34 



NA TURE 



[November 12, 1908 



objections, and the investigations now recorded tend 

 to show (i) that the seams are not all similarly 

 anthracitic, and though each seam is generally more 

 anthracitic than the one above it, there are many 

 exceptions to the rule; (2) that the anthracitic 

 character was not due to faults, but existed before 

 the faults were formed; (3) that the anthracite 

 existed as such before the coalfield was reduced by 

 denudation to its present dimensions ; and (4) that 

 the percentage of ash diminishes pari passu with the 

 decrease of bituminous matter. These conclusions 

 point to the variations in the composition of the coals 

 having been either original or at least of very early 

 date. Indeed, of all the suggested causes of altera- 

 tion subsequent to deposition, none appear to have 

 been adequate to produce more than a slight modifi- 

 cation of the differences due to original composition. 

 Written in faultless literary style and edited with 

 scrupulous accuracy, this v'aluable addition to geo- 

 logical literature will appeal to a wide circle of 

 readers, and the authors deserve great credit for the 

 success they have achieved in the first attempt to 

 define the distribution of anthracite and to explain 

 its origin on purely experimental grounds. 



VITALISM. 

 Verstich cincr Begriinditng der Dcszendeiiztheorie. 

 By Prof. Karl Camillo Schneider. Pp. viii+132. 

 (Jena : G. Fischer, 1908.) Price 3 marks. 



A COUPLE of years ago Prof. K. C. Schneider pub- 

 lished six admirably clear and objective lectures 

 as an introduction to the studv of the evolution-theory. 

 It was a useful e.xposition of the facts of variation 

 and heredity, and of the Darwinian and Lamarckian 

 interpretations. The present volume is critical and 

 personal, and is not easy reading. \\'e cannot 

 do more than indicate the author's point of view. 

 The first half of the book deals with stimulus, 

 psyche and consciousness, subject and individuation, 

 sensation and heredity, need and purpose, and Dar- 

 winism. The second half deals with mutation, 

 potency, and structure ; orthogenesis and extinction ; 

 trophic stimulus; vitality; cntclechy and heritabilitv ; 

 phylogeny, and the becoming of man. 



The author's general position is closely akin to 

 the positivism of Mach and Avenarius, which is, he 

 thinks, the stable foundation for that part of the 

 biological edifice that now requires building. Bio- 

 logically he is perhaps nearest Weismann, but he be- 

 lieves that the psychical is the most important 

 biological factor ; he will not hear of the transmission 

 of somatic modifications, but he believes that the 

 transmigration of souls is almost self-evident. In dis- 

 cussing Lamarckism he points out that it has two 

 sides; on the one hand, it is an erroneous thcorv 

 of passive transformation conditioned by external 

 stimulus; on the other hand, it is a true theory of 

 the subjective response of a creative agent. He 

 develops this second idea — which he calls by the 

 extraordinary name of " Eulamarckism." 



Prof. Schneider is a neo-vitalist who has the 

 courage to say out and out that he believes in a 

 specific vital energy, in a living substance. There 

 NO. 20^7, VOL. TqI 



are some who deny this, and maintain that life may 

 be described as a succession of fermentations and the 

 like, but this view ignores the phenomena of regu- 

 lation and correlation, not to speak of memory and 

 the power of profiting by experience. There are 

 others who deny a living substance, and refer regu- 

 lation and mental processes to an immaterial prin- 

 ciple or agent, which deals directively with meta- 

 bolism, though it is not of it. Schneider does not 

 sympathise with either of these positions ; he supposes 

 a special vital substance, the vehicle of the specific 

 vital energy, just as the ether is the medium for 

 radiant energy. But this vital substance is not a 

 particular kind of matter; it consists of psychical 

 substances residing in the structural units of the 

 organism. The relation between Psyche and Physis 

 is illustrated by the mutual relations in thermo- 

 chemical processes. The physical processes in the 

 plasma, which are set going by stimuli, correspond 

 to the chemical processes ; the associated ps3xhical 

 energy corresponds to heat. On the one hand there 

 is molecular movement, on the other there is 

 cell-sensation. Life depends on the sensations of 

 cells, as heat on the movements of molecules. As 

 temperature is the intensity-factor of heat, structure 

 is the intensity-factor of vitality, the measure of vital 

 potency. 



In a short notice it would not be for edification to 

 try to expound the author's views on the four- 

 dimensional character of consciousness or the law of 

 the conservation of the psyche, or his theory that 

 the mysterious process of assimilation represents a 

 particular kind of gravitation, and that the psychical 

 analogue of the force of cohesion is the entelechy or 

 soul — the formative principle of the organism. 



Prof. Schneider believes strongly in mutation, but 

 the essential factor in species-formation is " Descen- 

 sion " — which means a thorough-going change in 

 organisation, such as getting a notochord or gill- 

 clefts. To study descensions is at present the most 

 urgent task of setiologists. What brings about a 

 " Descension " ? It is a step in the " entelechialen 

 (svnthetischen) Umpragung " which seems lo be the 

 most characteristic secret of the organism. 



J. A. T. 



OUR BOOK SHELF. 



.■Iritliineliqiic graphiqiw. Lcs Espacc.', luilliincliiiiics ; 



Icitrs 1 raiisformatioiis. By Gabriel .\rnoux. Pp. 



xii-l-84. (Paris: Gauthier-Villars, lyoS.) Price 



3 francs. 

 Till-: title of this little work does not indicate, as the 

 English reader might expect, another addition to 

 the ever-growing list of treatises upon geometrical 

 methods of calculation or the graphical solution of 

 ordinary problems. It might rather be described as 

 an essay upon the geometrical interpretation of the 

 theory of numbers. 



The author has attempted a systematic exposition 

 of what may be called the geometry of abacs and 

 magic squai-es. By an arithmetical space he under- 

 stands the set of all points (in a geometrical space 

 of any number of dimensions) the coordinates of which 

 are integral, and he has worked out the properties 

 of such point-systems. Many theorems true for con- 



