Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
of motors designed to produce work - they are not one-time causal agents but
must be continually able to produce work:
'Continuous work performance can only be achieved by means of suitable
work-performing systems characterized by changes occurring through a series of
constrained motions, such that the inner organizational characteristics of the system
remain unchanged'.
(p. 68)
In order to maintain the system unchanged while still performing work, cyclic
organization is required, and this he contends is true of both humanly designed
mechanical systems and biological systems:
In an internal combustion engine the explosion moves the piston from its
original location, but the engine is so constructed that the displacement occurs
on a constrained path and after performing work the piston returns to its start-
ing position. The ability of non-mechanical systems to perform continuous
work also depends on cyclic processes or, as they are often call for simplicity,
cycles.
(p. 72)
In the case of the internal combustion engine, the component parts are (rel-
atively) permanently fixed. As Gánti puts it, they exhibit a 'geometrical struc-
ture of fixed materials'. While there is some material fixity in living systems, for
the most part organization involves what he terms a 'soft geometrical structure'
(pp. 64-65).
17
'Firstly, it is the chemical motor. The cytoplasm contains the system transforming the chemical energy
of nutrients into useful work. Secondly, it is the homeostatic subsystem compensating the influences
of the external world by dynamically responding to them. Therefore, the cytoplasm is responsible for
the dynamic and organizational responsibility of the cell. However, it is also responsible for sensibility
and excitability, since the accomplishment of homeostasis is nothing more than excitability. To achieve
all of these it is necessary that processes in the cytoplasm should occur in a regulated order and thus
that the cytoplasm carries the property of regulation and is considered a soft system. Finally, the raw
materials necessary for the growth and reproduction of all three subsystems (cytoplasm, cytomem-
brane, and genetic substance) are also delivered by the cytoplasm; thus it is a self-reproducing soft
system'.
(pp. 83-84)
In locating the motor in the cytoplasm, Gánti is reflecting a pre-Mitchell conception of the critical chemical
reactions. According to Mitchell's chemiosmotic account, a central part of the mechanism transforming
chemical energy into ATP is the inner mitochondrial membrane, across which a proton gradient is established
that then provides the energy for ATP synthesis.
17
Soft organization is central, as per Gánti, for cell life: 'Now what makes the cell living? The soft organization
of its inner events and occurrences. Thus, if we are looking for the fundamental laws, for the principle of life,
we have to establish the connections of this soft organization' (p. 66).
