The nature of nervous processes / by W. McDougall.

  • McDougall, W.
Date:
[1906?]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The nature of nervous processes / by W. McDougall. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    neurone from whatever point may be excited. As to the nature of this liberated energy, I do not think we need feel bound to show that this liberated energy is identical in character with electricity, or any other form of energy known outside the body, before we accept its existence. I think we may with advantage attempt to describe it in terms of its own behaviour, allowing our expectations to be guided by our knowledge of those forms of energy with which it seems most nearly analogous. This conception of the charging of the excited neurone with liberated energy is the central feature of my view. It is, 1 think, very important clearly to distinguish this liberated energy from the store of potential chemical energy resident in every part of the resting neurone. Hence it is important to have a name for the fixation of this concept, and 1 have proposed to call it neurin (perhaps unfortunately, in view of the fact that neurine is already the name of one of the waste products of nervous activit}'). However, I may continue to use this convenient name for this evening at least. This conception enables us, it seems to me, to give satis- factory explanation of several fundamental facts, for which the current views do not adequately account. It gives us an insight into the way one neurone plays upon another. We know' that there is what is called lost time in the transmission of excitenient through a chain of two or more neurones, i. e. that the transmission occupies a considerably longer time than does the passage of the impulse through a nerve-fibre of the same length as the chain of neurones. There are many good reasons for regarding the synapse, i.e. the place of junction of two neurones, as a place where the process of transmission meets with some special resistance, and that it is at this point that the loss of time is determined. According to my view, the charge of free energy, or neurin, in the stimulated neurone must reach a certain potential before it can overcome this resistance, and when this potential D 2