Habit and intelligence: a series of essays on the laws of life and mind / by Joseph John Murphy.

  • Joseph John Murphy
Date:
1879
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Habit and intelligence: a series of essays on the laws of life and mind / by Joseph John Murphy. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    63/632 (page 19)
    11.] unless it gives as much emphasis to the fact of the trans- formation of energy hy the action of the organism, as to the fact of the transformation of matter. In the present state of science, indeed, this is almost self-evident; hut it could not be clearly seen until the laws of the conservation of energy, and of the transformations of energy, were understood. It is now time to consider more precisely the laws of these transformations. We have seen that energy is taken up in the formation of organic compounds. It appears likely that this energy is directly obtained and appropriated by the plant from the radiance which falls on its leaves; but it. may be also in part derived from the slow combustion of carbon. Energy of Organization.—But in addition to the energy thus taken up chemically, it appears probable that energy is taken up in the process of organization and development. On this subject I am not aware that any precise determinations have been made: we only infer that energy is probably so taken up from the fact that there appears to be a demand for energy, in the form of heat, during every process of organic development; but in the absence of precise experiments we cannot assert with certainty for what purpose the heat is required. Heat, as already stated, appears to be a concomitant of vegetable as well as of animal life generally; and it is produced in unusual abundance in the act of flowering. The flower of the Arum cordifolium has been found to have a temperature 20° above that of the surrounding air.^ Heat is also produced in the ger- mination of the seed. Its source in these cases is oxidation; this is proved, if proof were needed, by the production of carbonic acid: and its purpose, no doubt, is in some way to promote the transformations that take place in the acts of flowering and germination. Animal development also depends in some way on temperature: this, as everyone knows, is true of the ' Stated in Carpenter’s Comparative Physiology (p. 846), on the authority of Adolphe IJrogniart. I presume the degrees are centigrade. 20° C. = 36° F. c 2