BIO-DYNAMICS 115 



The first necessity of organisation and colony-formation is 

 work and mutual surplus of work on the part of the units, and 

 this requires a kind of nutrition which is both qualitatively 

 adequate and quantitatively unobstructive. 



We have seen that in-feeding leads to a loss of photo- 

 synthesis and concurrently results in obstructive surfeit 

 (impedimenta). This mode of nutrition, therefore, is not 

 associated with " appropriate nutritive media," with appro- 

 priate physiological currency. It does not lead to progressive 

 symbiosis. It means disruption. That we have in our bio- 

 economic theory indeed a universal principle, which shows 

 other differences to be more apparent than real, and that our 

 investigators from totally different considerations are driven 

 to similar inferences (though expressed in a different 

 terminology), is strikingly evident from Prof. Bretland 

 Farmer's opening remark. 



A general survey of the biological field shows that the evolution of 

 the higher from the lower forms of life, strictly depends on the due 

 discharge of the two great functions of nutrition and reproduction. 

 (Italics mine.) 



The same botanist also shows by an experiment how 

 plantagens may be forced asunder from a previous symbiosis 

 by improper (surfeiting) nutrition. 



If the plant (Cladophora sp., marine species) be placed in sea-water 

 to which a strong salt solution is slowly added (up to about 12*5 per 

 cent.), the protoplasm of each of the cells contracts away from the walls, 

 and forms an ellipsoidal mass within each cell cavity. The protoplasts 

 then surround themselves with new walls. After allowing them to 

 remain in this condition for about four days the strong salt solution 

 is gradually replaced by sea-water. The ellipsoidal cells swell out until 

 they approximately fill the space they previously occupied within the 

 old membrane. But the disunion has obliterated the mutual relation- 

 ship formerly existing between cell and cell. Each one proceeds to 

 develop without any reference to the rest, and puts out a basal attaching 

 organ below, which usually penetrates the adjacent cell cavity. Later 

 on the cell also proceeds to grow in the apical direction. Thus the 

 individual cells of the filamentous colony have been, in this experiment, 

 released from the influence which bound them together into an organism, 

 and have recovered complete autonomy and individuality. This has 



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