WHAT IS PHYSICAL LIFE 



bored and experimented for years on 

 account of the complexity of the problems 

 they encounter. One result is curious, and 

 that is that fever is a good thing to have 

 under the circumstances. Professor W. 

 G. MacCallum * of Johns Hopkins Uni- 

 versity says : " It seems probable that 

 every detail of this fever reaction is that 

 which is best calculated to take its own 

 special part in the making up of a whole 

 well-ordered plan. The conclusion seems 

 inevitable that this plan is one devised 

 for the good of the organism and that 

 fever in its essentials is a protective 

 reaction." 



It will be noted that biological investi- 

 gators can hardly escape from using lan- 

 guage about living processes which im- 

 ply design and purpose. The celebrated 

 physiologist, Sir Michael Foster, when 



*New York Harvey Society Lectures, 1908; MacCal- 

 lum on " Fever Processes." 



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