Carl Nägeli

“ As a result of the increasing complexity of structure in the idioplasm the entire organism, which in each generation rearises therefrom, becomes, from generation to generation, more and more complex with greater and greater differentiation of function. Thus the progression of the idioplasm controls the phylogeny of the race. It marks out the course of evolution. ”

“ If heredity and variation are defined according to the true nature of organisms, they are only apparent opposites. Since idioplasm alone is transmitted from one ontogeny to the next following, the phylogenetic development consists solely in the continual progress of the idioplasm and the whole genealogical tree from the primordial drop of plasma up to the organism of the present day (plant or animal) is, strictly speaking, nothing else than an individual consisting of idioplasm, which at each ontogeny forms a new individual body, corresponding to its advance. ”

“ Nowadays all intelligent men and women agree that all knowledge must be subjected to criticism, and the best men and women act on these beliefs. The books and magazines published by the Open Court Company are intended to help these men and women.
We will dwell a little longer on the subject of religion, because it is in religion that the majority of us have the one region of ideals above our bodily needs. It is rare, though of course not unknown, that Science or Philosophy satisfies the spiritual needs—the purest of human cravings. ”

“ The species arises neither from the nutrition variety nor from the race; it is always a more advanced variety, and hence species formation is identical with variety formation. Cause for variation and consequently for variety formation is always shown, either when, environment remaining the same, the automatic variation of the idioplasm has advanced so far that the ontogeny is raised to a higher grade of organization and division of labor, or when external stimuli act for a sufficiently long time in a manner not in harmony with the previous adaptation. ”

“ All races disappear through crossing, likewise many races that have arisen from pathological variations disappear even in sexual reproduction (in self-fecundation) . Races belong exclusively to cultivation, where they can develop and exist protected from free intercrossing.
While varieties and races arise by progressional or stationary variation of the idioplasm, modifications are produced by such influences of nutrition and climate as act only on the soma-plasm and the [ 33 ] non-plasmic substances, and hence do not give rise to inheritable characters in the organism. ”

“ The determinants have arisen one after another during the whole period of evolution from the primordial cell. The configuration of the idioplasm is a character of phylogeny and the determinants in it have by nature the tendency to develop in the order in which they were formed. Further, since the ontogeny begins as a unicellular organism with the formation of a germ cell, that determinant of the idioplasm comes first to development, which has developed in the unicellular ancestor. ”

“ In the lowest forms of cell differentiation the cells of successive generations are all independent; the ontogenetic period consists of a cycle of generations of unicellular plants. Later the cell generations of an ontogeny are united by parts into plant individuals; the ontogenetic period consists of a cycle of multicellular and unicellular, or only of multicellular plant generations. If all the cell generations of an ontogenetic period have been united into a single individual, the successive plant generations are alike and alternation of generations has ceased. ”

“ If we have in mind the inner nature of the organism, there is, properly speaking, no such specific phenomenon as heredity, since the phylogenetic line is a continuous idioplasmic individual. In this sense heredity is nothing more than the persistence of organized substance in a movement in which variations are automatically induced, or the necessary transition of one idioplasmic configuration into the next following. ”

“ The phylogenetic significance of the alternation of generations consists in its representing a transition stage from the unicellular to the simpler multicellular and from the latter to the more complex multicellular plants. The plant generations of any phylogenetic stage increase by ampliation, become unlike by differentiation in time (alternation of generations) , and unite in a plant individual, whose unlike ontogenetic stages correspond to the unlike plant generations of the earlier ancestral series. ”

“ Thus the organism must contain at least as many determinants in its idioplasm as there are different phenomena in its inheritable ontogeny; and if new phenomena appear in it, new clusters of micellæ must previously have been introduced into the idioplasm, or the orientation and arrangement of clusters already present must have been changed. The formation of such a determinant, whether it concerns the perfecting of the organism or its adaptation to environment, always proceeds very slowly, and as a rule has no effect before its completion. ”

“ Each ontogeny (individual) begins in a minute germ cell, in which a small quantity of idioplasm is contained. In the cell divisions, by which the organism grows, the idioplasm divides into as many parts as there are single cells, while it continually increases in quantity in a corresponding degree. The ontogenetic increase of the idioplasm takes place by length growth of the strands—that is, by intercalation of micellæ in each row of cells of the strands, which thereby grow in length without changing the configuration of the cross section. ”

“ The idioplasm continually alters its configuration with its growth in successive ontogenies, but comparatively very slowly, so that it makes a minute advance from the germ of one generation to the germ of the next. The summation of these increments of advance through a whole line of evolution represents the race history of an organism, since the latter is connected only by its idioplasm in unbroken continuity with the micellar beginning of its race. ”

“ But the determinant of an absolutely new form of adaptation, which does not take the place of a preceding one, must develop enough before it can become outwardly manifest, for it to be possessed of a sufficient amount of molecular energy to render its activity possible. For this reason the characteristics of the developed organism change abruptly, notwithstanding the fact that the transformation of the idioplasm has proceeded very gradually. ”

“ In sexual (digenic) reproduction the formation of the germ cell is brought about by the union in equal parts of both parental idioplasms. The offspring is the organism resulting from the union of the force and matter of the parents, and represents in its nature the united continuation of their ontogenies. The characteristics of development of the child depend however on the viability of the determinants of the mingled idioplasms in which a new equilibrium has been formed. ”

“ He aptly says, that natural selection prunes the phylogenetic tree, but does not cause new branches to grow. He allows that the principle of selection is well suited to explain the adaptation of organisms to their environment and the suitableness and physiological peculiarities of their structure, but he asserts that in the definiteness of variation of plants and in their progressive differentiation there is evidence of a higher and controlling perfecting principle.—Trans. ”

“ Error is simply a psychological condition [ 57 ] of blindness to the truth; and the discovery of errors committed by other people or ourselves is not—as many superficial people like to say—the pulling down of a structure already raised, unless an error can be called a structure which is built out of the fictions of our imagination which have no objective existence. Criticism often enables us to discover more of the Truth, and nobody can do more than discover Truth: nobody creates Truth, any more than Columbus created America. ”

“ Thus alternation of generations in cells exists, because the successive generations become more and more complicated at each succeeding period. Among these periods the ontogenetic period or ontogeny embraces all generations from one cell to the return of the exactly similar kind of cell. ”

“ Hence if the child bears more resemblance to the father or to the mother, it follows that some of the inherited determinants develop while the others remain latent. If the child has certain visible characteristics more marked than either parent, it becomes possible only by the development of determinants which had previously been latent. The fact that the mother furnishes the germ cell with nutritive plasm and that she nourishes it for a considerable time does not increase the number of maternal determinants nor their capability of development. ”

“ A plasmic substance causes definite chemical and physical changes only when it is present in a certain condition of motion. The peculiar agency which the idioplasm has in each ontogenetic stage of development and in each part of the organism depends on the activity of a definite group of micellæ in the cross section of the strand or of a complex of such groups, while this local stimulus controls the chemical and physical processes by dynamic influence and by transmission of a specific mode of motion, even to a microscopically small distance. ”

“ In his philosophy, form plays the most important part. Form is the significant feature of both objective existence and subjective thought. Matter and energy only denote reality, but form characterizes quality. Science traces form, and the nature of all things, the human character included, is constituted by form. ”

“ Accordingly, each strand of idioplasm contains all the determinants that the particular individual has inherited in the germ cell, and each cell of the organism is idioplasmatically qualified to become the germ cell of a new individual. Whether this qualification may be realized depends upon the nature of the soma-plasm. In the lower plants this power belongs to each individual cell; in the higher plants many cells have lost it; in the animal kingdom it is possessed in general only by cells normally set apart as asexual or sexual reproductive cells. ”

“ A man may rightly conclude that he stands little chance of finding out very much of the Truth, and so he may voluntarily limit his view to a certain roughly defined domain of facts and thoughts, and become, for example, what is called a "biologist," a "physicist," a "higher critic," or, if he thinks that he may discover rather more of the Truth, a "philosopher." ”

“ External stimuli impign upon the organism usually at a definite point, but they not only effect a local transformation of the idioplasm but also reproduce themselves in a dynamic manner in the entire idioplasm, which is in unbroken connection throughout the whole individual. The idioplasm is thus changed everywhere in the same manner, so that the germ cells that are given off at any point feel and inherit the effects of those local stimuli. ”

“ It is our duty, as rational beings, to be non-sectarian. It is not a merit to allow ignorance to blind us to the glimpses of Truth that we sometimes get from prophets, poets, and priests of other religions and other philosophies than our own. ”

“ At the same time the other adaptation determinants remain either undisturbed, or the new determinant is formed at the expense of related determinants which are already present and which may at last entirely vanish. Hence along with growing and complete determinants the idioplasm always contains likewise weakened and vanishing determinants. From the fact that a phylogenetic race is thrown repeatedly among different external conditions, it may at last unite in its idioplasm a large number of developing, mature, and vanishing adaptation determinants. ”

“ If we think that there is more truth or sacredness in our own, let us use every means to make this sacredness or this truth appear evident to others. But, in justice, let us also fearlessly discuss other religions and philosophies, and discover their greater merits, if any, as compared with our own. ”

“ The same transformation of the reproductive cells into non-separable tissue cells is repeated several times in multicellular plants and serves to enlarge the individual. There is manifested in this phylogenetic process the tendency of the plant to combine in the higher stages into one complex whole those parts which in the lower stages tend to be independent. A similar unifying tendency is revealed also in those plant members which have arisen by differentiation and represent a system only by their being connected at certain points. ”

“ Varieties belong to feral nature rather than to culture; they can assume all possible modifications without injury to their specific characteristics, but can show no distinctions of races, for all beginnings of race formation are destroyed by free intercrossing. They differ from species only in that they are to be designated as more closely related species, or species as more [ 32 ] remotely related varieties. Every other distinguishing characteristic is wanting. ”

“ These variations are inheritable in the phylogenetic sense and contribute to the formation of varieties and species; they always appear as the results of more or less secondary reactions which make their appearance with stimuli exerted by external causes.
External stimuli exerted on the organism are reproduced in the idioplasm. Since the stimulus is discontinued with each change of the ontogeny and only the idioplasm persists, permanent variations are produced only in the idioplasm by those conditions that produce visible transformations in the mature organism. ”

“ Since, according to Nägeli, new life with new idioplasms, may arise wherever and whenever the necessary conditions combine, the present organic world is not made up from branchings of a single original idioplasm, but each race or group may have its own specific idioplasm ”

“ What is called a "conflict between religion and science" always has ended in a victory for "science" and an agnosticism which ousted religion. And thus many see that it is desirable that the matured results of science should enter into the fabric of our [ 58 ] religious convictions. For the realization of this purpose, the Open Court Company publishes two periodicals, The Monist, a quarterly magazine devoted to the philosophy of science, and The Open Court, an illustrated monthly devoted to the science of religion and the religion of science. ”

“ Races arise from gamogenic or pathological variations of the idioplasm. In the former case they presuppose crossing between related varieties or species, in the latter case an increased sensibility and weakening of the idioplasm. Very often both causes co-operate, since crossing follows more easily when the idioplasm is weakened by hurtful influences and since the irritability and weakening of the idioplasm increases if crossing has preceded. Race formation begins in single individuals. ”

“ If, after careful investigation, we arrive at the belief in the truth or falsehood of anything in these religions or philosophies, let us state our grounds for believing so in the fullest possible way. Only by so doing can we fulfil the duties of being true to ourselves and helpful to others. ”

“ Weismann regards adaptation as all-powerful. According to Nägeli, the organic world would have become much what it is, if natural selection and adaptation had performed no part in the operations of nature. ”

“ If genetic relation between two races is assumed, either as a reality or as a symbol, the degree of relationship is determined in a theoretically exact manner by the number and length of the phylogenetic steps which are found either between them both or between them and the common starting point, according as races belong to the same or collateral lines. ”