CHAPTER XIX 
A NEW COMPOSITE CAUSO-MECHANICAL THEORY OF 
EVOLUTION (THE TETRAKINETIC THEORY): 
HENRY FAIRFIELD OSBORN 
THE ENERGY CONCEPT OF LIFE 
While we owe to matter and form the revelation of the existence 
of the great Jaw of evolution, we must reverse our thought in search 
for causes and take steps toward an energy conception of the origin 
of life and an energy conception of the nature of heredity. 
So far as the creative power of energy is concerned, we are on sure 
ground: in physics energy controls matter and form; in physiology 
function controls the organ; in animal mechanics motion controls 
and, in a sense, creates the form of muscles and bones. In every 
instance some kind of energy or work precedes some kind of form, 
rendering it probable that energy also precedes and controls the 
evolution of life. 
The total disparity between invisible energy and visible form is 
the second point which strikes us as in favor of such a conception, 
because the most phenomenal thing about the heredity-germ is its 
microscopic size as contrasted with the titanic beings which may rise 
out of it. The electric energy transmitted through a small copper 
wire is yet capable of moving a long and heavy train of cars. The 
discovery by Becquerel and Curie of radiant energy and of the proper- 
ties of radium the energy per unit of mass is enormously greater than 
the energy quanta which we were accustomed to associate with units 
of mass; whereas, in most man-made machines with metallic wheels 
and levers, and in certain parts of the animal machine constructed of 
muscle and bone, the work done is proportionate to the size and form. 
The slow dissipation or degradation of energy in radium has been 
shown by Curie to be concomitant with the giving off of an enormous 
amount of heat, while Rutherford and Strutt declare that in a very 
minute amount of active radium the energy of degradation would 
entirely dominate and mask all other cosmic modes of transformation 
1 From H. F. Osborn, The Origin and Evolution of Life (copyright 1916). Used 
by special permission of the publishers, Charles Scribner’s Sons. 
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