filaments in much the manner described in earlier tidal revolution cheories, are endowed with momenium derived from the parent star."

This theory has been born out by Professor H.N. Russell who has also written a book on the same subject. Some of the other subjects discussed were the eclipse of June 19, the twenty-inch camera at the Lick Obserratory, the discovery of a red nebulosity around Antares, the appearance of a wave of bright novae, appearing in the Milky Way, and the misbehavior of the star Gamma.