THE RELATION OF CELLS TO ONE ANOTHER 209 



It is impossible to know whether the phenomena that take 

 place at a given scale of magnitude will occur at a very 

 much smaller scale. Can the second law of thermodynamics 

 express what is going on in cell organs less than o. i micron 

 in diameter? Helmholtz doubted it, and Guye, in his remark- 

 able essay on physicochemical evolution, has discussed 

 how, at such a magnitude, the statistical laws of physics 

 are possibly replaced by the laws of the individual action 

 of molecules, atoms and electrons. As long as the phenomena 

 that take place in minute cell structures have not been 

 investigated, they cannot be assumed to follow the known 

 laws of physical chemistry. The affirmations of mechanis- 

 ticists on this subject must be considered as useless and 

 meaningless. The neomechanistic school has assumed a 

 more sensible attitude. It makes almost no philosophical 

 claims, but merely asserts the universal dominion of scientific 

 method over natural phenomena. However, it is still unsound 

 as it limits science to the realm of phenomena which can be 

 studied quantitatively and expressed mathematically. 

 Science should not be identified with measurement and, as 

 Gilbert Lewis said, one must have no patience with any 

 definition of the scientist that would exclude a Darwin, a 

 Pasteur, and a Kekule. After all, it seems that the best 

 possible intellectual attitude for biologists is to follow the 

 advice of Claude Bernard and "reject all scientific and 

 philosophical systems in the same manner as they would 

 break the chains of intellectual bondage." 



The problem of the unity and manifoldness of the organ- 

 ism has then to be attacked with only the help of the experi- 

 mental method. Our concepts of the integrating principle 

 must not be logical constructs, but the mere expression of 

 the manner through which they are acquired. How can we 

 bring into the field of experimental analysis the purposeful 

 processes of the living organism? It is obvious that such an 

 attempt would be unthinkable if the teleological agent were 

 an entelechy independent of the body. In that case, the 

 subject should be dismissed from the laboratory and 

 entrusted to the philosopher. However, we may reasonably 

 assume that the purposeful factors reside within the units 

 themselves, and not within the organism as a whole. While 



