SPECIAL PHASES 291ble record of concrete fact is desired, stereo has proven superior.
Education.-For teaching in schools as well as for adult educa-
tion and specialized technical training, stereo has proven lo be
free from the disadvantages of planar photography. It is the only
photographic process which can rival handmade drawings in such
fields as surgery and pathology.
Educational stereo, however, lags. For some reason which can-
not be understood, many educators are against visual aids in
school work. They seem to have the same idea which rules medi-
cine in primitive civilizations. The more unpalatable education is
the greater its value. That this is false has been demonstrated time
after time. Lasting knowledge comes only from study which is in-
teresting. The forced cramming of ordinary book study fades
from memory within weeks or months; while that which has been
learned visually is a permanent acquisition.
Reading is a comparatively recent acquirement of man, but
vision has come up with him from primeval time. It is easy to
forget what we read and hear, but it is almost impossible ever to
forget what we have seen. And as has been demonstrated time
after time, the artificiality and convention of the planar photo-
graph, makes it akin to reading, but the stereogram is in every
way equivalent to the sight of the real object. Those who have
seen a stereogram remember it fully as long and as distinctly as
do those who saw the original object.
It must be admitted, however, that in this discussion we speak
of the stereogram as we have it today, the true replica of the
original in gradation and color, coupled with the benefit of stereo-
chromatism. The monochrome paper print is not nearly so effec-
tive and holds a position midway between the true stereo and
the planar.
Even so, stereo is gaining in education, and it will be perhaps
only a matter of a few years before it will have been fully accepted
as a part of our educational program.
Forensic Stereo.-The acceptance of a photograph as evidence
in a court of law is hedged about by many proper limitations. The
photograph as we ordinarily know it is subject to too much alter-
ation by skilled hands and to far too great a diversity of interpre-
tation. True forensic photographs are made by trained operators