CELLULAR SPECIFICITY HI 



"L'homme machine"; but "La cellule machine" could be a con- 

 temporary title. The old anthropomorphism* of the sciences has 

 been replaced by a streamlined mechanomorphism, with some 

 sort of "templates" made of stainless protoplasm. But we may 

 ask: Was this change really beneficial? 



"Lasciate ogni speranza" is, however, hardly a motto that 

 would appeal to the munificence of research foundations and 

 government agencies; and a moderate optimism, intimating more 

 than it ever promises outright, is the fashion of the day. We shall 

 not dare transgress it, though no immediate vistas of roseate 

 finality will be painted. 



The title I have chosen for my talk is at the same time bold 

 and modest. It should indicate how great the goal is and how 

 far we are from it. But, as I recently said on another occasion^, 

 "there will always be a time in the natural sciences — and it will 

 always be too early — when a summary, a provisional and ten- 

 tative summary, must be drawn up. As long as we realize that the 

 experimental sciences operate under an unwritten statute of 

 limitations, no harm will result". I shall first consider in what 

 manner the phenomena of heredity may be subject to chemical 

 research and what could be said to be the chemical basis of cel- 

 lular specificity. 



2. CHEMICAL BASIS OF CELLULAR SPECIFICITY 



Let us start with a dictionary definition. "Heredity — 3. Biol. 

 The property of organic beings, in virtue of which offspring inherit 

 the nature and characteristics of parents and ancestors generally; 

 the tendency of like to beget like. (Often spoken of as a law of 

 nature.)" Thus the great Oxford^ Dictionary (Vol. V, p. 238); 

 and it is interesting to note that the term is not very old, the first 

 example of its use dating from 1863. It is the sum of all the 

 characteristics of a given cell which could be defined as cell 

 specificity. But even if we are agreed that life at one level must 



* "II ne faut pas juger la nature selon nous, mais selon elle." Pascal, 

 Pensees (Brunschvicg, No. 457). 



References p. 125 



