86 ANATOMY AND MORPHOLOGY 



from the records of its ancestr\', no cnccs and tlirough plnlosophy, arc 

 matter how completely these may be agreed in emphasizing one particular 

 deciphered. Ph\siolog\' is evidently problem, one general phenomenon of 

 nearer than plulogcny to the ultimate life, as of primary and dominant sig- 

 problem. Stimulated by the great ad- nificance. This may be stated in a word 

 vances which the plnsical sciences had as the problem of organization. Living 

 made, the attack through physiology things are well termed organisms. The 

 began about a generation ago to at- activities of their manifold structures 

 tract many new workers and gave every are so integrated and coordinated that 

 promise of substantial progress. The a successfully functioning whole indi- 

 \cars have found this promise amply vidual develops. As to how this is ac- 

 fulfillcd in our success in plotting the complishcd very little is known. The 

 flow of ph\ sical and chemical change of advances of biological science have 

 which an organism is the seat, but the been chiefly in quite the other direc- 

 results of physiological research have tion, in breaking down the organism 

 tended to emphasize the complexity' into its constituent organs, tissues and 

 rather than the simplicitv of proto- cells, into chromosomes and genes, into 

 plasm and have entirely failed as yet protein molecules and cellulose chains, 

 to solve the elusive problem of what into potential differences, axial gradi- 

 an organism reallv is. A similar frus- ents and morphogcnetic fields. But 

 tration has attended still another line analysis alone, however detailed it may 

 of attack, through the science of genet- ultimately be made, can never lead to 

 ics. Ever since the rediscovery of the a complete understanding of an organ- 

 Mendelian principles of heredity, this ism. Synthesis also is required. What 

 discipline has been enthusiastically it is that coordinates these various parts 

 pursued by many students who felt that and processes so that an organism 

 here, at last, something fundamental in rather than a chaos results, what syn- 

 biology had made its appearance. The thetic factors there may be which knit 

 truly sensational development of the the organism together into a function- 

 chromosome theor\', with its demon- ing unit, are extraordinarily difBcult 

 stration that the genes are definite problems. It is probably safe to say that 

 physical entities occupying constant the majority of botanists and zoologists 

 positions in the chromosomes, has justi- today would admit that this problem 

 fied this early enthusiasm; but with of organization is indeed their ultimate 

 their first major objective attained, and central concern; and that if the 

 geneticists are coming to realize that biological sciences have any problem 

 their really basic problem is not the peculiar to themselves and diffcrentiat- 

 location and transmission of genes but ing them from the physical sciences, 

 the mechanism b\' which these control this is the one, 



the development of an organism. My purpose in making such an ex- 

 To formulate with anything like as- cursion as this into biological funda- 

 surance a problem which is central and mentals is to defend the thesis that the 

 fundamental for all biolog\-, the Mount solution of our basic problem can be 

 Everest of our scientific exploration, approached more simply and directly 

 may still seem to many an act of faith through the study of form than by any 

 rather than of sight; but within the last other means; and that morpholog}', far 

 few decades, and recently in increasing from being the hopelessly static disci- 

 numbers, many biologists, as well as pline which some would have us be- 

 thinkers who have approached biolog- licve, therefore touches so intimately 

 ical problems through the physical sci- the central problem of biology that it 



