Part 5 (1/2)

Of these the cell substance appears to be handed down from the mother; the centrosome comes, at least in some cases, from the father, and the chromosomes from both parents. It is not yet certain, however, whether the centrosome is a constant part of the cell. In some cells it cannot yet be found, and there are some reasons for believing that it may be formed out of other parts of the cell. The nucleus is always a direct descendant from the nucleus of pre-existing cells, so that there is an absolute continuity of descent between the nucleii of the cells of an individual and those of its antecedents back for numberless generations.

It is not certain that there is any such continuity of descent in the case of the centrosomes; for, while in the process of fertilization the centrosome is handed down from parent to child, there are some reasons for believing that it may disappear in subsequent cells, and later be redeveloped out of other parts. The only part of the cell in which complete continuity from parent to child is demonstrated, is the nucleus and particularly the chromosomes. All of these facts simply emphasize the importance of the chromosomes, and tell us that these bodies must be regarded as containing the most important features of the cell which const.i.tute its individuality.

==What is Protoplasm?==--Enough has now been given of disclosures of the modern microscope to show that our old friend Protoplasm has a.s.sumed an entirely new guise, if indeed it has not disappeared altogether. These simplest life processes are so marvelous and involve the action of such an intricate ma.s.s of machinery that we can no longer retain our earlier notion of protoplasm as the physical basis of life. There can be no life without the properties of a.s.similation, growth, and reproduction; and, so far as we know, these properties are found only in that combination of bodies which we call the cell, with its mixture of harmoniously acting parts. _Life, at least the life of a cell, is then not the property of a chemical compound protoplasm, but is the result of the activities of a machine._ Indeed, we are now at a loss to know how we can retain the term protoplasm. As originally used it meant the contents of the cell, and the significance in the term was in the conception of protoplasm as a somewhat h.o.m.ogeneous chemical compound uniform in all types of life. But we now see that this cell contains not a single substance, but a large number, including solids, jelly ma.s.ses, and liquids, each of which has its own chemical composition. The number of chemical compounds existing in the material formerly called protoplasm no one knows, but we do know that they are many, and that the different substances are combined to form a physical structure. Which of these various bodies shall we continue to call protoplasm? Shall it be the linin, or the liquids, or the microsomes, or the chromatin threads, or the centrosomes? Which of these is the actual physical basis of life?

From the description of cell life which we have given, it will be evident that no one of them is a material upon which our chemical biologists can longer found a chemical theory of life. That chemical theory of life, as we have seen, was founded upon the conception that the primitive life substance is a definite chemical compound. No such compound has been discovered, and these disclosures of the microscope of the last few years have been such as to lead us to abandon hope of ever discovering such a compound. It is apparently impossible to reduce life to any simpler basis than this combination of bodies which make up what was formerly called protoplasm. The term protoplasm is still in use with different meanings as used by different writers. Sometimes it is used to refer to the entire contents of the cell; sometimes to the cell substance only outside the nucleus. Plainly, it is not the protoplasm of earlier years.

With this conclusion one of our fundamental questions has been answered.

We found in our first chapter that the general activities of animals and plants are easily reduced to the action of a machine, provided we had the fundamental vital powers residing in the parts of that machine. We then asked whether these fundamental properties were themselves those of a chemical compound or whether they were to be reduced to the action of still smaller machines. The first answer which biologists gave to this question was that a.s.similation, growth, and reproduction were the simple properties of a complex chemical compound. This answer was certainly incorrect. Life activities are exhibited by no chemical compound, but, so far as we know, only by the machine called the cell.

Thus it is that we are again reduced to the problem of understanding the action of a machine. It may be well to pause here a moment to notice that this position very greatly increases the difficulties in the way of a solution of the life problem. If the physical basis of life had proved to be a chemical compound, the problem of its origin would have been a chemical one. Chemical forces exist in nature, and these forces are sufficient to explain the formation of any kind of chemical compound.

The problem of the origin of the life substance would then have been simply to account for certain conditions which resulted in such chemical combination as would give rise to this physical basis of life. But now that the simplest substance manifesting the phenomena of life is found to be a machine, we can no longer find in chemical forces efficient causes for its formation. Chemical forces and chemical affinity can explain chemical compounds of any degree of complexity, but they cannot explain the formation of machines. Machines are the result of forces of an entirely different nature. Man can manufacture machines by taking chemical compounds and putting them together into such relations that their interaction will give certain results. Bits of iron and steel, for instance, are put together to form a locomotive, but the action of the locomotive depends, not upon the chemical forces which made the steel, but upon the relation of the bits of steel to each other in the machine. So far as we have had any experience, machines have been built under the guidance of intelligence which adapts the parts to each other.

When therefore we find that the simplest life substance is a machine, we are forced to ask what forces exist in nature which can in a similar way build machines by the adjustment of parts to each other. But this topic belongs to the second part of our subject, and must be for the present postponed.

==Reaction against the Cell Doctrine.==--As the knowledge of cells which we have outlined was slowly acquired, the conception of the cell pa.s.sed through various modifications. At first the cell wall was looked upon as the fundamental part, but this idea soon gave place to the belief that it was the protoplasm that was alive. Under the influence of this thought the cell doctrine developed into something like the following: The cell is simply a bit of protoplasm and is the unit of living matter.

The bodies of all larger animals and plants are made up of great numbers of these units acting together, and the activities of the entire organism are simply the sum of the activities of its cells. The organism is thus simply the sum of the cells which compose it, and its activities the sum of the activities of the individual cells. As more facts were disclosed the idea changed slightly. The importance of the nucleus became more and more forcibly impressed upon microscopists, and this body came after a little into such prominence as to hide from view the more familiar protoplasm. The marvellous activities of the nucleus soon caused it to be regarded as the important part of the cell, while all the rest was secondary. The cell was now thought of as a bit of nuclear matter surrounded by secondary parts. The marvellous activities of the nucleus, and above all, the fact that the nucleus alone is handed down from one generation to the next in reproduction, all attested to its great importance and to the secondary importance of the rest of the cell.

This was the most extreme position of the cell doctrine. The cell was the unit of living action, and the higher animal or plant simply a colony of such units. An animal was simply an a.s.sociation together for mutual advantage of independent units, just as a city is an a.s.sociation of independent individuals. The organization of the animals was simply the result of the combination of many independent units. There was no activity of the organism as a whole, but only of its independent parts.

Cell life was superior to organized life. Just as, in a city, the city government is a name given to the combined action of the individuals, so are the actions of organisms simply the combined action of their individual cells.

Against such an extreme position there has been in recent years a decided reaction, and to-day it is becoming more and more evident that such a position cannot be maintained. In the first place, it is becoming evident that the cell substance is not to be entirely obliterated by the importance of the nucleus. That the nucleus is a most important vital centre is clear enough, but it is equally clear that nucleus and cell substance must be together to const.i.tute the life substance. The complicated structure of the cell substance, the decided activity shown by its fibres in the process of cell division, clearly enough indicate that it is a part of the cell which can not be neglected in the study of the life substance. Again the discovery of the centrosome as a distinct morphological element has still further added to the complexity of the life substance, and proved that neither nucleus nor cell substance can be regarded as the cell or as const.i.tuting life. It is true that we may not yet know the source of this centrosome. We do not know whether it is handed down from generation to generation like the nucleus, or whether it can be made anew out of the cell substance in the life of an ordinary cell. But this is not material to its recognition as an organ of importance in the cell activity. Thus the cell proves itself not to; be a bit of nuclear matter surrounded by secondary parts, but a community of several perhaps equally important interrelated members.

Another series of observations weakened the cell doctrine in an entirely different direction. It had been a.s.sumed that the body of the multicellular animal or plant was made of independent units.

Microscopists of a few years ago began to suggest that the cells are in reality not separated from each other, but are all connected by protoplasmic fibres. In quite a number of different kinds of tissue it has been determined that fine threads of protoplasmic material lead from one cell to another in such a way that the cells are in vital connection. The claim has been made that there is thus a protoplasmic connection between all the cells of the body of the animal, and that thus the animal or plant, instead of consisting of a large number of separate independent cells, consists of one great ma.s.s of living matter which is aggregated into little centres, each commonly holding a nucleus. Such a conclusion is not yet demonstrated, nor is its significance very clear should it prove to be a fact; but it is plain that such suggestions quite decidedly modify the conception of the body as a community of independent cells.

There is yet another line of thought which is weakening this early conception of the cell doctrine. There is a growing conviction that the view of the organism, simply as the sum of the activities of the individual cells, is not a correct understanding of it. According to this extreme position, a living thing can have no organization until it appears as the result of cell multiplication. To take a concrete case, the egg of a starfish can not possess any organization corresponding to the starfish. The egg is a single cell, and the starfish a community of cells. The egg can, therefore, no more contain the organization of a starfish than a hunter in the backwoods can contain within himself the organization of a great metropolis. The descendants of individuals like the hunter may unite to form a city, and the descendants of the egg cell may, by combining, give rise to the starfish. But neither can the man contain within himself the organization of the city, nor the egg that of the starfish. It is, perhaps, true that such an extreme position of the cell doctrine has not been held by any one, but thoughts very closely approximating to this view have been held by the leading advocates of the cell doctrine, and have beyond question been the inspiration of the development of that doctrine.

But certainly no such conception of the significance of cell structure would longer be held. In spite of the fact that the egg is a single cell, it is impossible to avoid the belief that in some way it contains the starfish. We need not, of course, think of it as containing the structure of a starfish, but we are forced to conclude that in some way its structure is such that it contains the starfish potentially. The relation of its parts and the forces therein are such that, when placed under proper conditions, it develops into a starfish. Another egg placed under identical conditions will develop into a sea urchin, and another into an oyster. If these three eggs have the power of developing into three different animals under identical conditions, it is evident that they must have corresponding differences in spite of the fact that each is a single cell. Each must in some way contain its corresponding adult.

In other words, the organization must be within the cells, and hence not simply produced by the a.s.sociations of cells.

Over this subject there has been a deal of puzzling and not a little experimentation. The presence of some sort of organization in the egg is clear--but what is meant by this statement is not quite so clear. Is this adult organization in the whole egg or only in its nucleus, and especially in the chromosomes which, as we have seen, contain the hereditary traits? When the egg begins to divide does each of the first two cells still contain potentially the organization of the whole adult, or only one half of it? Is the development of the egg simply the unfolding of some structure already present; or is the structure constantly developing into more and more complicated conditions owing to the bringing of its parts into new relations? To answer these questions experimenters have been engaged in dividing developing eggs into pieces to determine what powers are still possessed by the fragments. The results of such experiments are as yet rather conflicting, but it is evident enough from them that we can no longer look upon the egg cell as a simple undifferentiated cell. In some way it already contains the characters of the adult, and when we remember that the characters of the adult which are to be developed from the egg are already determined, even to many minute details--such, for instance, as the inheritance of a congenital mark--it becomes evident that the egg is a body of extraordinary complexity. And yet the egg is nothing more than a single cell agreeing with other cells in all its general characters.

It is clear, then, that we must look upon organization as something superior to cells and something existing within them, or at least within the egg cell, and controlling its development. We are forced to believe, further, that there may be as important differences between two cells as there are between two adult animals or plants. In some way there must be concealed within the two cells which const.i.tute the egg of the starfish and the man differences which correspond to the differences between the starfish and the man. Organization, in other words, is superior to cell structure, and the cell itself is an organization of smaller units.

As the result of these various considerations there has been, in recent years, something of a reaction against the cell doctrine as formerly held. While the study of cells is still regarded as the key to the interpretation of life phenomena, biologists are seeing more and more clearly that they must look deeper than simple cell structure for their explanation of the life processes. While the study of cells has thrown an immense amount of light upon life, we seem hardly nearer the centre of the problem than we were before the beginning of the series of discoveries inaugurated by the formulation of the doctrine of protoplasm.

==Fundamental Vital Activities as Located in Cells.==--We are now in position to ask whether our knowledge of cells has aided us in finding an explanation of the fundamental vital actions to which, as we have seen, life processes are to be reduced. The four properties of irritability, contractibility, a.s.similation, and reproduction, belong to these vital units--the cells, and it is these properties which we are trying to trace to their source as a foundation of vital activity.

We may first ask whether we have any facts which indicate that any special parts of the cell are a.s.sociated with any of these fundamental activities. The first fact that stands out clearly is that the nucleus is connected most intimately with the process of reproduction and especially with heredity. This has long been believed, but has now been clearly demonstrated by the experiments of cutting into fragments the cell bodies of unicellular animals. As already noticed, those pieces which possess a nucleus are able to continue their life and reproduce themselves, while those without a nucleus are incapable of reproduction.

With greater force still is the fact shown by the process of fertilization of the egg. The egg is very large and the male reproductive cell is very small, and the amount of material which the offspring derives from its mother is very great compared with that which it derives from its father. But the child inherits equally from father and mother, and hence we must find the hereditary traits handed down in some element which the offspring obtains equally from father and mother.

As we have seen (Figs. 34-44), the only element which answers this demand is the nucleus, and more particularly the chromosomes of the nucleus.

Clearly enough, then, we must look upon the nucleus as the special agent in reproduction of cells.

Again, we have apparently conclusive evidence that the _nucleus_ controls that part of the a.s.similative process which we have spoken of as the constructive processes. The metabolic processes of life are both constructive and destructive. By the former, the material taken into the cell in the form of food is built up into cell tissue, such as linin, microsomes, etc., and, by the latter, these products are to a greater or less extent broken to pieces again to liberate their energy, and thus give rise to the activities of the cell. If the destructive processes were to go on alone the organism might continue to manifest its life activities for a time until it had exhausted the products stored up in its body for such purposes, but it would die from the lack of more material for destruction. Life is not complete without both processes.

Now, in the life of the cell we may apparently attribute the destructive processes to the cell substance and the constructive processes to the nucleus. In a cell which has been cut into fragments those pieces without a nucleus continue to show the ordinary activities of life for a time, but they do not live very long (Fig. 25). The fragment is unable to a.s.similate its food sufficiently to build up more material. So long as it still retains within itself a sufficiency of already formed tissue for its destructive metabolism, it can continue to move around actively and behave like a complete cell, but eventually it dies from starvation.