Oct. 3, 1872J 



NATURE 



467 



species of the order known from all parts of the world, by 

 which it appeared that America was its home, only four species 

 having been described from Europe. lie said that the Dnimb-ni- 

 saiinis of Bunzel had no relationship to the group. The Ame- 

 rican species were forty-two, distributed as follows: viz.. New 

 Jersey Greensand, 15 : Rotten Limestone of Alabama, 7; Chalk 

 of Kansas, 17; other localities, 3» The Kansas species were 

 referred to Clidiislcs 3 sp., Eiicstosaiints 4 sp., Hokodiis ^s,^., 

 Liodon 6 sp. Of these Edcstosmtrus tor/or and E. stenops ; 

 Ilohodus coryphaeus and //. tectidus ; and Liodon curtiroslris, L. 

 Iclispinus, L. glamifcrus, and L. crassartiis were described as 

 new. 



January 5. — Hon. Eli K. Price read a paper " On some 

 Phases of Modern Philosophy," in which he combated the views 

 of the heterogenists and of the evolutionists. In the latter part 

 of the subject he opposed the views of Darwin, asserting that 

 the variations seen among domesticated animals had no paral- 

 lel among those in a state of nature, and tlie fact of their ready 

 hybridisation is an indication of their specific unity. He quoted 

 Prof. Wyville Thomson to the effect that no transition from 

 species to species had ever Ijeen observed in palseontological his- 

 tory ; and asserted that the variations observed among animals 

 on which the developmentalists relied in evidence of their theory 

 were few and abnormal, and utterly insufficient for the use made 

 of them ; that the origin of man from apes was not supported 

 by evidence ; lastly, that the theories of evolution are highly 

 injurious to faith and morals, and thus to Christian civilisation. 



Janaury 19. — Mr. Benj. Smith Lyman read a paper on "The 

 Oil-bearing Region of the Punjaub," accompanied by a topo- 

 graphical map. He pointed out the tertiary age of the oil-bearing 

 strata. — Prof Cope read a paper on a new Dmosaurian from the 

 cretaceous strata of Kansas, which was named Cynoccrcus iiicisus. 

 The vertebral articular faces were deeply excavated above and 

 below, so as to give them a transverse character. — Prof H. 

 liarlshome read a paper on " Organic Physics." It explained 

 that the expression "organic physics" is as well justified as 

 "organic chemistry " and " animal mechanics," for vital force 

 is clearly correlated with other physical forces, as heat, light, 

 &c., but the correlation is not identity. Advocates of the con- 

 tinuity theory have endeavoured to make it appear to be identity, 

 but they will not succeed ; because the effects of heat, light, 

 electricity, magnetism, and gravitation are known, and they 

 always tend (in the absence of life) to an opi)Osile kind of change 

 to that which occurs under life force ; namely, they form of C, 

 H, N, S, P, &c., compounds of few equivalents and stable equi- 

 librium ; while imder life force the same elements are made to 

 produce compounds of many atoms or equivalents, and of un- 

 stable equilibrium. The first are mainly crystalloids, the second 

 always colloids. The directness of this opposition is especially 

 demonstrated by the result of death (arrest of life force), which 

 is attended by the resolution of the complex, unstable, colloidal, 

 organic substances into more simple, stable crystalloids and 

 gases. Eliminating all the functions of living beings otherwise 

 explicable, we must restrict the term " vital action," or "action 

 of life force " to the conversion of inorganic uito organic material, 

 with type-formation or organic construction as its result. It is 

 supposable, at least, though not proven, that the assumption of 

 particular forms under given circumstances is (analogous to crys- 

 taUisalioii) the property of the bioplasm ; i.e., given the matter, 

 the form results as its property or attribute, but chemists have 

 never succeeded in making organisable matter by synthesis ; nor 

 is it likely that they ever will. All complex organic substances 

 made in the laboratory (as urea, by Wohler ; fatty acids, &c., by 

 Berthelot ; and even, if made, crystallisable neurin) are post- 

 organic (a term first used by the aulli / , ^.tlts of the 

 do»vuward or retrograde metamorphosis ; produced, not by life 

 force, as such, but by the composition or balance between life 

 force and the other forces. They are not germinal or formative, 

 but formed and effete materials (Beale's terms). The question 

 of the possibility of abiogenesis is not yet finally decided. Crosse 

 gave it momentum with his galvanised acarus ; Pouchet and Pas- 

 teur have long debated it ; Owen, Bennett, Clark, and a few 

 others have of late years reasserted it ; Bastian (Nature 1S70) 

 makes an elaborate experimental defence of it. We note con- 

 cerning it as follows : — (a) The manipulation (to avoid introducing 

 minute visible forms) requires an almost or quite impracticable 

 delicacy throughout, (b) When heat is used, we have always 

 the alternative, to conclude that certain minute organisms, 

 germs or spores, can resist a higher temperature than was 

 supposed, or to conclude that, taking for granted that the 



heat employed must have killed all germs, new life after- 

 wards sprang up, without parentage. All experience makes 

 the former much more probable. George Pouchet's experiments 

 with rotifers tend this way. Jeffries Wyman found that, although 

 four hours' boiling would not, five hours would put an end to all 

 manifestations of life. Franklin's experiments (and Calvert's) 

 gave similar results against abiogenesis. Supposing (although 

 Huxley does not) that Bastian could^not have mistaken " Brown- 

 ian " molecular movements for evidence of life, we yet observe 

 that if life sprang up in Bastian's apparatus, it was such life as 

 can exist without air or oxygen ; altogether unlike, therefore, 

 ordinary world-life. The assertion of Pasteur is justified, that 

 the onus probaiidi lies with abiogenesists, since there is no expe- 

 rience of any living form more than nrW of a-" inch in diameter 

 springing into life out of inorganic matter ; it is therefore vastly 

 improbable (needing most cogent evidence to prove), that any 

 form less than itjVs of ^" \\\c\\ in size can be made to spring 

 into life from inorganic matter. While abiogenesis is unproved, 

 we hold to the conclusion that vital force is not the mere out- 

 come or resultant of any or all of the other cosmic forces. How 

 does It differ? Of the organic cell, or "physiological unit," the 

 most constant determinaole acts or changes are incretion and 

 excretion ; atomic or molecular motion, definite in results, is an 

 essential of life. Must not the motion itself be peculiar ? 

 More definitely, we find that while in the condensation of matter 

 in the (nebular theoretical) formation of the sun and planets 

 there was integration of matter with dissipation of force, such as 

 heat (H. Spencer), life action involves integration of matter 

 with accumulation of force (stored up physical force in the plant, 

 of Barker; "bottled sunshine," of some one else). This is a 

 striking contrast. Sexual union is closely analogous to chemical 

 union ; instead of combustion, it makes construction by de- 

 taining products. Again, we notice the analogy between the 

 spiral phyllotaxis of plants (opposite leaves a double spiral), 

 (whorls two or more, and bilateral symmetry of vertebrates and 

 articulates'Jand some molluscs, and radial symmetry of radiates 

 and ccelenterates corresponding) and the spiral helix of the electro- 

 magnet. As the opposite chemical and polar elements of the 

 battery are to the current of the helix, so (may be) the polarities 

 of the sperm cell and germ cell to the spiral phyllotaxis of plants 

 and symmetrical (usually double) organotaxis (a new term) of 

 animals. A close (but reversed) analogy exists between heat 

 force and vital force. A spark of fire may " light," and so burn 

 successively, an indefinite amount of combustible matter. A 

 spark of life may animate an indefinite amount, successively, of 

 organisable matter. The former, combustion, reduces complex 

 substances which are unstable to more stable compounds. The 

 latter, life, elevates simple substances to more complex states, 

 but with constant transmutation of their forms. Such analogies 

 are as yet crude, and do not solve the mystery of life. But the 

 facts on which they rest justify and encourage the physical inves- 

 tigation of vital actions, including their study under physics — 

 organic physics. Such a view of life is in no manner antago- 

 nistic to theism or^to "teleology," anymore than is the now 

 familiar reduction of digestion, circulation, absorption, &c., to 

 the category of chemical or physical phenomena. All such 

 analytical inquiries are moreover, legitimate so long as they are 

 accurate, whether they point to biogenesis or abiogenesis, to the 

 origin of types by interrupted appearances or by evolution. — 

 A discussion on E. K. Price's paper,) read January 5th, took 

 place, in which Prof. Hartshorne, Prof. Lesley, Mr. Price, and 

 Prof Cope took part. Prof. Hartshorne supported the oppo- 

 sition to abiogenesis expressed in the paper, on the ground of 

 insufficiency of evidence in its favour, but believed in the evolu- 

 tion of species. Prof Lesley olijected to the insufficiency of Mr. 

 Price's reasoning against the labours of experts in biological 

 science ; and stated that the more attention he paid to the sub- 

 ject the better satisfied he became that man was descended from 

 apes. Prof Cope stated that Mr. Price's paper was in error as 

 to the facts. That (i) variability of specific type was even more 

 common in nature than under domestication, examples from 

 many so-called " protean " genera being cited. (2) That some 

 wild species did produce fertile hybrids. (3) Tliat transitions 

 between species, both at the present time and in past geological 

 periods, were common, but were concealed by a universal pdilio 

 principii involved in the practice of naturalists. This consisted 

 in uniting distinct forms or species under the head of one species 

 as soon as the intervening connections were formed. (4) That 

 the known cases of transition were numerous, not few ; and that 

 common induction required that we should believe of the un- 



