Picture - Cosmic Polymath

DESIGN IN NATURE
INORGANIC AND ORGANIC MATTER DISTRIBUTED ACCORDING TO THE SAME
GENERAL LAWS: GLOBULAR, CONCENTRIC, CURVED, SPIRAL, RADIATING,
BRANCHED, AND SEGMENTED ARRANGEMENTS OF MATTER. MOVE-
MENTS AND RHYTHMS IN THE INORGANIC AND ORGANIC KINGDOMS
—A FIRST CAUSE NECESSARY ^
§ I. Atoms and Molecules under Guidance.
The distribution and movements of atoms and molecules in the universe, especially that part of it forming the
organic kingdom, is of the utmost importance in biology and physiology.
in giving a complete explanation of them.
No one, so far as I know, has succeeded
Atoms and molecules, there can be little doubt, move and are moved, and arrange themselves under the
operation of a First Cause, as represented by hfe and physical force— gravitation, attraction, repubion, changes
of temperature, condensation, rarefaction, osmose, &c.
Newton and Swedenborg held strongly to a First Cause.
Newton, when speaking of the formation of the sun and fixed stars, says : " I do not think (this) expUcable
by mere natural causes, but am forced to ascribe it to the counsel and contrivance of a voluntary agent."
In Uke manner, Swedenborg remarks " that nothing can be truly known of the visible world without a know-
ledge of the invisible, for the visible is a world only of effects, while the invisible, or spiritual, is a world of causes."
Haeckel and Tyndall reject a First Cause. They attribute everything to a power inhering in matter as
matter, in virtue of which it assumes shape and movement, as apart from a Creator and as apart from hfe.
Kant, Herschel, Laplace and others endeavoured to explain the existence and movements of the heavenly
bodies by what is known as the nebular hypothesis. Laplace was of opinion that the matter of the solar system
" existed originally in the form of a vast, diffused, revolving nebula, which, gradually coohng and contracting, threw
off, in obedience to mechanical and physical laws, successive rings of matter, from which subsequently, by the same
laws, were produced the several planets, satellites, and other bodies of the system." ^
Descartes attempted to account for the formation of the universe, and the movements of the bodies com-
posing it, by a theory of vortices.
It will be observed that all the philosophers referred to assume the existence of matter. It is the distribution
and movements of matter, not only in the physical universe, but also in the vegetable and animal kingdoms, which
is still sub judice.
' What is written undei- tliis heading first appeared in an article, entitled " On the Formation of Crystals, Dendrites, Spiral, and other
Structures, in Relation to Growth and Movement, esjiecially Rhythmic Movement," by the author, in the Edinhitrgh Medical Journal under dates
March and April 1901. The article is now reproduced with its original illustrations, which were too numerous and costly for any journal to
undertake. It has been re-cast, and short connecting pas-sages added to introduce the illustrations, but with these exceptions it is as when first
the form but not the substance has been slightly altered.
published :
^ An alternative to Laplace's theory of the formation of planetaiy systeujs is suggested in an article by Mr. F. R. Moulton, of Chicago
University, in the Astrophysieal Journal, October 10, 1905. In 1900 this writer and Prof. T. 0. Chamberlin examined the older hypothesis
from the dynamical standpoint, and discovered, as they believed, cci'tain contradictions which induced them to frame a new theory.
The theory now suggested supposes that the planets and their satellites have been formed around primitive nuclei of considerable dimensions
existing in a spiral nebula probably similar to
types.
those which Prof. Kceler showed to be many times more numerous than all the nebulre of other
The gi-owth of each nucleus, according to them, is caused by the gradual accretion of smaller masses, and the method of this growtii, it
is suggested, accounts for all the different types of bodies now found in the solar system, and for their present motions and velocities, on dynamical
principles.
The original spiral nebula is supposed to have been formed by the near ap])roach of another star to the body which is now our sun. This
exterior attraction, it is assumed, set up tides in the solar matter, and, lieing continued, caused immense masses to be ejected and drawn out into
the spiral form. On this assumption the spiral would emerge from the central nucleus in two directions on opposite sides, and this is the form
generally shown in photographs of such nebulfs, (Short notice in Kiiture of November 23, 190,5, headed "The Evolution of the Solar
System.")
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