The morning call., 1893-11-16
Goethe on Deviation of
Character.
TRANSMISSION THEORIES.
Weisman on the Continuity of
Germ Plasm.
NUCLEUS DIVISION EXPERIMENT.
Germ Cells Male and Female, Polar
Bodies and Inheritance of Ac.
quired Characters.

The second lecture of President Jordan's
course on Evolution" was followed with
close attention by large audience in
Golden Gate Hall. last evening. The sub
ject was "Heredity."
Science finds no ego, self or will that
can maintain itself against the past" said
the speaker. "Heredity rules our lives
like the supreme primeval necessity that
stood above the OlympiaR gods. We are
possessed, not by demons, but by the dead.
These are the real ghosts that throng our
lives and haunt our footsteps remorseless
as the furies. We are followed by the
shades of our ancestors, who visit US not
with midnight squeak or gibber. but in the
broad MONDAY, speaking with our speech
and doing with our deed. On the stage of
life the actors recite speeches and follow
stage directions written for them long be-
fore they were born.
Goethe says he obtained his stature
from his father as also his stern views OF
life; from his mother the joyous heart and
the love of storytelling; from his grand
father his love for the fair. and from his
grandmother his love for pomp and gold
and show.
What we want to get at tonight is the
physical basis of heredity-that is the pro-
cess by which characteristics go over from
one generation TO the next and by which
tuey are mixed and gathered together.
These characteristics are passed over by
the sexual cells specialized SO as TO carry
| all the qualities of the parents. There
have been many theories on the mat
ter-the oldest that of evolution by
which the germ cell was developed, each cell
containing as il were in little ihe whole
that was to be developed from il. Again
there was the theory of epigsnesis OF cell
aggregation. Darwin's theory OF GEM
| - IL
in gemmules. the male active and varying,
the female sessile and conservative The
latest, however, and the only working one
is WelsmaD's theory of continuity of germ
plasm OF cell different from the other cells,
and persisting from generation to genera
tion, while the body cells are thrown out.
This germ cell passes on unchanged except
that contents are mixed with some other
germ CELL liz trees the trunk may repre-
sent the germ cell in its continuity, while
the leaves stand for the body cells.
The law of mutual help is shown in its
beginning - first by the aggregation of
cells, the formation of compound animals,
and, second. by the congregation of cells
Aggregation leads TO differentiation of
structure, specialization and death. The
protoZoa are immortal because they are
not specialized.
sIn protozoa the animal is unit, sim
gle CELL In metaZoa single cell is differ
entiated from the others and thrown off
as germ cell. Germ cells primarily alike
become differentiated into female cells and
male cells. The former. the ovum, is
sessile and immovable and is provided
with food yelk for the Dourishment of
new food structure; the latter, the
spermatoZOon, is a movable cell, CON-
posed chiefly of the nucleus. Un-
| der the influence of the attraction
spheres the cell divides lengthwise split
| ting the chTomatn or ideoplasm. AS
| the nucleus Is. so is the resultant animal
/ whether developed in its own egg or pro-
! toplasm or in that OF another animal. II
! is the nucleus which carries heredity. In
| the nucleus the ribbon-like substance,
which is known as chromatin on account
of Its deeper shade, is shown by the process
| of exclusion to carry heredity. When the
nucleus divides nature divides the chro-
matin as nearly equally as possible
and plants, and can be studied in
parasite of the horn. The male
| cell divides into two first, then
! into four, each having only half of the
| chromatin the parent cell had. The female
cell divides first into two unequal cells,
which are then subdivded and ultimately
become four cells. one large, with food
| yelk and half amount OF original chroma-
| tion and three small. These latter are
called polar bodies. are without food yelk
| and do not develop. The minglng of these
| two cells, male and female, is called am
|
| Of the elements of character or structure
| in the new individuals In this one half
| of the material comes from the male half
| from the female. and no two resultants of
such mngling can be the same. There
| fore the variation in the children. The
| variations of the grains of chrOmatin are
! innumerabe and therefore nature does
not repeat her works The general char
acters are the same. but no two individuals
| are the same.
IAN experiment has been made by Pro-
| fessor Wilson in dividing the germ cell of
the lancelet. He succeeded and from one
| cell he succeeded in getting two fish. He
split it into four parts and produced four
fish, showing that the one fish contained
| four. This division could be made of all
animals were it not that mutual aid begets
mutual dependence.
"rhe sex cells are fundamentally alike.
| This is shown in many ways.
| "Heredity is the mixture OF parental
char acter in offspring through mixture of
idants carried in the chromatin. Sex
differentiation takes place after the cell
| growth has begun and the idants are
mixed. The idants are the units of hered-
| ity, their ordinations are infinite, %
| per cent from each parent, 3 per cent
| from grandparents and the rest from up-
| identified sources.
1.-THE embryo of both sexes is funda
| mentally alike, but the germ cell develops
under varying stimuli. Mostare unknown,
| but overfeedng and heat are said to de-
velop the male, undertaking and cold The
! female.
1.-The battle of modern evolution is the
| Inheritance of acquired character. Ac-
/ Quired character is one gained by the in
dividual after birth, as result of func-
tional activity or mode OF life. Do children
inherit parents acquired qualities or are
| they lost? There are two theories-one
that they do, as in 1bsen's Ghosts, the
other that they do not CONSIDERING
says Herbert Spencer, the width and
of one or the other of these hypotheses
must have on our views of life, the ques-
tion, which is true? demands beyond all
questions whatever the attention of scien-