CREATION OF LIFE.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 5145, 29 June 1927, Page 3

CREATION OF LIFE.

WILL MAN EVER SUCCEED ?

IF THERE IS NO SOUL HE MAY.

Will human skill in the laboratory ever be able to create life ? The view of a Sydney scientist is that it might some- day, but that the information at present at the disposal of invesigators is so inadequate that this generation is hardly likely to witness what would be the greatest discovery in .the world’s history. Speculation on the old-age subject has been provoked by a new cable message giving the substance of a remarkable address by Sir Oliver Lodge at Oxford. Sir Oliver predicted that it was possible, even probable, that human skill in the laboratory would some day succeed in creating a ma.ss of artificial protoplasm, which, on being subjected to suitable . treatment, would exhibit forms of life. Many, he said, >vould fear such a conclusion as. conflicting with religious ideas, and such a life would not come in existence without an antecedent life, and there- was nothing in the process to which exception could be taken. Discussing the. matter Dr. Murray, of Sydney University, said that, boiled down the process described by Sir Oliver Lodge was the creation of life by chemical and physical means. _ “That certa.inly won’t happen in our time,” he said. “Our knowledge is very limited, and is totally incapable of making any attempt to manufacture protoplasm now. With further information we might be able to try, but there is nobody in the world attempting to make prctoplasm at present.” MANUFACTURING LIFE. “If life consists of anything more than matter, as we- know it,” he continued, “and there are no other forces than the forces of physics and chemistry, we might then be able td manufacture life some day. “But if life does contain something which is totally different from matter ; if anything supernatural, such as a soul, is necessary, and there are other forces which are quite different from those of chemistry and physics, the-n we shall 'never be able to create life.

“It might be' found,” he added, “that life can exist, irrespective of whether there is such a thing as a soul or not. If life were created by man it would not necessarily disprove the existence of a soul. “No man of science,” Dr. Murray concluded, “is justified at present in having an opinion one way or another about the soul on the scientific evidence available.”