268
12 Coda
defend is not a proposal from me to the Union. I want to have nothing to
do with the Union. My view is that it is a proposal from the Dutch club. If
you are looking for a name, it is Pieter van Rhijn, from whom the proposal is
indeed coming.’ A somewhat less far reaching proposal does indeed appear in
the Congress report as having been adopted.
Kapteyn is not mentioned at all in this report, but apart from the above, there
are three cases where his name would have been appropriate. The first concerns
the reports on the progress of the Plan of Selected Areas; that Kapteyn’s name
was associated with it must have been obvious. The second is the resolution,
adopted at the suggestion of the American ‘Section’ of the IAU (which worked
under the auspices of the National Research Council), to define the absolute
magnitude of stars as the apparent brightness at a distance of 10 parsec. This
is the definition that Kapteyn had been using for years (and was the first to do
so). Its widespread use was mentioned, but the name Kapteyn does not appear
in the resolution or explanation.
Fig. 12.10 Edouard-Benjamin Baillaud, first President of the IAU. This picture comes
from the Album Amicorum, presented to H.G. van de Sande Bakhuyzen on the occasion
of his retirement as professor of astronomy and director of the Sterrewacht Leiden in
1908 [47]
12 Coda
defend is not a proposal from me to the Union. I want to have nothing to
do with the Union. My view is that it is a proposal from the Dutch club. If
you are looking for a name, it is Pieter van Rhijn, from whom the proposal is
indeed coming.’ A somewhat less far reaching proposal does indeed appear in
the Congress report as having been adopted.
Kapteyn is not mentioned at all in this report, but apart from the above, there
are three cases where his name would have been appropriate. The first concerns
the reports on the progress of the Plan of Selected Areas; that Kapteyn’s name
was associated with it must have been obvious. The second is the resolution,
adopted at the suggestion of the American ‘Section’ of the IAU (which worked
under the auspices of the National Research Council), to define the absolute
magnitude of stars as the apparent brightness at a distance of 10 parsec. This
is the definition that Kapteyn had been using for years (and was the first to do
so). Its widespread use was mentioned, but the name Kapteyn does not appear
in the resolution or explanation.
Fig. 12.10 Edouard-Benjamin Baillaud, first President of the IAU. This picture comes
from the Album Amicorum, presented to H.G. van de Sande Bakhuyzen on the occasion
of his retirement as professor of astronomy and director of the Sterrewacht Leiden in
1908 [47]