Highland recorder. (Monterey, Highland County, Va.) 1877-1972, 1903-09-18
What IS DEATH
and WHEN
DOES IT OCCUR +?
1.-THE RUPTURE OF The ADJUST.
MEAT OF INTERNAL TO EXTERNAL
RELATIONS. MEDICAL RECORD.
1.-THE RUPTURE OF THE ADJUST.
MEAT OF INTERNAL TO EXTERNAL
RELATIONS" -. MEDICAL RECORD.

Herbert Spencer, it will be remem-
bered, has defined life as Il continued
adjustment of internal relations to eX-
ternal relations, and it is doubtful
whether any definition of death would
be better than a rupture Of that adjust
ment Ordinarily, Of course, every one
thinks that he knows when a man is
dead. But when looked at more close
ly the subject is not quite so simple.
For example, shall we say that a pa
tent is dead" when respiration
ceases? In the writer's experience a
woman suddenly became unconscious
and ceased all attempts (even the
slightest at respiration. Under arti-
fetal respiration, however, the heart
beat for five hours, when the artificial
respiration was given up. The autopsy
showed hemorrhage into the ventricles
Of the brain. Was, then, the woman
"iving" during the five hours of arti-
Gcial respiration, OF was she ''dead?"
The question, while it may have
somewhat the aspect Of metaphysical
juggle, is by no means entirely of that
nature. For on it might depend the
question of survivOrship; the question
in law of (which died first" involving
an entirely different inheritance OF
property. Again shall the criterion be
the cessation of the action of the
heart? Brouardel cites case wit
messed by Drs. Reginald and Paul
Loye, in which the heart beat for one
hour in a decapitated murderer, and
he himself has seen the heartbeat per-
Sist fifteen, twenty, and twenty-five
minutes in decapitated dogs, and i'll
those dying from hemorrhage. 1t is
no easier if we turn to the brain, for
it's functional activities are no more
necessarily cO-eXtensive with life than
are those Of the heart and lungs. I'm
consciousness is normally periodic in
sleep and pathologically it frequently
occurs without involving the cessation
Of "life."
The solution of the riddle really lies
in the fact that death" is negative
term denoting merely the cessation OF
life" This throws us back upon the
question of what "life" is. Without
any desire to dOgmatize Oh this much
debated question, "life" appears to be
merely a convenient name for a series
IF physicochemical processes which
avowedly differ much in compleXlty
from inorganic" phenomena, but
which have never yet been shown TO
differ from them in kind. On the con-
Tary, the more we learn about physlcai
and chemical phenomena, the more
physiological phenomena we are
able to explain. The essential OF life
then consists in the capability OF re-
spending serially and appropriately, by
continual adjustments, to changes IN
the environment. 1t is not the actual
demonstration at every moment OF It's
presence that constitutes life For,
unless we are to introduce some meta
physical dodge-the-issue Gas, for exam
pie. capable of life yet not living" or
other empty phrase, bodies are either
"alive" or dead"
What meaning has the word "alive"
when applied to the seeds of wheat
which grew after having lain thou
sands of years in mummy's coffin!
Evidently this: A seed represents
collection of chemical compounds
which. under suitable conditions (of
temperature and mOisture) are capable
of producing, by their mutual interac-
tions, another series Of compounds,
which, in their turn, are capable OF
producing, by their interactions, third
series of compounds; the first second
and third series of compounds repre-
senting in their totality respectively the
first second and third stages in the
DEVELOPMENT of the plant. But, as
Ryder has shown, this repetition Ill
heredity is conditioned upon repetition
in environment-that is, the seed Will
respond in a regular serial order only
provided the physical and chemical
forces act upon it in the regular serial
order to which it has been adapted,
through countless generations, to re-
spond.
The eggs of fishes when extruded
are fabby and collapsed, and in THIS
condition they appear to be in physico-
chemical equilibrium. Placed in water,
however. during the first twenty min
utes they imbibe it, swell and become
round and smooth, and fertilization &C.
ours. But after the swelling and Ter
tilization have occurred, the contents
of the egg are in a different physical
and chemical condition than when first
extruded, and this different physical
and chemical condition it is which H.
wolves the next change of state, cleav-
age. Yet that the latter change is no
necessary outcome of the swollen, fer
tilized condition is shown by the pos
sibility of inhibiting it indefinitely by q
towering of the temperature.
The possibility of the continuance OF
"life" then depends upon the ability OF
the chemical compounds which (collec-
lively and at any given mOment we
term "the body" to give rise to another
similar collection which shall be able
inter Sc to maintain similar adjust
ment of internal relations to external
relations. Conversely, when the forma-
ton of such derivative collection is
no longer possible. death ensues.
Less abstract put, death is the name
we give to the inability Of the organs
70 act together with the harmony |