of the genesis of modern physics The Part and the Whole .*
Where indeed in micro-physics do we find the ultimate 'elementary'
parts which do not turn out to be composite wholes? Where in the
macro-world of astro-physics do we locate the boundaries of our universe
of multi-dimensional space-time? Infinity yawns both at the top and
bottom of the stratified hierarchies of existence, and the dichotomy
of self-assertive wholeness and self-transcending partness is present
on every level, from the trivial to the cosmic. The earthiest aspect of
hierarchic order is reflected in what one might call 'Swift's paradigm';
So, naturalists observe, a flea
Hath smaller fleas that on him prey;
And these have smaller fleas to bite 'em,
And so proceed ad infinitum . . .
* Der Teil und das Ganze in the German original.
In the English translation this was changed to
Physics and Beyond.
6
I am aware that this chapter may have seemed to oscillate between the
over-obvious and the apparently abstract and speculative; yet one of
the tests of a theory is that, once grasped, it appears self-evident.
There is a further difficulty inherent in the subject. The postulate
of a universal self-assertive tendency needs no apology; it has an
immediate appeal to commonsense, and has many forerunners -- such as
the 'instinct of self-preservation', 'survival of the fittest', and
so forth. But to postulate as its counterpart an equally universal
integrative tendency, and the dynamic interplay between the two as
the key to a general systems theory, smacks of old-fashioned vitalism
and runs counter to the Zeitgeist, epitomized in books like Monod's Chance and Necessity or Skinner's Beyond Freedom and Dignity .
It may therefore be appropriate to wind up this chapter with a few
quotations from a recent book by an eminent clinician, Dr Lewis Thomas
(President of the Sloan-Kettering Cancer Centre), who can hardly be
accused of an unscientific attitude. The passage starts with a fascinating
description of the parasite myxotricha paradoxa , a single-celled
creature which inhabits the digestive tract of Australian termites:
At first glance, he appears to be an ordinary, motile protozoan,
remarkable chiefly for the speed and directness with which he swims
from place to place, engulfing fragments of wood finely chewed by his
termite host. In the termite ecosystem, an arrangement of Byzantine
complexity, he stands at the epicenter. Without him, the wood,
however finely chewed, would never get digested; he supplies the
enzymes that break down cellulose to edible carbohydrate, leaving
only the nondegradable lignin, which the termite then excretes
in geometrically tidy pellets and uses as building blocks for the
erection of arches and vaults in the termite nest. Without him there
would be no termites, no farms of the fungi that are cultivated by
termites and will grow nowhere else . . . [7]
But this tiny creature inside the termite's digestive tracts turns out to
consist of whole populations of even tinier creatures living in symbiosis
with each other, yet retaining their autonomous individuality. Thus . . .
. . . the flagellae that beat in synchrony to propel myxotricha
with such directness turn out, on closer scrutiny with the electron
microscope, not to be flagellae at all. They are outsiders, in
to help with the business: fully formed, perfect spirochetes that
have attached themselves at regularly spaced intervals all over the
surface of the protozoan. [8]
Thomas then enumerates the various types of other organelles and bacteria
which form a kind of cooperative zoo inside myxotricha , and cites evidence
that the cells which constitute the human body evolved by a similar
process 'of being made up, part by part, by the coming together of just
such prokaryotic animals'. Thus the lowly myxotricha becomes a paradigm
for our integrative tendency.
The whole animal, or ecosystem, stuck for the time being halfway along
in evolution, appears to be a model for
Where indeed in micro-physics do we find the ultimate 'elementary'
parts which do not turn out to be composite wholes? Where in the
macro-world of astro-physics do we locate the boundaries of our universe
of multi-dimensional space-time? Infinity yawns both at the top and
bottom of the stratified hierarchies of existence, and the dichotomy
of self-assertive wholeness and self-transcending partness is present
on every level, from the trivial to the cosmic. The earthiest aspect of
hierarchic order is reflected in what one might call 'Swift's paradigm';
So, naturalists observe, a flea
Hath smaller fleas that on him prey;
And these have smaller fleas to bite 'em,
And so proceed ad infinitum . . .
* Der Teil und das Ganze in the German original.
In the English translation this was changed to
Physics and Beyond.
6
I am aware that this chapter may have seemed to oscillate between the
over-obvious and the apparently abstract and speculative; yet one of
the tests of a theory is that, once grasped, it appears self-evident.
There is a further difficulty inherent in the subject. The postulate
of a universal self-assertive tendency needs no apology; it has an
immediate appeal to commonsense, and has many forerunners -- such as
the 'instinct of self-preservation', 'survival of the fittest', and
so forth. But to postulate as its counterpart an equally universal
integrative tendency, and the dynamic interplay between the two as
the key to a general systems theory, smacks of old-fashioned vitalism
and runs counter to the Zeitgeist, epitomized in books like Monod's Chance and Necessity or Skinner's Beyond Freedom and Dignity .
It may therefore be appropriate to wind up this chapter with a few
quotations from a recent book by an eminent clinician, Dr Lewis Thomas
(President of the Sloan-Kettering Cancer Centre), who can hardly be
accused of an unscientific attitude. The passage starts with a fascinating
description of the parasite myxotricha paradoxa , a single-celled
creature which inhabits the digestive tract of Australian termites:
At first glance, he appears to be an ordinary, motile protozoan,
remarkable chiefly for the speed and directness with which he swims
from place to place, engulfing fragments of wood finely chewed by his
termite host. In the termite ecosystem, an arrangement of Byzantine
complexity, he stands at the epicenter. Without him, the wood,
however finely chewed, would never get digested; he supplies the
enzymes that break down cellulose to edible carbohydrate, leaving
only the nondegradable lignin, which the termite then excretes
in geometrically tidy pellets and uses as building blocks for the
erection of arches and vaults in the termite nest. Without him there
would be no termites, no farms of the fungi that are cultivated by
termites and will grow nowhere else . . . [7]
But this tiny creature inside the termite's digestive tracts turns out to
consist of whole populations of even tinier creatures living in symbiosis
with each other, yet retaining their autonomous individuality. Thus . . .
. . . the flagellae that beat in synchrony to propel myxotricha
with such directness turn out, on closer scrutiny with the electron
microscope, not to be flagellae at all. They are outsiders, in
to help with the business: fully formed, perfect spirochetes that
have attached themselves at regularly spaced intervals all over the
surface of the protozoan. [8]
Thomas then enumerates the various types of other organelles and bacteria
which form a kind of cooperative zoo inside myxotricha , and cites evidence
that the cells which constitute the human body evolved by a similar
process 'of being made up, part by part, by the coming together of just
such prokaryotic animals'. Thus the lowly myxotricha becomes a paradigm
for our integrative tendency.
The whole animal, or ecosystem, stuck for the time being halfway along
in evolution, appears to be a model for
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