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| Program > Biomedical Sciences in Social Context |
| Programme > Le contexte social des sciences biomédicales |
| Andrew Reynolds
(University
College of Cape Breton) Metazoic Polities and Cellular Citizens: The Cell-State Metaphor in 19th Century Cell Biology |
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In 1861 the German physiologist Ernst Brücke (1819-92) dubbed individual cells the “Elementarorganismen.” This encouraged some scientists and philosophers to think of human beings as Leviathan-like colonies of these “elementary organisms” come together to form giant “cell-states” or “social colonies.” The founder of cellular pathology, Rudolf Virchow (1821-1902), referred to multicellular organisms (metazoa) as “cell-republics”, “democratic cell-states”, and “commonwealths.” Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919), the German biologist and philosopher, also made frequent use of this type of analogy. His evolutionary accounts of the origin of multicellular organisms from unicellular ancestors (amoebae) pays homage to natural selection and to radical liberal sentiment. These political metaphors naturally reflect the authors’ political inclinations. (Virchow was dismissed from his hospital teaching position for actively participating in the 1848 uprising in Berlin. Haeckel was a radical liberal who opposed the repressive and religious aristocracy of the Prussian Junkers.) Although these metaphors seem to reduce human beings to social colonies of independent cells, there is also a principle of holism involved. After all what makes all these independent cells obey the broader interests of their respective tissues, organs, and organisms as a whole? Were similar types of political metaphors used to describe cells and multicellular organisms in a more liberal and democratic country like Britain? The prevalence of Milne-Edwards' "division of labour" idea will be discussed, as well as the historical roots of the colonial view of complex organisms in Lorenz Oken and Leibniz.
Dept.
of Philosophy and Religious Studies |
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