Miscellaneous Scientific Intelligence. 59 



Australia. The book closes with brief chapters on the ''Indus- 

 trial Applications of Tin" and the ''Prices, Sale of Tin, and 

 World's Output." An exhaustive bibliography is added. 



w. E. F. 



III. Miscellaneous Scientific Intelligence 



1. Symbiosis: A Socio-Physiological Study of Evolution; 

 by H. Reinheimer. Pp. xii, 295. London, 1920 (Headley 

 Brothers). — The author's thesis is that biological cooperation, 

 rather than a struggle for existence, is the key to the true explana- 

 tion of the phenomena concerned in progressive organic evolu- 

 tion. He shows that the more advanced types of plants and 

 animals exhibit a harmonious reciprocity, or "organic civiliza- 

 tion," comparable to the social organization of mankind. The 

 law of "Concord in Nature" leads to progress, while competition 

 t^nds to parasitism which is the forerunner of degeneration, 

 disease, and death. 



The book consists of an assemblage of essays on various topics 

 more or less relevant to the subject, leading from a discussion of 

 the origin of morality, evolutional psychology, the valu^e of 

 abstemiousness, the bio-economics of the internal secretions and 

 "pathologia physiologiam illustrat" to "maladie et symbiose." 

 In regard to the biologist's interpretation of the phenomena of 

 nature the author concludes that as concerns the distinctions 

 between parasitism and symbiosis "Science has as yet attained 

 no clarity of thought. " v^. r. c. 



2. Die Mneme als erhaltendes Prinzip im Wechsel des organ- 

 ischen Geschehens; von Richard Semon. Pp. xviii, 420. Leip- 

 zig, 1920 (Wilhelm Engelmann). — This is the fourth and fifth 

 unchanged printing of the third (1911) edition of this book, 

 which contains a full exposition of the author's theory that 

 organic memory is the maintaining principle in evolution. By 

 this theory the effects of external stimuli on the organism result 

 in a permanently altered protoplasmic constitution, thereby modi- 

 fying to some extent the future responses ' of the organism. 

 Such organic memory is conceived as underlying and directing 

 the course of- regeneration, of regulation, of the successively fol- 

 lowing morphological and physiological changes in the devel- 

 oping embryo, and in the later life of the organism as well as 

 ultimately affecting the germ cells in such a way as to modify 

 the hereditary phenomena and thus lead to the evolution of 

 species. v^. r. c. 



3. BiMiotheca Chemica-Mathematica. Catalogue of works in 

 many tongues, on exact and applied science, with a subject index; 

 by H. Z. and H. C. S. In two volumes. Pp. 964, with 127 



