48 



THE MITOCHONDRIAL CONSTITUE>fTS OF PROTOPLASM. 



Now, the advocates of the above-mentioned terminology beUeve that it is of 

 use because they think it convenient to have a special word to designate granular, 

 rod-like, and filamentous forms, and rows of granules; but this system of terminology 

 is not only cumbersome, confusing, and arbitrary, but it is also inadequate. That 

 it is cumbersome needs no explanation. It is confusing because individual inves- 

 tigators do not all use it in the same way (see table 2). Indeed, it is not an 

 easy matter to find two workers in agreement about it. It is arbitrary because it 

 leads one to make sharp and clear-cut distinctions between dilTerent forms of mito- 

 chondria where none exist. Instead of saying, for instance, that the mitochondria 

 in a cell are characterized by their great diversity of form, we must remark that 

 chondriosomes of this particular cell occur in the form of mitochondria, chondrio- 

 contes, and chondriomites, and we are obliged to speak of the cellular content of 

 chondriosomes as the chondriome. It is also inadequate because branching mito- 

 chondria — networks and circles and bleb-like sweUings and many other varieties — 

 also occur which are not provided for. Let us hope that no one will coin special 

 names for them. 



Table 2. 



But the most pernicious systems of nomenclature arose several years later, 

 when investigators became deluded into thinking that they knew something about 

 the functional significance of mitochondria. 



Koltzoff (1906, p. 468) has called the mitochondrial droplets " mitochondrosols" 

 (or, briefly, "mitosols"), and the larger masses which he believes they form by 

 confluence in the course of spermatogenesis he terms "mitogels." 



The plastochondrial nomenclature of Meves is important in this connection. 

 It is based upon his theory (Meves, 1908, p. 845) that, with the specialization of 

 the embryo into different organs and tissues, primitively similar cells assume special 

 functions which find expression in characteristic structures or differentiations. All 

 these products, no matter how heterogeneous they may be, arise through the meta- 

 morphosis of one and the same elementary plasma constituent, the chondriosomes. 

 He writes, subsequently (1910a, p. 150), that when we consider the important role 

 that chondriosomes play in histogenesis we can speak (instead of chondriosomes) 

 of " Plastosomen " ("Plastochondrien," " Plastochondriomiten " or short chondrio- 

 mites, and "Plastoconten"). This terminology was accepted by all except those 

 who oppose, or are skeptical, of the theoretical considerations which inspired it. 



Duesberg (1912, p. 598) first accepted this system of nornenclature and adopted 

 it, but later (1915, p. 35) rejected it for several reasons, but particularly in order to 



