Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-11-25

lately. They bear technical names. mean
ingless to any except men far advanced In
pure science. Their processes are too In
tricate to be Ineligible to any except spe-
.oialists. But they lead to the new theory
that every form of action, every visible
thing, every flash of sunlight, every wnls-
pering stir of leaf or grass is electrical.
The experiments have been tried with SIM
pie things like salt and water. They have
been tried with human blood They have
been tried with metal and drug, mineral
and vegetable. And they lead the expert
mentors to believe that the whole world,
mental and physical. is composed OF cleo
trical atoms or atomic electricity. though
that is not the name they give It,
What that means Is that evermore, every
where, whirring. darting, flashing cease
lcssly in limitless intricacy, yet ever
obedient to one Eolemn law, there fly in
fnitesImal bodies each containing, as IN
a capsule, an atom of electricity.
Two German scientists did something
few weeks ago. They made a galvanic ele-
ment of carbon and iron, and Immersed II
in solution of salts of uranium. When
various other metallic salts were added
queer objects began to form on the carbon
They grew swiftly until at last they ciung
veritable mushroom growths.
At first they are Transparent; Ihen 'heS
begin to color beautifully, so that some be-
come bright red on top while the stem Is
pale yellow and the under part OF the heao
is pale rose.
have named them. But with the micro
scope can be seen fine canals extending
from the top down through the stem-uKe
veins.
This term Inorganic would have been
final a few years ago. But now, when adj
vanced thought is more than ready 10 pro-
claim that there is nothing that Is inor-
ganic. we ask with propriety: why
should these growths be called inorganic!
How can we prove that a thing is or
ganic?" Because it moves, or grows, or
eats, or breathes?
The amoeba Is organic without DOUBT IN
the old sense. Yet 1t required years of
observation to discover that 1t is not bit
of dead jelly. 1t moves, but almost I'M
perceptibly. 1t eats. but in no way known
nor intestines. It's food enters 1t just as
bit of pebble might be thrust into bit OF
jelly.
Are these mushroom forms then, born of
electrical action from metallic salts des-
tined to teach us something of the birth of
life at last?
Some years ago Prof Loeb took the I'M
fertilized eggs of a sea urchln and laid
them into a chemical mixture Of which sea
water was the greatest part. There re-
suited what seemed like a miracle Inc
eggs became fertile.
Since his discovery little real progress has
been made Nature had apparently revealed
a wonderful secret, only to draw the curtain
riddle greater than 1t was before.
But what if we accept the theory that
electricity Is the mother of life? Then it
was the electrical impulse that thrilled
through the sea water and touched the egg
of the sea urchin. And in the egg there
began to pulse something.
So when the earth was young what was
fire became black and what was fluid be-
came dense, somewhere, somehow, the
change of temperature suddenly reached a
point where an impulse was born. 1t
reached into black chaos and loi some
thing moved. The first crystal was born.
These are all theories still. Research must
ever limp with exact and tedious study,
behind the eagle flights of the poet Man.
But like all theories-Ptolemaism, kopernl-
kussm Linnaism, Darwinism-they are keys
that lead from room to room.
The key Darwinsm led us far.
To unlock the next door we may need
a new key and the old may have to be
thrown away. But without 1t we could
not have reached the second door.
And so with the new and daring theories
that are touched on here. They will be
replaced in their turn by new ones. But
all, the discarded ones as well as those
that remain, were and are necessary to
lead US on.