Synthesis

“ A clear recognition of the different use of analysis and of synthesis is essential in any claim of research to be called scientific. 'Although by analysis we separate, and by synthesis we combine, yet in the synthesis there is more than in all the parts taken analytically. ”

“ The capacities for organisation in their various grades are revealed by a synthesis. The aggregations and affinities of metals, like the vegetative soul of plants and like all powers of assimilation, are also made known by a synthesis. ”

“ The experiments by which the chemical analysis or synthesis of various forms of matter is demonstrated are simple or compound applications of this method of Difference, together with the quantitative mark of causation (that cause and effect are equal) ; since the bodies resulting from an analysis are equal in weight to the body analysed, and the body resulting from a synthesis is equal in weight to the bodies synthesised. That an electric current resolves water into oxygen and hydrogen may be proved by inserting the poles of a galvanic battery in a vessel of water ”

“ But if ultra-refined experiment leads us to more precise relationships at variance with our former crude ones, or, again, if a wider array of facts has become known, it may well happen that our original synthesis will be incapable of co-ordinating all these results unless we appeal to a number of artificial corrective hypotheses. In this case we may be compelled to widen our synthesis or even to reconstruct it entirely. We must realise, therefore, that a synthesis can never be considered final, for we never know what the future may hold in store. ”

“ Primarily, all we are aware of is a complex of sensations. Even the crude knowledge of the savage is therefore itself the result of a highly complex synthesis. But science must pursue the synthesis still farther, taking the results of previous syntheses as the elements of its more sophisticated ones. And so what was formerly the synthetic view becomes the private one when we rise to a higher plane. Thus, if we consider the aspect of the earth’s surface, viewed from any one spot, our private view would suggest that the earth was flat. ”

“ The universal synthesis which is to constitute philosophy must express the total operation accomplished by the cooperation of these factors. The law which shall formulate this synthesis must be a law of the changes in forces under the two phases, matter and motion, by which they are manifested to us: it must be a principle of dynamics holding good both for the whole of the cosmos, and for its every detail. The changes of an object are all produced by new arrangements of the matter constituting it, and by a new distribution of the forces which belong to it. ”

“ Thus a synthesis of molecules produces the stage for Life, a synthesis of living particles produces the Cell, a synthesis of cells produces an organism, a synthesis of organisms is a species—for the evidence (most notably that derived from the consideration of bee and ant communities) seems to show that material discontinuity in the members does not preclude the existence of a true synthetic union.116 The characteristic power gained by a species is that of evolutionary development working in the obscure region of germinal combination and variation. ”

“ By this way of Analysis we may proceed from Compounds to Ingredients, and from Motions to the Forces producing them; and in general, from Effects to their Causes, and from particular Causes to more general ones, till the Argument end in the most general. This is the Method of Analysis: And the [Pg 405] Synthesis consists in assuming the Causes discover'd, and establish'd as Principles, and by them explaining the Phænomena proceeding from them, and proving the Explanations. ”

“ Yet, on the other hand, it must be admitted that when we have succeeded in constructing some lofty scientific synthesis which takes in the facts of experience, our synthesis must always be such as to permit us to account for the facts of crude observation; for these, to the same extent as the results of ultra-precise experiment, constitute facts which must be co-ordinated. ”

“ Every analysis, then, presupposes a synthesis, and every synthesis presupposes an analysis. When we say that X is Y, we express an analysis, or imply that such an analysis has been made. We recognize the fact that X and Y have already been distinguished from each other. If we say X is not Y, we imply a previous synthesis by which they had been brought together. ”

“ The terms synthesis and analysis are used in mathematics in a more special sense than in logic. In ancient mathematics they had a different meaning from what they now have. The oldest definition of mathematical analysis as opposed to synthesis is that given in Euclid, XIII. 5, which in all probability was framed by Eudoxus: "Analysis is the obtaining of the thing sought by assuming it and so reasoning up to an admitted truth; synthesis is the obtaining of the thing sought by reasoning up to the inference and proof of it." ”

“ Thus, in these Concrete Sciences, the object is the converse of that which the Ab­stract-Con­crete Sciences propose to themselves. In the one case we have analytical interpretation; while in the other case we have synthetical interpretation. Instead of synthesis being used merely to verify analysis; analysis is here used only to aid synthesis. Not to formulate the factors of phenomena is now the object; but to formulate the phenomena resulting from these factors, under the various conditions which the Universe presents. ”

“ Synthesis is the act of combining simples so as to form a whole or compound. Thus, in putting together letters so as to form syllables, syllables so as to form words, words so as to form sentences, and sentences so as to form a discourse, the process is called synthetic. ”

“ In melting wholly away into the product which they create they become consciously undistinguishable, and the mind apprehends only their resultant, the intuition of space. Thus there obtains a certain analogy between this psychic synthesis and that chemical synthesis which out of simple bodies generates a compound that appears to our immediate perception as a homogeneous whole with new properties. ”

“ In the laboratory, synthesis starts with the elements, and from them, by exceedingly wasteful means, builds laboriously, from platform to platform, up to the desired height. On the other hand, the smallest speck of green vegetable tissue, if living, elaborates its substance, not from elementary bodies, but from compound ones, and those too which are among the most stable and most highly-oxidized known; each new step, then, in the artificial method, tends to carry us away, rather than to approximate us to the natural agent. ”

“ As we learn, through intercommunication with our fellows, of the existence for their perception of perceptual extension never directly presented to our own senses, the process of synthesis is extended further, so as to comprise in a single 247spatial system all the presentation-spaces of all the individual percipients in an order once again determined by the direction of the movements of transition from each to the others. ”

“ But this sort of interest does not thrive under compulsion.
293 Analysis and synthesis.—The question-and-answer method evermore implies analysis. But children are inclined to synthesis, which shows at once that the analytic method runs counter to their natural bent. They like to make things, to put things together, to experiment along the lines of synthesis. Hence the industrial arts appeal to them. But constructing problems satisfies their inclination to synthesis quite as well as constructing coat-hangers or culinary compounds, if only the incitement is rational. ”

“ The influence of special groupings in retarding chemical change is apparently well established, but no comprehensive theory of the subject is yet possible. Until such a theory is forthcoming a dynamical theory of stereo-chemistry is incomplete.
152
CHAPTER X
Organic Synthesis: Condensation: The Synthesis of Vital Products In its widest sense, the term “synthesis,” as used in organic chemistry, means the building-up of carbon compounds, either from their constituent elements or from groups of differently constituted molecules. ”

“ Of the highly complex series of albuminoid substances, which neither crystallize nor possess any combining equivalent, and therefore can not be expressed by exact symbols, analytic chemistry knows but little, and hence it would be in vain to attempt their reproduction by synthesis. Notwithstanding our ignorance of essential facts, the progress of synthetic chemistry has been great, and the prospect is favorable for more brilliant achievements in the future. ”

“ It is known that there are no elementary substances in living matter which are not also found in the world of inorganic matter, but it is also known that their synthetic combination in living is different from that which obtains in dead tissue,24 and it is precisely through this factor—that of the grouping or synthesis of elements—that the most remarkable forms of energy are developed. ”

“ Now those who decide for a single element, which is either water or air or a body finer than water and denser than air, and proceed to generate other things out of it by use of the attributes density and rarity, all alike fail to observe the fact that they are depriving the element of its priority. Generation out of the elements is, as they say, synthesis, and generation into the elements is analysis, so that the body with the finer parts must have priority in the order of nature. ”

“ But it may be convenient to treat the subject of the artificial production of this group of bodies rather more comprehensively and as a sub-section of this chapter on organic synthesis, since their formation by such means constitutes a phase in the development of chemistry, and has undoubtedly exercised a profound influence on scientific thought and on philosophical and even theological doctrine. During the past fifty or sixty years the chemist has been enabled to form the active principles or characteristic products of many plants and animals. ”

“ An ascending synthesis accordingly finds the correspondence at first direct and homogeneous, then direct but heterogeneous, as extending in space and in time, and as increasing in specialty, in generality, and in complexity. Along with the all-sided development thus going on in the correspondences, there goes on a development in the degree in which the organs and functions of the individual are so correlated and united a to respond promptly and effectually to the answering changes in the environment. ”

“ Just as synthetic chemistry began with the artificial formation of the simplest organic products, so biological synthesis must content itself at first with the fabrication of forms resembling those of the lowest organisms. Like other sciences, synthetic biology must proceed from the simpler to the more complex, beginning with the reproduction of the more elementary vital phenomena. ”

“ Now, the categories are all divided into two classes- the mathematical, which concern the unity of synthesis in the conception of objects, and the dynamical, which refer to the unity of synthesis in the conception of the existence of objects. The former (those of magnitude and quality) always contain a synthesis of the homogeneous, and it is not possible to find in this the unconditioned antecedent to what is given in sensible intuition as conditioned in space and time, as this would itself have to belong to space and time, and therefore be again still conditioned. ”

“ Belief in the mysterious vital force operating in living beings received a rude shock at the hands of Wohler, sixty years ago, and successive triumphs in synthesis have dispelled it entirely, so far as non-organized bodies are concerned: "To-day we know that the same chemical laws rule animate and inanimate nature, and that any definite compound produced in the former can be prepared by synthesis as soon as its chemical constitution has been made out." ”

“ Synthetic biology includes morphogeny, physiogeny, and synthetic organic chemistry, which is also a branch of synthetic biology, since it deals with the composition of the constituents of living organisms. Synthetic organic chemistry is already a well-organized science, important by reason of the triumphs which it has already gained. The other two branches of biological synthesis, morphogeny, the synthesis of living forms and structures, and physiogeny, the synthesis of functions, can hardly as yet be said to exist as sciences. ”

“ Learning dates and other figures by Synthesis is never recommended except where the pupil is ignorant of the subject matter and cannot in consequence use Analytic Substitution. Synthesis power has a good training effect in all cases.
Is it always necessary for us to know the dates of the birth and death of men? Then why do we do this exercise? What do I want you to get thorough control over? What will you then be able to do? The specific gravity of Iridium is 22.40, represented by the phrase none serious ”

“ We should recognize that these products, that this albumen obtained by synthesis, while having the same elementary composition as living albumen and the same physical and chemical characteristics, is nevertheless distinguished from it by a very important point: it does not exhibit the characteristic phenomena of life. ”

“ In the formation of formic acid from carbonic oxide we observe an example of the synthesis of organic compounds, such as are now very numerous, and are treated of in detail in works on organic chemistry. ”

“ In the first place, the very complicated arrangement of matter which is found in living substance has not been yet sufficiently analysed by physics and chemistry: accordingly we find many processes occurring in biology—such as the directional changes in evolution of which we have spoken—which could not have been foretold on our present physico-chemical knowledge, but must be investigated separately as adding to our store of facts and principles, in the confident hope that a synthesis will one day be possible. ”