Emotions and Bodily Changes

It is interesting that the last decade has seen a revival of interest in the most fundamental of all biological problems, that of organization. This book is a new attempt to solve this problem. Beginning with a critique of the difficulties inherent in the experimental approach to living beings and the statement of a conviction that the answer to organization is to be found only at the biological level and not at the level of theoretical physics, an imposing array of facts is summarized in quite adequate fashion. After discussing the protoplasmic system as a whole, the author presents a detailed discussion of the surface membrane of a living organism; this is somewhat unfortunately called ectoplasm. This semi-permeable membrane which separates protoplasm from the external environment is the all-important structure which determines what shall enter and leave the cell, plays a dominant role in fertilization and in cell division, and contributes largely to the process of differentiation. Just departs somewhat from the gene theory as the controlling agent in differentiation and substitutes an ingenious analysis of his own. After calling attention to the factorial difficulties in the rigidly formulated chromosome theory, he proposes that the protoplasm of the cell is totipotent and that the chromosomes extract from the protoplasm, at any given time, all those potencies which are not necessary for the differentiation of a specific cell at a specific time. He suggests that as growth and differentiation proceed, fewer and fewer potencies remain in the protoplasm and more and more are concentrated in the chromosome. While this reduces somewhat the difficulty of conceiving the chromosome as the reservoir from which all physical characteristics must come, enlarging the limits of the reservoir to include the protoplasm is an argument of the same kind and is faced by the same limitations as the modern genetic theory. In any event, the whole process is controlled and determined by the ectoplasm which, therefore , becomes the key to all biological problems. It is unfortunate that the author has not consulted more of the recent and careful studies of the physical properties of living membranes, for these would have documented his theory very effectively. At the same time, such consideration would have shown that membrane phenomena can be explained most adequately in terms of theoretical physics and chemistry. Since this would be a denial of his original thesis, it may explain the omission. Although …