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chapter 3 A CLOSE-UP OF PROTOPLASM |
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CELL GROWTH AND PROPAGATION -- "INHERITANCE OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS" DISPROVED -- "SPONTANEOUS GENERATION" EXPLANATION DESTROYED BY M. PASTEUR -- PLANETARY ORIGIN OF LIFE RULED OUT BY NEWTON'S LAW -- MENDEL'S LAW AN INSURMOUNTABLE OBSTACLE TO EVOLUTION -- BEE MATHEMATICIANS -- DROSOPHILA MELANOGASTER
"All things wise and wonderful: the Lord God made them all."
We will now look more closely and critically at this very important substance -- protoplasm. The evolutionists claim it as the link between inorganic and organic substance; they allege that it generated spontaneously and thus gave the start to life on earth. Now the evolutionist willingly admits that life could not start spontaneously into a heterogeneous creature (consisting of multiple differing elements), but that an organism consisting of one element only could so generate. Again a multicellular organism could not spontaneously generate, but a unicellular one could. It is the very lowest and simplest form of life known and consists apparently of one substance in one cell. These living organisms are called Protozoa. There are quite a number of them. One such microscopic organism is to be found in the slime of ponds. If it were magnified sufficiently we should see something like a hen's shell-less egg -- a globule of albumen with a central nucleus, corresponding to an egg's yolk. This microscopic egg-like "amoeba," as it is termed, is capable of propelling itself along, relatively fast, by means of pseudo-podia (false feet) which are formed as occasion demands. At such times it pushes out finger -- like projections -- much like the arrows of advance on war maps -- which point in the direction of the intended movement; they next fan out or broaden; and this, as you will realise, results in the hindermost protoplasm moving forward in the direction of the pseudo-podia's finger-like thrusts. A small globule of fat floating on soup -to use a homely illustration-can be made to behave in very much the same way. AN EQUAL SHARE-OUT Now this amoeba eats by absorbing nourishment (smaller living forms usually) by a multiplicity of mouths which, like its feet, it forms as the need arises. After eating, the unassimilated residue is ejected. The result of this eating is rapid growth -- so rapid that in some cases its size is just doubled in a few hours. This accomplished, the time has arrived for propagation. The central nucleus elongates and, pinching in at the middle, separates into two equal portions of equally divided elements. These elements, according to Dr. Frisch, are of various kinds, and are equally divided -- much as a bag of mixed money could be divided into two identical heaps each containing the same number of florins, shillings and pennies. But even this simile is not strictly correct, because some florins would be new and others worn, some with Victoria's head and some with George's head. Dr. Karl V. Frisch shall explain it for us:
So you see the point we are trying to make: it is that the division is strictly and EXACTLY EQUAL: there is ABSOLUTELY NO DIFFERENCE between the two DAUGHTER CELLS. This equal share-out being finished, the ensuing nuclei move apart: thus presenting the appearance of an egg with a double yoke. Then the outer jelly (Protoplasm), corresponding to the white of our egg illustration, pinches in between the nuclei (or yolks), thus becoming dumb-bell shape. Finally, the then connecting isthmus is severed and thus are formed two separate amoeba, which in turn will repeat the previous process. Having thus very briefly sketched the nature of these protoplasmic amoeba, we would like to quote a dictionary definition of these organisms:
AN APPEAL TO FACTS Thus we see that this supposed unicellular amoeba EATS, ASSIMILATES the nutrition and by it GROWS, has POWER OF LOCOMOTION "AT WILL" (i.e., it chooses when it will move in search of food), and last of all, after having exactly divided its nucleus, it PROPAGATES by division. I do not know how these simple -- and I believe undisputed -- facts appeal to you, but to me it is all very wonderful. I sometimes feel that small life is even more wonderful than bigger life. But do you feel that this "unicellular structureless substance" definition sounds convincing? I do not. To me, eating, walking, growing and propagating, inevitably necessitates organisation: and if organisation, then structure: and if structure, then it is a heterogeneous creature with many parts and not such a simple homogeneous form of life as the evolutionists would have us believe. The fact that the smallness of its organs prevents their being seen does not affect the matter. There are even smaller organisms that have never been seen or isolated by any known filter, but when they prostrate a man in death their living existence is not questioned. We feel convinced that these various manifestations of the amoeba's activity demand structure and, if you like, organs. If they do, then we feel that the evolutionists have lost their case, and their claims must be disallowed. Indeed, do not Dr. Frisch's explanations postulate heterogeneity (more than one substance)? By this time the technical reader may be puzzled as to why we are reasoning the matter out, when it could easily be proved by a direct appeal to authority. Well. it is not because we are unaware of such a line of evidence. Our reason has been to deal with objections which, although they have outlasted further progress, are still used by persons who have not moved with the times. ANYTHING BUT SIMPLE Of course the study of this once-thought simple cell has now developed to such an amazing extent that it has been found necessary to form a separate branch of study for research called Cytology. This simple unicellular structureless substance has since turned out to be anything but simple. Mr. Dewar, in "A Challenge to Evolutionists," writes:
So you see the simplicity which the evolutionists so desperately needed has been denied them. The possibility of spontaneous generation in consequence recedes and, with it, evolution. A scientific admission of this disappointment is quoted in "Evolution Criticised," (page 231):
Thus we have reasoning, reinforced by scientific testimony, witnessing to the complex nature of protoplasm and the consequent impossibility of its generating spontaneously. SINGULARLY UNFORTUNATE CHOICE There is yet another reason why the choice of this so called "unicellular" amoeba was a singularly unfortunate one for the evolutionist, and that is its peculiar method of propagation. We mean, of course, that it has no offspring in the accepted sense -- it is in a way its own offspring. What is the difficulty here then? Just this: A fundamental principle of the evolutionary theory is that which postulates the upward and onward progress of life by the "inheritance of acquired characteristics." In the case of the primitive ammba this would mean that in the few hours' duration of its life, it would have to develop by acquisition something with which it was not born. Having thus improved itself, it would then have to transmit the improvement to its offspring in order for the "acquired characteristic" to be perpetuated, after being further improved by the offspring. We realise that the choice of the amoeba, by the evolutionists, to explain "spontaneous generation" was obviously dictated by the organism's simplicity of structure. This, they hoped, should make it an easy pill for the lay man to swallow -- a "scientific" accounting for the start of life. No doubt, for this reason, it served its purpose well. But we repeat that their choice was singularly unfortunate because any "acquired characteristics" are not handed on by propagation, because in the amoeba's divisional "share out" they are exactly halved. And next time, unless they do some quick improving, they are halved again into quarters and-so on. Surely this is no help to evolution -- ONE STEP FORWARD AND TWO BACKWARDS, is it not? Evolution demands pro gression. This would be retrogression-and IS NOT PROGRESSION VITAL TO THE THEORY? Think it over carefully, and see whether you must not agree that this is so. But this is not all: we are now going to look a little closer, and question the evolutionist's explanation of Protoplasm's origin. Here is the "scientific" explanation:
That is, it just happened itself. Now that is a scientific impossibility, as we shall presently demonstrate. But first of all we would break off here to address the evolutionist. You say that you cannot accept the Bible account of creation because "it involves the acceptance of miracle." But why cannot you accept miracle when it comes to you on credible testimony? You reply, "because miracle is outside the range of human experience; I have to do with scientific facts, not with theological fancies." But isn't there something wrong here with your logic? Is "spontaneous generation" a thing within your human experience? or within that of anyone you may know? Have you any evidence of its occurrence, or even of the possibility of its occurrence, ever? You know the answer -- the scientific answer -- to all these questions: it is NO. Very well then, "spontaneous generation" is also "outside the range of human experience," like-well, like our belief in miracles. But our belief in miracles is capable of demonstration, for they come to us on the credible testimony of those who witnessed them. But your miracle of "spontaneous generation" is not capable of the demonstration of any who witnessed it: and, what is more telling, it is not capable of scientific demonstration. Yes, and even more than that, we are now going to disprove your contention, and show you that we have truescience -- experimental science -- on our side, although we suspect that you already know what we are going to say, for at heart you know these things better than your lay accuser. However, for the sake of those who do not and in order to expose you further, we pass on to consider the experiments of M. Pasteur. PASTEUR'S "COUP DE GRACE" According to the geologist -- who we believe is a great friend of yours, Mr. Evolutionist -- our earth was once an incandescent mass which has since cooled down. Now, no life known to science can live in incandescent heat, can it? Thus this earth was once completely void of life because it was perfectly sterile. M. Pasteur's experiments with bacteria resulted in the perfecting of a process for destroying harmful germs in milk. "Pasteurized milk" is now a memorial to his labours. Pasteur demonstrated that by heating liquids you destroyed in them every vestige of life. Boiled water, for instance, became sterile; and if afterwards all outside contamination was prevented, that water could never produce life by "spontaneous generation." And even you, Mr. Evolutionist, would not like to suggest that you could get life from sterile water, now would you? Especially in view of what Professor Huxley said about, Pasteur's experiment. He said:
Therefore we cannot allow your claim that life came through spontaneous generation in a sterile earth. It is not true -- and it is not scientific! A DESPERATE EXPLANATION So, then, life on earth once was not, but now is: life both multiform and teeming fills earth, sea and sky. If spontaneous generation has received its coup de grace by Pasteur -- where, pray gentle evolutionist, has life come from? What outside agency caused it? for an outside agency is demanded by the law of logic; yes, and -- we are sorry to have to rub it in-by the laws of science also, the scientists being our witnesses. You are aware of your desperate difficulty and -- it is said -- "desperate needs demand desperate measures", so that, in order to avoid an inevitable conclusion, you are prepared now with the last despairing suggestion that "protoplasm already formed and living floated to earth from some other planet." How very ingenious and -- how very unscientific! Come now, tell us, have you forgotten your Newton? Do you not remember that he laid down the following principle which has since become a law:
We hope that you do not mind being reminded; you should not, when you are so fond of "scientific fact" and show such an aversion to "theoloical fancy." Of course. it would be superflous to tell you, but for the unlearned reader we would say, that Newton's formula reduced to plain, untechnical English means that this last wild suggestion of the evolutionist's is PALPABLY ABSURD AND SCIENTIFICALLY IMPOSSIBLE. THE CREDULITY OF UNBELIEF No! No! Mr. Evolutionist, it simply will not do, not even to deceive poor uneducated laymen. But, you know, even if -- for the sake of argument -- we were disposed to be generous and allowed your plea of "planetary protoplasm," even that would not help you a tiny bit, because you have still not answered the question or solved the problem. What you have done is to transport the difficulty to Mars or Jupiter or Uranus. But even there the question re-emerges. How do you account for life appearing unaided from perfect sterility? We say -- and we have Pasteur and Huxley on our side -- that it just cannot be done, no, not even by professional dishonesty. And so do you not think it would be more becoming if in future you did not talk quite so airily about disbelieving things outside your experience? Especially if you intend still to cling desperately to a belief in greater miracles than the Christian was ever required to believe. You know the kind -- slime "deciding" to get legs, blood and brain. Dear me, your arguments may have a certain amount of shallow subtlety, but they are very inconsistent. The fact is, Mr. Evolutionist, you are an advocate for a poor, a very poor, cause. We believe it is a lost, an irretrievably lost cause. You are doing your best with a bad case and your troubles are not over yet -- but we hope that you are not counting too much on a favourable verdict from a discerning jury. NO PERPETUAL MOTION So, in further pursuit of our inquiry, we would ask you, Mr. Evolutionist, Have you ever considered that in your professed zeal to avoid the errors of the "credulous Christian" and to be "strictly scientific" you are being grossly unscienitific? Do you not see that the logical outcome of your reasoning is to give us the greater springing from the less, whereas your sages have unanimously declared against such a principle? A pound weight, they say, cannot lift a pound weight, because action and reaction are only equal. Every cause must be greater than the observed effect. Your principle, logically applied, would give us one pound of energy lifting two pounds of weight -- and streams rising higher than their founts. Also, perpetual motion would be capable of practical demonstration whereas science shows it to be but a futile dream. But there -- why go on? You know these things better than we do; and your "planetary origin" of living protoplasm was just a try-on. The truth, the unassailable (because scientific) truth, was beautifully stated by Lord Kelvin, who wrote:
If that is true, and it is beyond all successful contradiction, then antecedent uncreate life is a necessity -- an indispensable necessity. THAT LIFE WE HAVE IN GOD; AND -- ONLY IN GOD. A STOLEN START And so you see, even when the evolutionists allow untold millions of years for development, even when they choose the microscopic amoeba for its smallness and simplicity in order to make it easy for us to "imagine things," even then they have still miserably failed to make out a reasonable case. At least that is how we feel. You must, of course, answer for yourself. In order that you may be even better able to answer, we could grant the evolutionists their stolen start. This is, of course, like a man stealing an egg and then claiming to account for the ensuing chicken! But, even allowing this, there is yet another insurmountable obstacle in the way. We refer to the law which demonstrates that a parent can only transmit to its offspring its own inherent qualities-at least so the scientists say. Evolution, on the contrary, requires the parents to develop post-natal characteristics in order to perpetuate them in their children, so that the children in their turn may further improve upon them. In this way, after a long time, and in the manner they are so fond of describing, the evolutionists affirm that amoeba became fish, fish be came lizards, lizards became mammals and monkeys and men. Yes, and all this by acquired changes handed on and to think that they cannot believe in miracles! Isn't it wonderful? MENDELISM But now for our story. About the middle of the last century, Gregor Mendel, Abbot of Brunn, carried out very exhaustive experiments over a number of years with sweet peas. Different varieties were crossed and the results carefully recorded. In 1865 Mendel published the findings of his patient labours, although not until 1900 did his book attract greater attention. Today, however, Mendel's teaching is acknowledged as authoritative on the subject of "Heredity." Indeed the laws of inheritance are now known as "Mendelism." His experiments with sweet peas have since been confirmed by experiments with guinea pigs. We will not go into the technical details which might obscure the point that we are endeavouring to establish; we will, instead, allow Professor Bateson to sum up for us the principles established by Mendel. He says:
Now this inheritance of acquired characteristics is not just an unimportant detail, but A VITAL DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION. Indeed its importance was so great to Herbert Spencer, a fervent evolutionist, that he wrote:
Spencer thus makes the issue very simple; for we have no difficulty in proving that ACQUIRED CHARACTERISTICS CANNOT BE INHERITED, and, consequently, of demonstrating evolution to be untrue. Dr. Morton, for instance, writes:
Then we have the famous Professor Bateson quoted by Sir A. Fleming as saying: -
But here again long after a theory is repudiated by the scientists the public still fondly clings to it -- those, that is, who are sufficiently interested, like the rationalist or atheist, the existence of whose very creed depends on bolstering up evolution. For the rest of the public we think apathy best describes their mental condition. But there are still many prepared to think and act if they only get a lead; may this book be a means of helping such to clearer thinking on these vital subjects which in the final upshot concern matters of life and death. And now, in further illustration of our hereditary point, and also of the public lag of which we have spoken, we quote the words of Professor Sir E. Poulton (an ardent evolutionist):
With this agree the words of Dr. Karl V. Frisch, Professor of Munich University, who recently wrote:
So another law of experimental science confirms the multiplication "after their kind" of Genesis, chapter 1. BEE MATHEMATICIANS Before leaving this subject of inheritance of acquired characters, we would like to consider briefly the subject of the honey-bee. There are three types in a hive: The drone, or male bee, whose duties begin and end with mating the queen bee, and who, having fulfilled his function, is killed off, as a useless consumer of good honey, by the worker bees. Next is the queen bee, of which there is only one to each colony; her work is absolutely confined to egg laying -- hundreds and thousands of them -- under the guidance and control of the worker bees. Then we have the largest and most important type, the worker bee; this bee is neuter-sex, a kind of sterile female. Our reason for telling you all these details will become apparent later. The amazing activity and skill of the worker bee is proverbial. The construction of the honeycomb in which the honey is stored has arrested the attention of profound mathematicians. At first they were struck by its remarkable symmetry; then by the unique method whereby the floor junction of three cells on one side of the comb is utilised for the floor of an opposite cell. One mathematician set to work to analyse the bees' work, to see whether mathematics could suggest a way of saving wax without impairing the strength of the comb. Much painstaking work at last led him to the conclusion that although the bees were uncannily accurate, they were still just a decimal point wrong. Time passed and other mathematicians worked on this recondite problem with the result -- the bees' mathematics were found to be perfect. THE BEE WAS RIGHT ALL THE TIME AND THE LEARNED AND HIGHLY COMPETENT SCHOLAR WAS -- WRONG. Darwin found this but another obstacle in the way of his plausible theory. He says in "Origin of Species," page 124:
Or again:
Now the mathematician acquired his lore by many years of grinding study, having, at his disposal the finest instrument experimentally known -- the human brain. That mathematician's child is born bereft of any of his father's calculating abilities: he will have to learn them by the same hard process. Why? BECAUSE ACQUIRED CHARACTERISTICS CANNOT BE INHERITED. "THE HAND THAT MADE US IS DIVINE" Now here is the important point. How does the bee, which a few weeks before is a diminutive egg, know how to build a mathematically perfect cell? The answer is, rightly, instinct. But whence the instinct? Not from its father, the drone; he never touched a piece of cell-building wax in his life. He is no more capable of building a comb than you or I. The same may be said of the bee's mother, the queen. And so the bee did not inherit its father's or its mother's building, ability, for thev have none. Yet a few weeks from birth THEY HAVE SOLVED A RECONDITE AND PROFOUND PROBLEM WHICH HAS TAXED THE ABILITIES OF EMINENT MATHEMATICIANS. Finally, these worker bees cannot pass on their knowledge to their offspring-because they never have any; they are all, without exception, sterile. Mr. Darwin, aware of this staggering fact, seeks to explain it away by a prolixity of "may well supposes" and "we may infers," which finally leave the reader suspended in the air. Dear reader, in all this great and amazing universe which, to use Sir Oliver Lodge's words, is "a universe shoutingly full of design, plan, intention, purpose, reason," this bee -- this wonderful, amazing little honey-bee -- surely raises his voice loudly in proclaiming: "THE HAND THAT MADE US IS DIVINE." That is the answer to all the why's and wherefore's of life. Evolution is no answer; and when it tries to give one, it simply makes itself ridiculous. Paley has written a wonderful work called "Natural Theology" in which he develops the argument of design in nature as proving the handiwork of God. He has done it effectively and, we believe, unanswerably. Men like Darwin and Huxley knew of Paley's great work, and more than once make uncomfortable reference to it as if aware of its silent condemnation of their foolishness. Huxley made a very weak reference to it on one occasion. Paley, in order to reason by analogy, imagines a man finding a watch. Having never seen one before, he examines its wheels, springs, moving hands and transparent face. The man, clearly perceiving design and contrivance to have been at work, rightly concludes that the watch had a maker who designed its mechanism. Perceiving Paley's irresistible logic, but resenting the end to which his argument was directed--the design of God in nature -- the great Professor T. H. Huxley was betrayed into writing like a stubborn schoolboy the following:
"WRITTEN IN A MADHOUSE" Is it not remarkable? And to think that it was written by a professor. We are reminded of the words of a contemporary of Darwin who, after reading the explanation of how the eye evolved, said:
Huxley, in his effort to get out of a corner which he felt to be tight, is caused to postulate a miracle in order to explain a wonder. Yes, Paley has them all in a cleft stick. Their best weapon against, Paley is the one they use with good effect against the Bible: Ignore him! But be, like the Bible, will not be ignored. He is a skeleton in their cupboard, and he worries them. "A revolving barrel!" the father of a watch -- revolving fiddlesticks! Now while on the subject of insects, another insect, this time a fly known as Drosophila melanogaster, has contributed his share to the anti-evolution evidence of recent years. This fly is a quick breeding variety: about twenty-five generations in a year. Since 1910, Mr. Dewar tells us in "A Challenge to Evolutionists," scientists have been using every modern device, even X-rays, in an attempt to change this fly into something else. A FAIR TEST They have, tip till now, had 800 generations on which to make their concentrated efforts. This means that similar experiments conducted on human beings would occupy about 20,000 years. A fair test, is it not? Well, what has happened to the 800th descendant of Drosophila melanogaster? Like the pigeons and the apples, varieties have been produced; but he is still -- simply and only -- Drosophila melanogaster. And so we can round off and emphasize this important confirmation of our contention: that although variations of species can occur, change of species can never occur. Let the following quotations fix this anti-evolution truth for us:
Or again, from the same book (page 45):
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