BIOGENESIS AND ABIOGENESIS 129 



thai they at any rate saw no signs that the 

 problem of the origin of life was on the point 

 of being solved through this branch of their 

 science. Some stress has been laid by Bach 

 on the fact that a substance known as formal- Formalde- 

 dehyde, and regarded by botanists as the first y 

 step in the synthesis of sugar in green plants, 

 is formed artificially when, in the presence of 

 sunlight, carbon dioxide is passed through a 

 solution of a salt of uranium. The observation 

 is no doubt one of considerable interest, yet it 

 does not carry us very far. In fact Bateson 

 scoffingly says of it in his Presidential Address 

 to the British Association in 1914, that he is 

 reminded by it of nothing so much as of 

 Harry Lauder, in the character of a school- 

 boy, " pulling his treasures from his pocket : 

 ' That's a wassher for makkin' motor- 

 cars.'!" 



As there are no scientific facts to help them 

 and as the problem is one clamant of explana- 

 tion, various purely hypothetical explanations 

 have been given of which some mention must 

 now be made. A half-hearted suggestion by 

 Osborne * that there might possibly be an un- 

 known chemical element which might be called 

 Bion may be passed over, since it is not seri- Bion 

 ously pressed; there is not the remotest evi- 







* The Origin and Evolution of Life. Bell, London, 1919, 



1 



