Evolution by atrophy in biology and sociology / by Jean Demoor, Jean Massart, Émile Vandervelde ; translated by Mrs. Chalmers Mitchell.

  • Demoor, J. (Jean), 1867-1941.
Date:
1899
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Evolution by atrophy in biology and sociology / by Jean Demoor, Jean Massart, Émile Vandervelde ; translated by Mrs. Chalmers Mitchell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    26/342 (page 10)
    We shall justify the distinction we make by showing that colonies are entirely distinct from societies. The two are divergent branches which spring from the same source, a solitary indi- vidual. These divergent branches of organic life may be distinguished in the following manner: An individual may be either unicellular or mul- ticellular. Every cell capable of sustaining life and reproducing its own kind is an individual.1 In the case of multicellular individuals there is an unbroken physiological continuity, while life lasts, between the cells of which they are com- posed. All these units spring from one primary cell (i.e. a fertilized egg) which sprang itself from two cells (male and female), proceeding usually from two separate individuals. From the moment that this union is effected, the continuity remains unbroken.2 When such an individual reproduces 1 We regard the cell as the unit of life, although, according to Altmann, the unit of life is a still simpler structure—the bioblast. He maintains that the bioblast, or living granule, is the ultimate element of the cell; it is born from a pre-existing granule ; it lives, feeds, reproduces, and is, in fact, an organism (see Die Elcmcntarorganismen und ihre Beziehungen zu den Zellen; Leipzig, 1890.—Studien ilber die Zellen; Leipzig, 1886.—Zur Geschichte der Zelltheorien; Leipzig, 1889 (Altmann). The existence, however, of the bioblast is a pure hypothesis, no definite proof having been established of its existence ; and to assume that it is the simplest unit of life is to abandon oneself to pure imagination. 2 Although this theory is in agreement with the observed facts of biology, it is necessary to point out the complexity of the ideas of individual and organism. Boveri (Uber die Befruchtvngs