Beyond the Gene - Cytoplasmic Inheritance and the Struggle for Authority in Genetics - J. Sapp (Oxford, 1987) WW

283 Pages·1987·17.98 MB·English

Beyond the Gene

Monographs on the History and
Philosophy of Biology

RICHARD BURIAN, RICHARD BURKHARDT, JR.,
RICHARD LEWONTIN, JOHN MAYNARD SMITH

EDITORS

The Cuvier-Geoffroy Debate: French Biology
in the Decades Before Darwin

TOBY A. APPEL

Beyond the Gene: Cytoplasmic Inheritance and
the Struggle for Authority in Genetics

JAN SAPP

Controlling Life: Jacques Loeb and the
Engineering Ideal in Biology

PHILIP J. PAULY

Beyond the Gene
Cytoplasmic Inheritance and
the Struggle for Authority
in Genetics

JAN SAPP

New York
Oxford
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
1987

Oxford University Press

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Copyright © 1987 by Oxford University Press, Inc.

Published by Oxford University Press, Inc.,
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Sapp, Jan.
Beyond the gene.
(Monographs on the history and philosophy of biology)
Originally presented as the author's thesis (doctoral—University of Montreal)
Bibliography: p.
1. Cytoplasmic inheritance. I. Title.
II. Series.
QH452.S27
1987
575.1'09
86-12845
ISBN 0-19-504206-9

2 4 6 8 9 7 5 3 I

Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper

To Carole

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Acknowledgments

This book is based on my doctoral dissertation carried out under the supervision
of Camille Limoges and submitted to the University of Montreal in 1984. I owe
much to Camille and to many others who helped in the creation of this work. I
am particularly delighted in thanking Carole McKinnon who accompanied me and
gave me unending support throughout all phases of this project. David Nanney
and Richard Burian gave encouragement, valuable advice, and generous com-
mentary on each of the chapters of this work.
Mrs. Ruth Sonneborn kindly invited me into her home at Bloomington, Indiana,
and allowed me to search through and quote from letters in T. M. Sonneborn's
papers. Janine Beisson made me her guest at the Centre de Genetique Moleculaire
du C.N.R.S. at Gif-sur-Yvette and gave me access to Boris Ephrussi's papers. I
am happy to thank my Aunt Olive Cassidy for lending me her beautiful cottage
in Woods Hole, which allowed me to spend a summer near the excellent library
of the Marine Biological Laboratory. I also appreciate the help of the staffs at the
Rockefeller Archive Center in Tarrytown, New York, and at the Bibliothek und
Archiv der Max-Planck-Gesellschaftat Berlin.
For interviews and correspondence by mail I have great pleasure in thanking
Andre Adoutte, Geoffrey Beale, Jean Brachet, Ruth Dippell, Joseph Frankel,
Nicholas Gillham, John Jinks, Joshua Lederberg, Andre Lwoff, Georg Melchers,
John Preer, Marcus Rhoades, Ruth Sager, Piotr Slonimski, Ruth Sonneborn, and
Diter von Wettstein. I also thank Guido Pontecorvo and Barbara McClintock for
giving me permission to quote passages from their letters and Paul Harvey for
those of C. D. Darlington.
Many friends and colleagues have provided intellectual support, and in partic-
ular, I would like to mention Randall Albury, Garland Allen, Alberto Cambrosio,
Stephen Cross, Richard Gillespie, Yves Gingras, Tim Jordan, Peter Keating, Ho-
mer Le Grand, Robert Olby, and David Turnbull.
I would also like to express my gratitude to Bob Lee, who first introduced me
to cytoplasmic genetics as a student at Dalhousie University, and to Rita Hutch-
ison, who typed and retyped this manuscript.
This research was aided by a grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities
Research Council of Canada in 1981. Financial assistance for typing was received

viii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

from the Faculty of Arts Research and Development Scheme, University of Mel-
bourne, 1984.
I am grateful to Reidel Publishing Company for giving me permission to use
materials from:
Jan Sapp, "The Struggle for Authority in the Field of Heredity, 1900-1932:
New Perspectives on the Rise of Genetics," Journal of the History of Biology 16,
no. 3, fall 1983, pp. 311-342. Copyright © 1983 by Reidel Publishing Company,
Dordrecht, Holland.
Jan Sapp, "Inside the Cell: Genetic Methodology and the Case of the Cyto-
plasm," in J. A. Schuster and R. R. Yeo, eds., The Politics and Rhetoric of
Scientific Method. 1986, pp. 167-202. Copyright © 1986 by Reidel Publishing
Company, Dordrecht, Holland.

Contents

Introduction
xi

Chapter 1. Defining the Organism
3
The Organism as a Chinese Box, 3
"The Organism as a Whole," 6
Compromising the Chromosomes, 16
More Parts to the Whole, 25
Defending the Chromosomes, 26

Chapter 2. Constructing Heredity
32
Disciplines in Conflict, 33
Genotype/Phenotype: A Discursive Tactic, 36
The Rise of American Genetics and the Determinist Gene, 45

Chapter 3. Challenging the Nuclear Monopoly of the Cell in
Germany
54
The Conditions for the Possibility, 56
The Gradual Disappearance of Victor J olios, 60
"Subsumed Under a Single Formula": The Case of Richard
Goldschmidt, 65
Hans Spemann: The Magnetic Order of Cells, 68
Assembling the Plasmon, 72
"The Scotch Verdict, 'Not Proven,'" 80

Chapter 4. T. M. Sonneborn: Making Plasmagenes in America
87
Learning to Dissent, 90
Plasmagene Theory, 98
"1 Always Liked Unorthodoxy," 105
The Way to Power, 109
From Plasmagenes to Human Serfdom, 115

Chapter 5. Boris Ephrussi and the Birth of Genetics in France
123
The Nco-Lamarckian Hegemony, 124
From Embryology to Physiological Genetics, 128