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Copyright © 2020 by Jeremy England

Cover design by Ann Kirchner

Cover image Cover image © Daboost / Shutterstock.com; illustration
drawn from A snake, dark brown in colour. Watercolour, ca. 1795.
Credit: Wellcome Collection. Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
Cover copyright © 2020 Hachette Book Group, Inc.

Hachette Book Group supports the right to free expression and the
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Basic Books
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First Edition: September 2020

Published by Basic Books, an imprint of Perseus Books, LLC, a

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: England, Jeremy, author.
Title: Every life is on fire : how thermodynamics explains the origins
of living things / Jeremy England.
Description: First edition. | New York : Basic Books, 2020. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020003859 | ISBN 9781541699014 (hardcover) |
ISBN 9781541699007 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Life—Origin—Popular works. | Thermodynamics—
Popular works.
Classification: LCC QH325 .E64 2020 | DDC 576.8/3—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020003859

ISBNs: 978-1-5416-9901-4 (hardcover), 978-1-5416-9900-7 (ebook)

E3-20200820-JV-NF-ORI
 CONTENTS

COVER
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
DEDICATION

ONE | INTRODUCTION
TWO | STAFF AND SNAKE
THREE | SNOW AND DUST
FOUR | RIVER AND BLOOD
FIVE | MOUNTAIN AND SWORD
SIX | FLAME AND TREE
SEVEN | WIND AND BREATH
EIGHT | VOICE AND WORD

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
DISCOVER MORE
REFERENCES AND NOTES
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
For my Miriam
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|ONE| INTRODUCTION

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and
the earth was formless and void.
—GENESIS 1:1–2

THE PUZZLE BREAKS DOWN AS FOLLOWS: EVERY LIVING THING we know of

sprang from another living thing, yet we have reason to think that
there was no life at all anywhere when the world first got going.1
This observation implies that the first life there ever was grew from
stuff that was not alive, and the question is whether this grand event
occurred mysteriously, in a manner incomprehensible to the laws of
physics and chemistry as we know them, or took place in a series of
steps that we can understand. In other words, how did life begin?
Scientists, curious observers of the natural world, and a great many
other sorts of contemplative seekers struggling with the human
condition may all agree on the importance of this question, yet much
confusion and disagreement reigns about what kind of answer we
are even looking for.
Some biophysicists might like to know which specific types of
atoms collided with each other in order to form the first
biomolecules, while others take for granted that something like this
must have happened, and focus their inquiry instead on judging the
likelihood of such an event under various conditions. For that matter,
what even counts as life, and what doesn’t? Was the early presence
of life in the world a gray continuum through which things gradually
progressed over time, or do we insist there must have been one
moment when it burst decisively onto the scene? If the former, how
precisely can we differentiate between something that is alive and
something that isn’t? If the latter, considering that life is good at
doing an impressive number of things, which of them came into
being first? Was it guaranteed to do so, in the same way that ice
always melts in the warm sun, or must it have been sparked by a
freak occurrence, one so rare that our best theory of how things
transpired is no explanation at all? We understand something of why
ice forms when water gets sufficiently cold, or why stars ignite when
gravity is strong enough to squeeze hydrogen gas together, but it is
strangely and marvelously more challenging to articulate the physical
conditions in which nonliving matter is guaranteed to become alive.
Like the skeptical onlooker at a magic show, many of us simply won’t
be satisfied until we get to see how the trick was done.
Tenacious scientific inquiry is not, however, the only reason
people long so much to know something of how life began. A
thoughtful human being—indeed, even a professional scientist
willing to take an honest look in the mirror and examine his or her
own sentiments carefully—may admit that the reason the question
has such a command over us is that it expresses a shared yearning.
The search for meaning and purpose begins with wondering where
we came from and what we are part of, and seeking an account of
how things began, partly because people use ideas about the past to
decide how to act in the present and the future. If everything
humans are made up of can be found in a pond or a chemistry set,
then what really makes us different? Are humans simply animals, or
something more? Does our existence express the intention of a
Creator who made us in His image, or are we—and all other life—
merely an exotic variety of frost condensed in the razor-thin layer
between ground and sky? Can it be both? Once we start talking in
these terms, the stakes of the argument could hardly be higher.
In this book, we will see that physical science does provide a new
insight into when and how things that are not alive start to become
more lifelike. Living things accomplish a variety of feats that, though
not unique to life, are certainly distinctive of it. For example, they
make copies of themselves, harvest and consume fuel, and
accurately predict the surrounding environment. These processes are
all part and parcel of what it is to be alive, and each of them can be
studied systematically from the perspective of thermodynamics.
Emphasizing recent progress in a rapidly growing offshoot of
thermodynamics known as nonequilibrium statistical mechanics, this
text will build up all the concepts needed to construct a clear
argument for when and how the physical properties of inanimate
matter might first give rise to the kinds of activities that life is
particularly good at. The key point will be to realize that, just as
living things have specialized properties determined by their genes
that they have inherited from their ancestors, so, too, do collections
of physically interacting particles have specialized properties that
come from the past shapes into which they’ve been assembled. By
continually getting pushed and knocked around by patterns
presented in the environment, matter can undergo a continual
exploration of the space of possible shapes whose rhythm and form
become matched to those patterns in ways that look an awful lot like
living.
If all we aimed to do here were to make new physical sense of
life’s distinctiveness, that would be plenty. And yet, even more so
than most other scientific topics, this one surely demands a broader
conversation. Whether because one needs to grapple mightily with
the simple, definitional question of what is alive and what is not, or
because arguments about the exceptionality, value, and purpose of
life make up a large part of what people have disagreed and fought
about throughout the ages, it seems thoroughly necessary to put our
examination of the boundary between life and non-life in a suitably
rich philosophical context. There might be more than one way of
doing this well, in principle, but this is where my own deeply felt
personal commitments come to bear. The way I know how to be
most effective and accurate when talking about “big questions” of
the human condition is to ground my understanding in
interpretations of the Hebrew Bible. At the beginning of conceiving
this book, I therefore set to pondering whether the Bible had
anything cogent to say in reaction to the physics I planned to write
about.
What I have been amazed to discover is that the Bible is
particularly interested in the question of how and why matter might
cross from being lifeless to alive, and that it features this subject at
the center of one of its most central narrative moments. As a result,
the biblical text turns out to provide an unexpectedly detailed
conceptual roadmap for the scientific journey we are about to
undertake, one that is useful not only for making physical insights
comprehensible to the intuitions of everyday experience, but
ultimately also in navigating the broader consequences for how we
think about the human condition. Moreover, in what feels to me a
very pleasing side effect of this whole endeavor, we are going to
articulate a way of relating to the Hebrew Bible that combines with
and enriches what science can teach us, instead of seeming to be
incompatible. It is usually taken for granted that the Bible
comprehends little or nothing of what modern science knows about
the natural world; it has even been asserted that progress in
scientific understanding of where life comes from directly undercuts
the credibility and authority of biblical scripture as a path to true
knowledge.2 This book so happens to demonstrate the profound
falsity of that assertion, but not by injecting more argumentation
into an already bloated debate. Instead, engaging with the Bible
presents us with a delightful opportunity to prove the point by
example, for not only does its text seem to be aware of the concepts
needed to think about the emergence of lifelikeness in a physical
material, it even provides a poetic summary of them using imagery
that makes them more relatable and broadly comprehensible.
For me, in this regard, there is a very satisfying harmony here
between the demands of a personal commitment and what simply
does the best job when trying to teach about the physicochemical
ideas contained in this book. An account of how life might emerge
from “dumb, blind” mechanical processes unavoidably will look to
some rhetoricians like a last stake in the heart of the Bible’s account
of creation—not only this, it also risks casting the whole intricate
web of interwoven human lives as a wholly material process that is
devoid of any moral meaning. I therefore have a firm intention to lay
out the discussion in such a way that the relevant commentary
provided by Hebrew scripture never actually appears at loggerheads
with the science in the way that some mistakenly perceive. At the
same time, the way the Bible treats the subject of how matter
comes to life turns out to be wondrously useful as an explanatory
tool, because scripture addresses itself to the unenhanced
perspective of a human being observing and assaying the world with
little beyond his or her five senses. Ideas that are born in the
mathematical realm of statistical thermodynamics can often be
translated into more everyday parlance, but doing so usually
requires reference to tangible examples in that everyday world. In
quite deliberate fashion, the Book of Exodus provides a whole
drawer-full of these examples, and if I do my job right here, then
including them in our discussion is going to make the meaning of the
physical theory clearer to a greater number of readers.
Moses is a lone shepherd in the desert tending sheep when he
encounters a shrub wreathed in marvelous fire, a living thing that
burns brightly without being consumed. The God who reveals
Himself in that moment speaks to Moses of his nation’s ancestry and
the promise of their redemption from slavery, but He also provides
three signs for Moses to bring to the Hebrews in Egypt. The first sign
is a staff that turns into a serpent. The second is a “snowy” growth
on his skin. The last is a mixture of river water and dirt that turns
into blood.
Each of these signs can be read as a comment about the border
between life and non-life. The staff is a lifeless object that
surprisingly transforms into a living creature. The snowy skin is an
anomaly in the boundary between the body of a man (who is alive)
and his surroundings (which are not), and the reference to
snowflakes evokes the idea of an ever-branching edge that is
impossible to trace and thereby fully define. And, of course, the
creation of blood—the liquid essence of life—from more basic,
formless ingredients completes the portrait. Viewed in these terms,
this passage from Exodus hammers home the question of where life
comes from and how we can distinguish it from the inanimate
material background from which it might have emerged.
It is easiest to think of the miraculous signs given to Moses as a
bunch of parlor tricks. Indeed, the text expects this, for when Moses
and his brother Aaron show their mud-blood and transforming
reptilian stick to Pharaoh, the magicians of the Egyptian court are
able to produce the same dazzling effects using their own spells.
Superficially, the passage therefore invites those of us fascinated by
life’s emergence to compare ourselves to the audience at a magic
show. Looking more closely, however, we will discover that these
signs also serve as a surprisingly cogent and detailed guide for
explaining emergent lifelikeness in the language of physics. The
titles for the chapters of this book—2, Staff and Snake; 3, Snow and
Dust; 4, River and Blood; 5, Mountain and Sword; 6, Flame and
Tree; 7, Wind and Breath; and 8, Voice and Word—all come from the
biblical text, and I have paired each one with an accompanying
epigraph that highlights the title theme. These pairings will allow us
to ruminate on the biology and physics of life from a new
perspective. My goal in setting things down in this way is to let this
biblical lexicon provide a rich organizing framework for the separate
ideas in the natural sciences that must be woven together into a
complete account of the origins of living things. By tracing this path,
we will not only get a glimpse of how lifelikeness “gets going” in
material terms, but also, by the end, begin to appreciate how the
Bible seeks to express and comment on such a perspective, so that
our reaction to it stays grounded in a full appreciation of what the
lives we are living have the potential to mean.
Before plunging ahead, however, it will be well worth our while to
state a bit more concretely what kind of answer to the question of
where life came from one could possibly hope to put forward in what
follows. The most straightforward notion of what such a success
could look like would be the perhaps childlike hope that we could
one day make a movie of exactly whichever storied puddle it was
where certain special chemical reactions first happened, and
(crucially!), that we would be able to prove, using data gathered in
the present, that the movie was a faithful model of what took place
in the past.3 There is more than one reason why that kind of
approach is a fantasy, but the most fundamental must certainly be
that we do not have—and cannot ever have—any evidence in the
present day of exactly what happened on Earth however many
billions of years back. Much the same way that both crime scenes
and archaeological digs are ruined irreparably for forensic analysis if
all the clues are allowed to be trampled, tampered with, and
rearranged at random, so, too, must the precursors of the earliest
life have gotten scrambled—only much, much more severely. DNA,
RNA, and proteins are all macromolecules central to how life works
at the subcellular level, and all of them fall to pieces in water on the
time scale of millions of years or less.4 No one is foolish enough to
try to comb the beach sand at Coney Island trying to reconstruct
what a child’s castle might have looked like for a few hours one
summer day a hundred years ago, and reconstructing the molecular
origins of life as we know it by trying to detect its leftover debris is a
fool’s errand.
There is, however, a different kind of approach one can take to
explaining where something came from. The underlying premise of
asking about the origins of life is that there is something here that
needs an explanation, and it is helpful to try to be precise about
what that is. When we go hiking in the mountains and notice a
bunch of rocks at the bottom of a ravine, we are not provoked to ask
how they got there; the same goes for pine cones we step on when
walking under a pine tree. Of course, when I see a pine cone in a
place in which I find it perfectly normal to observe one, I do not
actually know with certainty what the whole history of that particular
cone is; maybe someone actually put it there under the tree by hand
before I arrived. Still, it does not seem out of place, because there is
a perfectly ordinary, observable, and reproducible way to get pine
cones to accumulate under pine trees. They fall there all the time as
part of the normal seasonal ebb and flow of things.
This is the sense in which life seems to demand an explanation of
the sort we might have a hope of constructing. We do not typically
(or really ever) see living things spring from inert, inanimate matter,
and so it seems abnormal to us to imagine it happening as an
explanation for the life we see. Moreover, it is clear to our intuition
that this is not merely an issue of our being unable to wait long
enough. Of course, some processes that seem rare and improbable
on one time scale (like a bolt of lightning on a particular mountain
peak) become near-certainties if we just wait a hundred or a million
times longer. Still, when we look at life, in all of its intricacy, it is
apparent that the simplest of examples of it that we know are so
complexly assembled that you would have to wait the ages of
countless universes before seeing all these parts slapped together
from one random fluke. The exact amount of time it all would have
had to take obviously must have been the consequence of little
details in this or that chemical process that might take a hundred
years under one set of conditions or a million years under another.
Nonetheless, the account we really hunger for—the only kind of
account that could provide an answer that is both testable and (at
least to some degree) satisfying—is for the first assembly of life to
be conceived of as a process that has been decomposed into steps
that can be theoretically understood and experimentally
implemented and observed—in other words, into steps that each
look to us like pine cones falling off trees.
I aim to showcase the beginnings of this sort of an understanding
within these pages. I do not know, and never expect to know,
exactly which molecules did what or when a long, long time ago.
What I do want to propose is that there is a set of ideas, based on a
branch of physics called nonequilibrium thermodynamics, that is
starting to show us how to break the stepwise process of life’s
emergence into comprehensible increments. Once we recognize that
life, through the lens of physics, is an omnibus of specific but
different phenomena with precise physical definitions, we can study
the emergence of these phenomena more in parallel, as little, limited
successes in lifelike self-organization. The more these pieces of the
puzzle can be separately implemented, poked, and tweaked in a
laboratory, the more we can start to relate to them as banal,
tangible bits of the places and timetables we inhabit.
Central to this discussion will be an idea I have called dissipative
adaptation, which essentially is a fancy way of saying that when
matter gets knocked around by the patterns in its surroundings, it
ends up getting stuck in shapes that look specially suited to respond
to those patterns. We are going to have to lay out a number of
different observations about physics and biology in order to build
this idea up a bit more rigorously, but one of the gratifying things
about this kind of science is that it stays very much in contact with
the examples of messy complexity that we encounter in everyday
life. What that means is that, by the time we reach our conclusion,
you may be in the position to test much of what is being claimed
here against the evidence of your own significant experience,
whether that be watching sleet slide down a windshield in cold rain
or observing how salt and pepper grains dance together in a pan of
heated oil.
|TWO| STAFF AND SNAKE

So he threw it to the ground, and it became a serpent.

—EXODUS 4:3

THERE IS JUST SOMETHING OBVIOUSLY REASONABLE ABOUT the following notion:

if all life is built from atoms that obey precise equations we know—
which seems to be true—then the existence of life might just be
some downstream consequence of these laws that we haven’t yet
gotten around to calculating. This is essentially a physicist’s way of
thinking, and to its credit, it has already done a great deal to help us
understand how living things work. Thanks to pioneers like Max
Delbrück, who crossed over from physics to biology in the middle of
the twentieth century, the influence of quantitative analyses from
the physical sciences helped to give rise to mechanistic, molecular
approaches in cell biology and biochemistry that led to many
revolutionary discoveries. Imaging techniques such as X-ray
crystallography, nuclear magnetic resonance, and super-resolution
microscopy have provided a vivid portrait of the DNA, proteins, and
other structures smaller than a single cell that make life tick on a
molecular scale.1 Moreover, by cracking the genetic code, we have
become able to harness the machinery of living cells to do our
bidding by assembling new macromolecules of our own devising. As
we have gained an ever more accurate picture of how life’s tiniest
and simplest building blocks fit together to form the whole, it has
become increasingly tempting to imagine that biology’s toughest
puzzles may only be solved once we figure out how to tackle them
on physics’ terms.
 But approaching the subject of life with this attitude will fail us,
for at least two reasons. The first reason we might call the fallacy of
reductionism. Reductionism is the presumption that any piece of the
universe we might choose to study works like some specimen of
antique, windup clockwork, so that it is easy (or at least eminently
possible) to predict the behavior of the whole once you know the
rules governing how each of its parts pushes on and moves with the
others. The dream of explaining and predicting everything from a
few simple rules has long captured the imagination of many
scientists, particularly physicists. And, in all fairness, a great deal of
good science has been propelled forward by the hunger of some
researchers for a more completely reductive explanation of the
phenomenon that interests them. After all, there are things in the
world that can be understood as the result of known interactions
among various simpler pieces. From the rise and fall of ocean tides
with the moon’s gravitational tug, to the way that some genetic
diseases can be traced to molecular events arising from the altered
chemistry of one tiny patch on a protein’s surface, sometimes the
thing we are studying looks like a comprehensible sum of its parts.
Alas, the hope that all scientific puzzles would be conquered
through reductionism was more popular with physicists before the
twentieth century rolled around. Since then, multiple Nobel laureates
in physics (and countless others as well) have written lucidly about
how and why reductionist thinking often fails.2 You cannot use
Newton’s laws or quantum theory to predict the stock market, nor to
predict even much simpler properties of “many-particle” systems,
such as a turbulent fluid or a supercooled magnet.3 In all such
cases, the physical laws supposedly “governing” it all are swamped
with the immensity of what we do not know, cannot measure, or
lack the ability to compute directly. As we shall see, physics still
works on such systems, but not solely by starting with fundamental
equations governing the microscopic parts.
The second mistake in how people have viewed the boundary
between life and non-life is still rampant in the present day and
originates in the way we use language. A great many people imagine
that if we understand physics well enough, we will eventually
comprehend what life is as a physical phenomenon in the same way
we now understand how and why water freezes or boils. Indeed, it
often seems people expect that a good enough physical theory could
become the new gold standard for saying what is alive and what is
not. What I will argue here, however, is that this approach fails to
acknowledge that our own role in giving names to the phenomena of
the world precedes our ability to say with any clarity what it means
to even call something alive. A physicist who wants to devise
theories of how living things behave or emerge has to start by
making intuitive choices about how to translate the characteristics of
the examples of life we know into a physical language. After one has
done so, it quickly becomes clear that the boundary between what is
alive and what is not is something that already got drawn at the
outset, through a different way of talking than physics provides. The
proper goal for a physicist’s account of things should therefore be to
find a way of describing that boundary in precise physical terms, so
that we can get new insight into how matter might be gotten to
move from one side of the borderline to the other.

TO SOME DEGREE, A HOPEFUL INCLINATION TOWARD REDUCTIONISM is expressed

in the very asking of the question of where life comes from. We look
at a living organism and cannot help but wonder whether such
breathtaking success in form and function could simply be the result
of a bunch of more basic pieces bouncing off of each other like
simple and predictable billiard balls. Is there something more in the
machine other than all its dumbly vibrating parts? If there isn’t,
shouldn’t that mean we can eventually understand how the whole
thing fits together? Put another way, wouldn’t any proposed
explanation for the emergence of life have to break it all down into a
series of rationalized steps, where each next one follows sensibly
and predictably from the last? If so, how is that not the same thing
as saying we want to reduce life to a choreographed performance
directed by a simple, calculable set of known physical rules?
As I’ve said, it must be granted that physicists have already
identified some rules that prove to make highly accurate predictions
in systems that once seemed hopelessly and mysteriously
complicated. Thanks to the ideas of people like Kepler and Newton,
the motion of heavenly bodies is now an open book, and our ability
to compute where these bright lights in the sky go is such an
unremarked banality that it is now possible to get an extensive
education in physics at many a great university without ever delving
into the specialty sideshow of rigorous orbital mechanics. Imagine,
though, being a brilliant natural philosopher at any point during most
of human history, and marveling at the seemingly intractable
complexity of how the sun, moon, and stars seem to continually
rearrange themselves in the firmament as the days and years pass.
The idea that a terse pair of equations describing gravitation and
motion under force could bring distant galaxies, the wandering
planets, and boxes dangling by coiled springs all into one
comprehensive theoretical frame must have been inconceivable even
to the greatest genius of every era for thousands of years. The
scope and significance of the revolution that started with Newton
and his contemporaries are hard to overstate.
And then came the twentieth century! Einstein began with
contemplating the equations that describe the motion of light, and
through sheer force of insight ended up reimagining the origins of
gravity, so as to finally explain the last remaining puzzle of planetary
motion that Newton could not touch (namely, Mercury). Meanwhile,
Erwin Schrödinger’s quantum mechanical wave equation unlocked
the atom, providing an elegant quantitative explanation for the
colors of light emitted from various types of electrified gases. This
was a bizarre, unintuitive theory of the mathematical inner workings
of objects too small to be seen or touched, yet it could still match
experimental measurements with stunning accuracy. In the wake of
these grand scientific victories, one might forgive the odd scientist or
two for feeling like all unpredictability might eventually be swept
away as newer and ever more brilliant theories arrived.
On closer inspection, however, this hit parade of wins for
reductive theoretical science reveals some bias. What these and
many other examples of successful physical theories have in
common is that they perform best when trying to predict a well-
isolated piece of the world described by a relatively simple
mathematical formulation involving a few different things one can
measure—the one-planet solar system, the single, solitary hydrogen
atom, and so on. In each of these cases, the theory succeeds by
filtering out the rest of the universe and focusing on a few equations
that accurately describe the relationships among a small number of
physical quantities. By the same token, looking a little more closely
at these same models gives us some appreciation of where reductive
thinking is going to falter.
Sometimes our models disappoint us because they fail to capture
something fundamental to the behavior of the system they are trying
to describe. For example, as referenced above, the sun’s gravity is
felt so strongly by the planet Mercury that Newton’s Law of
Gravitation was notoriously insufficient for predicting the observed
shape of the orbit; only with the added subtlety of General Relativity
could that hole be plugged. Still, there are a great many situations in
weaker gravitational fields where Newton works quite adequately, in
principle. Remarkably, though, even when the model we are using is
a perfectly accurate statement of the rules by which the system of
interest behaves, the problem of prediction can still be a slippery
one.
With only one star and one planet, the equations of motion are
beautifully supple and, after a little effort where pen meets paper,
yield precisely the Keplerian laws that planets are observed to obey.
Predicting the shape of a planet’s orbit when it’s all alone is
therefore thought of as being relatively easy. The task gets more
difficult, however, when you add just one more orbiting object, and
stumble into the famous three-body problem, which no longer
admits a solution in terms of exact equations on a blackboard.
Tangling with such a system forces one either to use mathematical
tricks, in order to approximate an answer that can still be derived by
hand, or to employ computers, for “brute-force” tabulation of
numerical results. Moreover, the longer one studies, the more it
becomes clear that the instances where everything is beautifully
tractable and can be written out from start to finish on a cocktail
napkin are the rare exceptions rather than the general rule. Every so
often, special symmetries and particularities of cases like the one-
planet solar system make for an elegant resolution of things in a few
lines of equations. The norm, however, is that systems with many
different interacting components have to be solved by a computer
program. With information-processing power as great as it is today,
it is possible to make highly precise and accurate Newtonian
predictions about orbital motions involving many more than three
celestial bodies. Nonetheless, the general and highly influential
lesson from orbital mechanics, ever since it was first developed as a
theoretical field, is that systems with more pieces are harder to
study than systems with fewer pieces, and by making and testing
predictions about the behavior of simpler cases, we can better
understand the laws that govern the complex ones.
According to what we have said so far, though, reductionism
could still be correct—it might just be a bit dull and costly to find out
the answer by waiting for a computer cluster to spit one out. Armed
with such tools, an extreme reductionist would say that all
theoretical science has to proceed as follows: start with the
fundamental laws that seem to govern the separate little pieces of
the world and that do well describing small groups of interacting
objects, and then groan and strain to keep adding more variables to
the calculation, in order to predict what more complicated systems
are supposed to do. Several centuries ago, when the total absence
of computers meant that no one understood very much about their
limitations, it may have been more reasonable to imagine that all
successful theoretical predictions would follow this same pattern. In
the past two hundred years, however, a great portion of the science
that has been done has worked in a different way from what had
been expected, for reasons both practical and profound.
Consider, for example, a beaker of liquid water that has been
placed on a hot plate: common knowledge would say there is a
certain temperature above which we expect water to boil off into
steam. For the reductionist, this boiling temperature depends on a
short list of fundamental things we already know about water at the
microscopic level. Water molecules are made of even tinier particles
called electrons and nuclei, and we know a lot about how much they
all weigh and what kinds of forces they exert on each other.
Consequently, the Schrödinger equation provides an excellent model
of what allows these components to bind together into what we call
H2O. In that case, you might say that to find out the boiling
temperature, you just need to write down a Schrödinger equation
describing the trillion trillion water molecules filling a vessel of water,
and then work out the probability of those molecules staying in the
vessel depending on how fast they are jiggling around.
This brute-force approach fails spectacularly. First of all, it faces
an obvious logistical hurdle: even with state-of-the-art
supercomputers, the amount of computing muscle required to
handle the time scales, particle numbers, and spatial resolution
needed to tell the difference between vapor and liquid, using an
exact treatment of quantum theory, dwarfs what we currently can
manage by many orders of magnitude. The insufficiency of our
computing power is so dire, in fact, that it is tempting to speak
bluntly and admit we will never build a computer big enough
because it would not fit inside our galaxy. Brute-force attempts to
bridge from the nanoscale to the macro-sized world of our
experience will lie beyond our reach for the foreseeable future, and
possibly forever.
There are, however, work-arounds. Perfect precision in every
detail is not needed in order to wring correct answers from the
reductionist approach, and we may be able to get away with
judicious approximations. Indeed, most, if not all, attempts to use
quantum mechanics to compute the properties of molecules these
days depend on well-established tricks for making the math simpler
by sacrificing a bit of accuracy. These methods can give decent
agreement with many quantities measured in real molecules, at least
up to a certain number of decimal places. What if we just get the
properties of each tiny molecule a little bit wrong—this force
somewhat too strong and that atom slightly too light? Can we still
get things mostly right when asking, for example, whether water
should behave as a liquid or as a vapor under certain conditions?4
 Boiling turns out to be a phenomenon perfectly well suited to
showing why the smallest inaccuracies in the simulated properties of
individual pieces of a system can lead to dramatic qualitative
differences in how the collective will behave. The conversion of a
liquid to a vapor is an example of what is called a phase transition,
which is precisely the sort of everyday scenario we are familiar with
where small changes in physical parameters can have a huge
impact. Water in a glass on a kitchen table at 98 degrees Celsius
(208°F) will be scalding, but unambiguously a liquid. As we heat the
same molecules to 102 degrees Celsius (215°F), we will see it
convert to a gas called steam. If we measured the typical speed at
which the molecules were found to be randomly jiggling around at
the two different temperatures, we would find it had changed by less
than 1 percent in the process of heating. How, then, can we explain
such stark differences in material properties between the liquid and
gas states?
Transitions between phases of matter happen when their
individual components cooperate in some way. Consider, for
example, a small group of water molecules. Because of the positive
and negative charges in different parts of the molecule, there are
attractive forces that hold groups of molecules together, a little like
the way gravity holds things on the surface of the Earth. If a rocket
achieves a high enough velocity pointed away from the planet’s
surface, it can escape the gravitational pull, which gets weaker as
the rocket moves upward. Similarly, if one member in a cluster of
molecules achieves a certain speed relative to the other members it
is also able to escape.
 In a liquid, the constituent atoms or molecules are packed
together relatively densely, so that one particle feels the
attractive forces exerted on it by a number of other
particles in its vicinity. Because of these forces, the
particles stay close together even though they are always
moving in haphazard directions. In a gas, particles move
at higher speeds, and the mutual attraction between any
pair of them is not typically strong enough to bind them to
each other as one flies by the other. As a result, the same
number of particles spread out over much more space.

At a given temperature, we can think of the possible speed of one

of these molecules as being roughly fixed, so that the question of
escape velocity reduces to asking how strong the “gravitational pull”
is. In a cluster of two molecules, there is a base level of attraction
between the two, but in a cluster of three molecules, the attractive
force felt by any one molecule is stronger, and with four, it is even
stronger than that. As other neighbors crowd around, the same
molecule moving at the same typical speed effectively finds itself
sinking into a deeper and deeper valley that it is harder and harder
to climb out of. The net effect, therefore, is that every individual
molecule feels stuck in place in proportion to how many other
molecules are near it. But this also gives us the makings of a
stampede, in which the escape of a few members of the group from
the liquid state can effectively drag the rest along with them.
Liquid water molecules take up much less space than the same
number of molecules of steam, so we can think of vaporization as a
process whereby molecules that were crowded into one corner of a
container together now break free and get to rove more widely.
When only one molecule escapes the huddle, the rest do not notice,
and the force holding each of them in place barely changes. If
another leaves, however, followed by another, each time, the
attraction holding the next molecule back gets weaker, on average.
Right at the phase transition of the boiling point, the water teeters
on the brink between a condensed liquid (where the molecules
crowd together) and a dilute vapor (where in a runaway
bandwagoning effect one molecule after another goes off on its own
as the number of other molecules grabbing onto it and holding it in
place precipitously declines).
If we imagine some steam poised on the tipping point in this way,
the tricky thing now is that we could make an enormous difference
to its behavior by just slightly altering how strongly its molecules are
attracted to each other. Formerly, we had a situation where the
evaporation of one molecule from a drop of liquid might make it
more likely that another molecule will do the same; by tilting the
scales just a bit to make molecules hold on to each other more
forcefully, we can suddenly find instead that when a single molecule
joins the liquid, it makes the next one more likely to follow suit. In
such a case, it is now a stampede into the higher-density liquid state
that becomes massively more probable. And the crucial point here is
that, because of how sensitive the physical prediction is to fine
details of parameters like the strength of an attractive force between
molecules, using an approximate, numerical simulation on a
computer to calculate what such molecular properties are becomes a
dicey proposition. In the finicky molecular herd, even small
quantitative ways in which our calculations are inaccurate can easily
add up to a huge qualitative inaccuracy, such as claiming a vapor is
a liquid, or vice versa.
The world abounds with cooperative, bandwagoning effects like
the one we have just described, many of them operating at the
molecular level or smaller. Phase transitions like freezing or
evaporation give us a simple everyday phenomenon to take as the
archetypal example, but the full range of ways that large groups of
interacting pieces can be tipped from one kind of collective behavior
to another through small changes in how they interact is vast and
diverse. The upshot of this fact is that there are many ways in which
the extreme reductionist, armed with a powerful supercomputer, is
going to miss the mark by miles when trying to compute the
behavior of the whole directly from the simple rules obeyed by its
parts. As physics Nobel laureate P. W. Anderson once famously
wrote: “More is different.”5 And while we may well succeed at
coming up with very good physical theories of things like freezing
crystals or viscous fluids, it will not be because we have started by
perfecting our detailed models of the atoms or subatomic particles
out of which these things are built. Instead, we have to meet the
many-particle system in question on its own terms and try to
understand relationships among the different collective properties it
presents.

THERE IS A RETREAT POSITION AVAILABLE AFTER THE defeat of reductionism

that keeps many vaguely nursing the hope that the study of life will
one day look less like gardening and more like tabulating the
consequences of a physical equation. While it may be hard to predict
the vaporization point of water from a first-principles model of
molecular dynamics, we certainly still have some very good physical
Another Random Scribd Document
with Unrelated Content
aside; and what was a greater Misfortune, the Prince and his
Retinue beheld with winking Eyes, all their Hovels on fire ashore:
The Occasion this; we happening to have all our Colours flying, and
some Guns let off in honour of the 28th of May, another Leader on
shore misinterpreting it as a particular Respect to Jacobus, grew
jealous, seized his House during the Revel, his Wives, and his
Dashees, drank up all his Brandy, eat all his Victuals, cudgelled his
People, and set both his Houses on fire.
Next Morning, on unravelling the Mystery, the Surprize was over,
and all became good Friends again. They have very little Knowledge
or Use of Fire-Arms, because no Trade scarce; their Weapons being
Spears, Arrows, and Clubs, and it is a bloody Battle among them,
when half a dozen of a side are knocked down.
 A
V O YA G E
TO
Brasil, and the West-Indies.
From Cape Lopez (parting with the Coast) we came in sight of the
Island Annabona, the Breezes small at South, and Calms
alternatively; hereabout we cruised three or four days, for our
Consort the Swallow, that some how or other was separated; and
missing her, bore away for Brasil.
In the Passage it may be first observed, that when we had sailed
ninety Leagues to the Westward, and got into 3°° S. the Winds that
were at South veered, so as to become a true S E. Trade, that
carried us four or five Knots.——And still as we advanced farther
Westward, it blew fresher at E S E. 7, 8, and 9 Knots constantly, with
neither Thunder nor Lightning. Quære, whether this distance is not a
proper Medium to allow for the Attraction of all Exhalations by the
Land; at least that they considerably abate after that length from all
Shores, allowing for Latitude, and as they are Montainous or Plain.
We see within this Dimension, (plainly) that it takes off the Influence
of the Sun, and varys the Trade Wind towards itself: Nor is it so
astonishing, since Animals themselves obey; several sorts of Fish
and Fowl have a periodical return to such and such places, and not
so of those inhabiting the more stable Element of Land: Wherefore it
is highly rational to think, that as the fluid Elements they live in yield
to the attractive Power of the Earth and Planets, so also their
Inhabitants have their Instinct more sensibly fated by them.
 Secondly, in this Trade-Wind sailing, we are every day diverted
with flying Fish, Bonetos, and Sea-Fowl; the Sails require little labour
in trimming, the Ship goes steady, and the Bowl unslung; so that at
leaving such a Country we might cheerfully sing,

How happy were we, when the Wind blew abaft!

One of these cheerful Evenings, eleven at night, the full Moon
became totally eclipsed, a Darkness surprizing, as it was
unexpected; when she had recovered her Light, we repeated our
Sacrifice in Bowls, and fell into Reflections and Admiration of that
Power which supports the Regularity of the planetary Motions, and
the Sublimity of that Art which can so exactly calculate them: They
demonstrate the Sphericity of the Earth, because Countries, as they
are farther East or West, observe them hours sooner or later,
according to their Longitude, which could not be on a Plain, but
visible to all at once.
This Longitude therefore in a general View, is the same thing as
Time, the difference of it being the distance East and West of any
two places, allowing 15 Degrees, or 300 Leagues to an Hour; the
whole 24 being lost or gained in a Circum-navigation of the Globe,
West or Eastward.
A natural, tho’ hitherto incorrect way of estimating the Parts of
Longitude in those Runs, till Instruments and Rules are discovered,
is, I think, First, to make exact Tables of the Sun’s Risings and
Settings, at Places commonly departed from, and those we go to for
every day in the year: and then, Secondly, to carry two proved
Watches of equal Goodness, kept in equal Warmth, and freest from
Motion and Weather, to measure the difference of time where you
are, by the same edge of the Sun the Tables were made from; the
Minutes sooner or later, according as you go East or West, is so
many Leagues of Longitude for that day. I would insinuate by this
only my Opinion, that those literal Improvers of Time, the Watch
Makers, bid as fair for the Discovery of Longitude as the Astronomer;
for if Watches can be made not to err above two or three Minutes in
the time a Ship is running 1000 Leagues, or if they do err more, a
Rule could be found how much, (like as an Azimuth corrects the
common Compass;) or if any Movement could be depended on only
from Observation to Observation, then the Error would be no greater
than what is met in different Quadrants, observing Latitude. As it is, it
seems a proper Method to correct or assist the present Rules of
calculating meridional Distance.
We made this Passage of 8 or 900 Leagues to Brasil in three
Weeks; but having elsewhere given my Observations on the Country,
I shall only take notice that the Trade blowing very fresh, and
bringing in a great Swell, we hastened from the Coast to our
intended Ports in the West-Indies.
In our Progress thither, a Remark or two: First, that in the
Navigation from Brasil, we crossed the Æquinoctial, two or three
Degrees W. of Cape Roque, keeping on with a pleasant S E. Trade
that gradually lessened, and in 4°° North Latitude, left us in Calms,
Rains, and uncertain Squalls, (varying round the Compass;) That
this continued for several days, till we drew in or near the Parallel of
Barbados, and then we as gradually had obtained the Trade to
Northward of the East, running 150 Leagues with it, that is, to
Barbados.
Secondly, The reason of Calms, and Rains met in Latitudes
between 4°° and 11°° N. (with a little Variation, as the Sun is of this
or that side the Equinoctial) is probably from a Contest between the
N E. and S E. Trade; but whether the passing them be more
favourable far to the Eastward or Westward, I am uncertain.
 BARBADOS.
Barbados was discovered by Sir William Carter, in King James I’s
time, planted to little purpose until 1627; since which, the Crops have
been so advantageous, as to have raised the Price of Ground thirty
fold.
We anchored here in Carlisle-Bay the beginning of August, the
resort of most Shipping who load at this Island. The Bay is made by
Needham and Pelican Points; the Anchorage 20 Fathom, so clear
Water that you may see to the bottom; but so foul and rocky, that the
Cables are always buoy’d up with Cask. In the bottom of the Bay
stands Bridgetown, the principal of the Island, and is the Residence
of the Governor, Factors, and Merchants, who transact their
Business here and at their Plantations alternately. There is only one
large Church, with an Organ, and about twenty Chappels at different
parts of the Island, all Episcopal, there having been no Dissenters
these many years. The People are for the most part polite and well-
bred, promoting Trade by a magnificent way of living; the chief of
them are Colonels, or Captains of Militia, and in the Assembly are
divided into a Party-Interest, on the civil Affairs of the Island, their
chief Distinction; murmuring, or elate, just as they are in or out of the
Governor’s Favour, who can abate in the Customs, or imploy in the
Application: (tho’ by the way the fewer Officers, and those Menials,
the better advantage to him.)
The whole is a sweet Spot of Earth, not a Span hardly uncultivated
with Sugar-Canes; all sides bend with an easy Declivity to the Sea,
and is ever green: This delight to the Planter has its Inconveniencies,
that there is no Recreation out of Business, but in Drinking or
Gaming.
 The Propriety was given by King James I. to the Earl of Carlisle;
and Anno 1661, King Charles II. purchased it back of Lord Kinoul,
that Earl’s Heir, allowing him 1000l. per Ann. Acknowledgment.
Anno 1663, an Act passed by the President (who acts as
Governor in their absence) the Council and Assembly, for 4½ in
Specie Duty of all Commodities, the Produce of the Island, which it’s
computed will amount to 10000l. per Annum.—Madeira Wines
imported, at 4l. 10s. per Pipe, raises 7000l. and this, with one Pound
of Gunpowder per Tun on each Ship, is appropriated for Stores, and
Repairs to Forts.
The Governor is appointed by the King, his Salary formerly used to
arise at an uncertain Sum of 4 or 5000l. per Ann. from Presents and
Perquisites, since fixed at 1200l., 2000l. and now is 6000l. And as
the Council, a part of their Constitution, is in a manner of his own
Nomination, being appointed by Letters of Mandamus, as they have
Power to make Demands on ancient Perquisites, and sway in the
Application of the publick Money; there are various ways of obliging,
and his Party will always be uppermost in the Legislature, which
consists of him, the Council of twelve, and an Assembly of twenty
two, chose at the several Parishes by a Majority of Votes.
One Law is, That no Inhabitant shall be carried off the Island
without Leave; whoever engages in the Project, is liable to the
Debts; so that when a Family sees Ruin approaching, (a frequent
Case of late years) their Remedy is stealing away in Boats to some
other Place of Subsistence; and if they cannot this way escape a
hard Creditor, they comfort themselves in dying, that it may be their
Lot next. Those who depart fairly, are obliged to give publick notice
at the Secretary’s Office; and no body objecting in twenty one days,
are at liberty.
Another Act in 1676, passed against the Industry of the Quakers,
whose Conversion of the Negroes, it was pretended, hazarded the
Safety of the Island. They are computed at 80 or 90000, and are
countenanced in Polygamy; yet not dangerous, because no
Mountains to fly to, Detections and Executions would soon follow
their Rebellions. The English are reckoned 20000, the Women
among them most Scotch and Irish, very homely, and great
Swearers. The Men, contrarily, are very gay, clean, and handsome,
from mean Originals, often succeeding with rich Widows; it being but
Justice to link a fat Plantation to the truely nauseous Draught of
Matrimony.
The way of feeding such a Multitude, and providing Necessaries in
an Island yielding little besides Sugar, is principally by their Fisheries
and Importations.
The Sea gives them great plenty of flying Fish, Dolphins,
Barricuda and King Fish, particularly the first; they bait with their own
Specie, which thrown about, the Fish fly in such numbers to the
Boats, that they take them up with Dip-nets, and sometimes the
Dolphins with them; the Season goes off at the Autumnal Equinox.
Their Importations by Ships from England, Ireland, New-England,
Pensylvania, Carolina, or New-York, constantly supplying any Defect
of Food or Necessaries, every Vessel bringing them something or
other of this kind, which the Merchants keep in store and sell the
Planters occasionally, who give their Sugars, Rum, and Molosses in
return. The Price in what I was acquainted is, viz.
Bought,
Rum at 1s. 2d. per Gallon.
Citron Water 40 0
Pickled Pepper 10 0
Preserved Ginger 5 0 per lb.
Sugar, twenty Shillings a hundred; and before
our Improvements (says Gee) the
Portuguese sold for 7 and 8l. a hundred.
Cocoa, 3 or 4l.
Aloes 4d. per lb.

Sold,
Salt Beef and Pork, 40 Shillings for a
Cask of 2 Cwt.
Bisket, 17s. per hundred
 Candles, 6½ per lb. &c.
Exchange 30 per Cent. or more.

I have heard that the Custom-house Books had one year 35000
Hogsheads of Sugar entred, which at 10l. per Hogshead, amounts to
350000l. Every Acre was supposed 10s. a year Profit to the national
Stock of England, besides what the Planter got, and Mouths fed by
it; but I must observe, the Crops of late years have very much failed,
and put many of them under great Necessities. The Soil fertile in the
Age past, seems now growing old, and past its teeming-time; they
endeavour to mend this by a few Cattle kept for the sake of Manure;
few, I say, because Land imploy’d this way, gives not 1/10 its Value.
Wherefore when a thoughtless Man has joined to unlucky Events
and Seasons an inadvertent way of living, he falls a Prey to the more
astronomical Heads of Factors, who supply him with Food and
Necessaries. The Hardships of many Planters at this time, through
such Inclemencies, cannot be better laid open to the Reader, than in
transcribing part of a Sermon, that I am informed was preached by
Command of his Excellency the Governor, May 1734.

A Charity S e r m o n at Bridgetown,
for the two Parishes, St. Philip, and Christ-Church.

“Here I should have left off, but I am commanded by his Excellency

the Governor, to exhort you to that Charity, the Necessity of which
has been laid before ye.
“Remember therefore, that one of the ways observed of seeking
God is, by obeying the Dictates of his Holy Spirit, that Humanity and
Charity undepraved Nature feels towards all that are poor and
distressed.
“What an excellent Grace of Christianity this is, St. Paul from the
Spirit of God teacheth, (1 Cor. xiii.) saying, that when the Gift of
Tongues, of Prophecies, of Miracles shall cease, a greater, even that
of Charity, shall never cease in the Church militant, never in the
Church triumphant; nor can there be any greater Inducements to
provoke us to Charity, than first, it covers a Multitude of Sins, and
next, bringeth God himself (as he is pleased to esteem it) in debt to
us; for he who giveth to the Poor lendeth to the Lord, and look, what
he layeth out shall be paid him again; paid in Blessings here, and
hereafter eternal Life, if no mortal Sin continue in the Giver, to hinder
these blessed Effects.—I need say no more to ye who read the
Bible, how dear to God those Christians are, who according to their
Ability are liberal to poor Persons and Families; so that what remains
for me to say, is to expatiate a little upon the miserable State of the
Poor of these two Parishes, and leave the whole to your pious
Consideration.
“In one of these, St. Philip’s, mine Eyes beheld all the Signs of an
approaching Famine; the Face of the Earth appeared as it were a
dry Crust, burnt up and gaping for its watry Nutriment; hardly any
thing green appeared, and I am told, the Face of the Country is
much the same in Christ-Church Parish. Now how miserable must it
be with the single Poor, and with Families! I assure you, several are
come into ours, and others are gone farther Leeward to seek for
Work and Food. You who are tender Parents, consider how terrible it
must be for Families with nothing in their House, nothing growing on
their Land, not a grain of any thing to support themselves and dear
helpless Children: No Money, and no Credit, no Relief from without,
and no Bread, nor Water either, hardly within or without. I have heard
of poor Men going about for Work, to sustain their own Bodies,
forced to leave Wife and Children at home to starve; sure your
Hearts must relent, and every one of you give according as you are
able, with a free Mind, and willing Heart. But here some may object,
Why should I give to those two Parishes, when our own Poor may be
in as great Want? I answer, some may be so; but the Calamity
(blessed be God) is not so general here; it is not so bad with us in
that one necessary Article of Water. Thirst is terrible, let us then pity
our poor Brethren, their Wives and Children, who go so far for Water
that they have not due time to get their Bread, were there Work for
them to earn it by.
“I believe, you know we have here poor Families in great want,
and I could wish our Vestry would meet, particularly to consider it;
but in the mean time, let us not forget the poorer People of these two
Parishes, as now perishing for want of Food; yea, his L——p and the
Council’s Belief is, (you hear) that some have already died for want
of Bread.
“What Christian Man or Woman then in Affluence and Plenty, can
have an Heart so hard as not to bestow liberally on so great, so sad,
so calamitous a Necessity and Misery? and what poorer Christian,
who has somewhat, tho’ little above his daily Wants, but will fling his
Mite to stop so dread an Evil?
“What Christian Woman, who has young and helpless Children of
her own, and Bread to give them, but whose Bowels must yearn and
Heart ake to hear, that in these two Parishes are many Infants crying
at the empty Breasts of their Mothers, and their Mothers weeping
and languishing at the same time for Bread to sustain themselves.
“What compassionate Fathers or Brothers but must grieve to
understand, that grown Children too young to work, are now starving
in these Parishes, and their Parents and Brothers nothing to relieve
them.
“What good Children but must bleed at heart to see their Parents
starving? yet such is the Fate of some in these Parishes.
“Christians consider, that one way of keeping Famine from us of
this Parish, is to bestow our Charity in a Proportion to their Wants,
and our Ability: That is the likeliest Method to move God to give us
fruitful Seasons, to renew our Springs, and bring a cheerful Green
over the Face of our Plants and Seeds.
“May the blessed Spirit, &c.”

The Consequence of this Distress now among the Barbadians, is

shifting their old Habitations; several impelled by Necessity, and
Wants, (stronger Motives than Religion;) are stealing away to mend it
where they can.
The Sufferings of these Islanders, I think, will carry some
Similitude to larger Countries; where the remarkable Decay, or Loss
of one single Branch of Trade, it’s observed, will sensibly affect
Multitudes, not only those immediately concerned in the retailing,
who must change Trades, infringing on others, or seek other
Countries, but also those not concerned; because as an
extraordinary Trade stamps an extraordinary Value on Land, and that
on Provisions, when the one fails, or changes hands, as it has and
will do, (Venice, the Hans Towns, Antwerp, Holland, and which by
the way, shews all Countries bordering on the Sea, within 50°° of
Latitude, equally advantageous for Trade) the other ought to give
way for the lowering of Provisions, and Charge of Subsistence to the
Poor, (some ways of it being supposed now to be cut off or
curtailed:) and if Landlords do it slowly, the Law should oblige;
because, as publick Virtue is no private Man’s Profession, he will
take his Lands into his own hands, tho’ with Loss, rather than submit
to the Reduction of his Rents; and because he can afford it, will
hoard, and suffer Grain to decay and spoil, before he will fall the
Price.
In our Plantations, the inferior sort of Merchants are not unlike
Sharpers in Gaming; they by a better Skill, know how to prey on the
Wants, the Weakness, and Passions of their Customers (the
Planters and Artificers) chaining them down by degrees to their
Service; many of the Inconsiderate being ruined without knowing it,
till the very Day they want Victuals.
 SUGAR-CANES.
In the Wars between Holland and Portugal in Brasil, a Dutch-Man
arrived here from thence, who taught them the way of Planting and
making Sugars. They are set out between August and December, six
Inches deep, and do not come to Maturity until one year and a
quarter: when ripe, which is known by their Colour, they cut them up
with a Bill, and send them to the Wind-mills, which presses out the
Juice so clean, the Canes by being an hour or two in the Sun,
become fit for Fuel.
The Liquor must not remain in the Cistern above a day, for fear of
souring; it is therefore by a Gutter conveyed to the Copper or Boyler,
and in the boiling, the Filth scummed off; thence it’s conveyed into
the second and third, and in the last, called the Tack, is boiled to a
Consistency, and turned into a Grain by throwing in of Temper, which
is only the Infusion of Lime and Water made strong according to the
Goodness of the Cane. Nine Pounds of Juice makes one of
Muscovado, and one of Molossus.
From hence it is carried to the cooling Cistern, till fit to put in Pots,
which have Holes at Bottom to drain off the Molossus.
Of these Molossus again, they sometimes make another worse
Sugar, called Paneels. Of the Scum, coarse Molossus, Washings of
the Boilers and Pots, fermented together, is made Rum.
To refine Sugar, is to boil it over again, and clarify with the same
Lime-Water and Eggs, reckoned better than the clayed Sugars of
this Region, made by putting a clayey Earth mixed with Water to the
thickness of a Batter upon them, and repeated three or four times
according to the degree of Whiteness design’d; both ways carry the
Treacle and Molossus downwards, but the former most esteemed,
as mixing less, and purging to better purpose. Lime refines from
Impurities, and imparts a softer Taste, experienced in throwing it into
Wells of hard Water; the best refin’d in Loaves comes back to the
Sugar-Colonies from England, sell at 50 or 100 per Cent. Advance,
and are of common Use; they must be kept dry, a hot and moist Air
dissolving them.
From Molossus, Distillers make a clean Brandy, and it gives a
pretty tasted Spirit to Malt Liquors, boiled and worked in the Tun.
Besides Rum and Sugars, they have Quantities of Ginger, Aloes,
Tamarinds, Citron, Cassia, Coloquintida, Cassava, Limes, Oranges,
Guavas, Pine-Apples, Mastick, Cedar, Cotton and Palmeto Trees,
prickled Pear; but our Apples and Pears, nor any of our Shrub-Fruits,
Goose-berry or Currant, will thrive. Of the Potato they make a brisk
Small-beer, called Mobby.
About two or three years ago, the low Price of Sugars, that had
reduced and beggar’d the Planters, brought on a Complaint, and Bill
in Parliament in their favour. They urged, according to the best of my
Remembrance, that the northern Colonies, especially New-England,
being suffered to trade with the French Islands, was in a great part
the Occasion of this, and a Loss to the Nation; for they took off all
the French Molossus, which before they had no use for, but sold it
our Islands at very low Prices.
The French therefore were helped by this Sale, to afford their
Sugars cheaper, and still more enabled by a nearer Way of Living;
by the Customs being taken off, allowing them to go thence to any
Market, and other Encouragements to undersell, and take the foreign
Markets from us, who were clogged with all those Inconveniencies.
The New-England People alledged, their Trade seemed the least
essential Article in the Injury complained of; for unless our Islands
found means to take off the other Impediments, and bring their
Sugars to as cheap, or cheaper Price than the French and Dutch,
they would be the same in respect to foreign Markets; and if new
Grounds are better, or more wanted in Plantations, there are enough
at Jamaica, St. Christopher’s, &c. to redress the Evil. But this is not
in their View, say they; the more Lands are employed, the less will
be the Value of the present Estates, an impolitick Reduction of all
prodigal Expences; for every Island singly, reckon their Happiness in
part, not from the flourishing Condition of another, but from
Casualties, and bad Seasons; the less quantity there is to answer
the Demand, the higher the Price.
Barbados formerly used to buy the French and Dutch Sugars,
making all that Trade go through their own hands, till in 1715, laying
a Duty turned the Channel, and they would now make up that
oversight by imposing their own Price on us.
The Northern Colonies deserve Favour, they think, as vastly
superior in Number and Trade, take off more of the Manufactures of
England for themselves, and their Trade with the Indians, who
exchange Furrs and Pelfry to make Hats; for the same Reason, they
want more Molossus to manufacture among themselves, than our
Islands can sell, or if they could, cannot take off one quarter of the
Lumber, Horses, and refuse Fish, with which we trade with the
French, not only for Rum and Molossus (which may as well come to
us this way, as through their hands) but sometimes also Money; and
without which we have no means of purchasing, nor could get rid of
our Produce and Industry, which is very unreasonable.
To lay a Tax of six-pence a Gallon on French Molossus, is the
same as a Prohibition, which their Country cannot so easily bear.
They take 20000 Hogsheads a year (each 100 Gallons) from the
Dutch and French, which is 50000l. whereas they have no Specie to
pay it, their Currency being all Paper, and that but 30000l. Besides, it
would be the first Tax on a charter’d Colony from England, where
they have no Representatives.
Lastly, it was said, the French buy their Negroes, and Sugar-
Materials (Mills, Coppers, &c.) 40 per Cent. dearer than us; therefore
for our Islands to say they cannot afford as cheap, is to say, they will
not abate of their Pride and Luxury, but help to maintain it by a Tax
on our more humble Industry.
 T h e W E S T- I N D I E S .
For a general Idea of the West-Indies, we may understand by that
Term, all the Continent, Sea, and Islands, from Terra Firma to
Florida, or from near the Equinoctial to 28°° of N. Latitude; and if you
include Bermudas, to 32°°. The main Land in this Circuit divided into
Spanish Provinces, is more peculiarly called the Spanish West-
Indies, they possessing all, unless to the Southward in Guiana and
Paria, where there are a few English, Dutch, and French,
interspersed on the Rivers and Coast of Oronoko, Surinam, and
Amazons.
They import hence to Europe, besides Rum and Sugars, great
quantities of Cocoa, Indigo, Cotton, Logwood, Ginger, Lignum-vitæ,
Cochineel, Snuff, Cassia, Aloes, Pimento, Tortoise-shell, Dyers, and
other Wood, a Variety of Drugs, and above all, prodigious Quantities
of Plate, and some Gold.
The Islands in this Sea are the Charibbees, Sotovento, Antilles,
and Bahama.
Charibbees were the lesser Antilles, about 30 in number, whereof
the French have Martinico, St. Lucia, Bartholomew, Deseada,
Granada, Marigalant, Guadalupe, and Santa Cruz. To the Dutch
belong in whole or part, Saba, Eustatia, St. Vincent, and Tobago, or
Tobacco Island; so called, from the Plenty of that Weed there, or the
Weed so called, as first transplanted thence. The rest are English,
and of them Barbados is chief. Others next of Note are Antegoa,
Nevis, St. Christopher’s, and Montserrat; which have a separate
Governor, stiled General of the Leeward Islands, their principal
Produce with us, is Rum and Sugars; but the French, besides these,
cultivate Cocoa, and Indigo: and as the managing of more Lands
naturally gives Plenty, and makes room for an Increase of People,
the French Policy of late years has considerably increased their
Colonies at Martinico and Hispaniola; some say 40000 settled there
at the French King’s Expence, with the Addition of a year’s
Maintenance, to countenance their Mississipi Settlements, and these
further Views of drawing over Men’s Affections, by affording
Europeans the West-India Commodities, at the cheapest rate, and
strengthning themselves against the Resentment of any who dislike
it.
In some are found large Caves that run half a Mile under ground,
supposed the Dwelling-places of the old Natives, who quickly
forsook them to the new Inmates; tho’ Dampier says, he met some of
these Charibbees at St. Lucia, and St. Vincent, and others say the
like of Curasao: The Name imports Cannibals, an Inhumanity
charged on them at the Discovery, as a proper Accusation for
Dispossessors.
Sotovento Isles lie E S E. and W N W. along the Terra Firma,
called so because the Spaniards in their Voyages to Mexico, make
them one after another sub vento (to Leeward.) Of these, the Dutch
have Curasao, Oruba, and Berraire. The Spaniard the others, (La
Trinidad, and Margarita, chief;) from whence, and the Antilles, they
have of late years very much infested this Navigation, with their
Guard le Costas, confiscating the English Effects in Reprisal, it is
supposed, for the Loss of their Fleet near Messina, 1718.
The greater Antilles are, Cuba, Hispaniola, Portorico, and
Jamaica; the three former, Spanish.
Cuba is principal; a very pleasant and flourishing Island, the
Spaniard building and improving for Posterity, without dreaming, as
the English Planters do, of any other Home. They make the best
Sugars in the West-Indies. It was from this Island, (Velasquez
Governor,) that Cortez in 1518, made his Expedition and Conquest
of Mexico.
The Havana, its chief Port and Town, is esteemed the richest in
America; for besides its own valuable Produce, the Spanish Fleets
from all parts on the Main, make up here in their return to Europe.
 The Islands on the South Side of it, and the Camaines, are
resorted to for the largest and best Turtle.
Porto-Rico, and Hispaniola (the diminutive of Hispania) are Islands
we make, in our Passage to Jamaica, famous of late for their Guard
le Costas. These Privateering Fellows, when they are not acting by
lawful Commission, they know the Governor’s Mind, and bring in
Ships on a pretence they are trading with the King of Spain’s
Subjects in a clandestine and prohibited manner; if they find any
Pieces of Eight, it is a Condemnation; an Encouragement in
searching a Ship, to deposite some there themselves: Or if this Trick
fails, they are yet detained, and on various Pretences lengthned out
with Law-suits, till ruined. We called, after weighing from Barbados,
at Sancto Domingo, the chief Town of Hispaniola, where we found
three English Masters of Ships under these Hardships. They had got
the better in Law, but with such Charge and Delay, that it had spoiled
their Ships and Voyages; and lest that should not do it effectually,
their Damages are against the Captains of the Privateers, who are
perhaps the Governor’s servile Dependants, and not worth a Groat.
Sancto Domingo Harbour has 15 Fathom Water at the Bar, and
the Entrance defended by several Batteries. The Town is the
Residence of an Arch-Bishop, and a President from Spain, who lives
in a House that is said to have been built and occupied by
Christopher Columbus himself. To this Officer (on account of its prior
Settlement) Appeals come from all the Spanish West-India Islands,
whose Sentence is definitive, unless called by a particular
Commission to Old Spain. They buy their Places, it seems, and
consequently execute them oppressively.
The Island is diminished of its Inhabitants, for this, or a securer
and better Settlement on the Continent; so that the French now,
about Petit Guavas, equal, if not outnumber them, tho’ both together
are vastly short of what its Extent and Fertility deserves. A Soil that
produces any thing; their Sea and Rivers full of Fish, and the
Country spread with Forests of Cabbage and Palm-Trees, in which
are prodigious Numbers of wild Hog and Beef, which the Hunters of
different Nations at certain Seasons shoot, the latter for their Hides;
and the Pork, they jerk (as they call it) that is, strip it from the Bones,
and then salting the Flesh a little, dry it in the Sun.
Bahamas, so called from the Principal, or Lucayes from Lucayone
(new Providence, the largest of them) where the English have a
Governor: They are noted for a dangerous and rapid Chanel,
commonly called the Gulph of Florida, through which the Spanish
Fleets always take their Passage to Europe, and are frequently
shipwrecked.
The Pyrates often take their rise here, or if not, seldom fail in the
Course of their Adventures to visit these Seas. There are Multitudes
of little Islands and Kays, besides this Division above, that afford
Refreshments of wild Hog, Cow, Goat, Sheep, Parrots, Guanas,
Turtle, and Fish; many of them uninhabited, and seldom visited but
on that account, whereby they are a natural and good Security. The
Sailor, when he would express the Intricacy of any Path-way, stiling it
the Caribbees.
They commonly make their Beginning here after this manner;
when any Spanish Ship is wrecked in Florida, the Jamaicans fit out
Vessels to fish upon her, (the best I believe, being always pleas’d
with going shares in such Voyages, which may be judged of by their
Treatment of the Galleon cast away on Jamaica, a very few Years
ago) and dispute a Right of Plunder with the Spaniard himself, who
is also fitted from the Havana on these Accidents, to recover what
they can; the Contest therefore is with various Fortune, and
sometimes turns to a bad account.
Our Logwood-Cutters from Campechy and Honduras, who have
been unfortunate by the frequent Visits of the Spaniards to destroy
that Trade, remove hither, or those to them, to consult of Reparations
to their broken Fortunes. Saunterers also, who are turtling from
different Parts, do all together make a considerable Resort
sometimes, and being prompted to Revenge for the Injuries
sustained, they combine and furnish out a little Sloop perhaps
against them at first, who finding little come by confining their Ways
and Means to the Spaniards only, who sail in Fleets, they fall at last
on any Nation; the Transition being easy from a Buccanier to a
Pyrate; from plundering for others, to do it for themselves.
These Logwood-Cutters, (since mentioned) I must observe, were
originally settled at the Bay of Campechy, but with a contested Right
that made it hazardous, the Spaniard opposing the Legality, and
when uppermost, treating them as Pyrates, which our People have
frequently returned again with Interest. It was taken 1659, by Sir
Christopher Mins. In 1678 again, by the English and French
Privateers; and what Licence the Peace of Utrecht gave, I am
uncertain, but they are since drove out, and now support themselves
with their Arms at the Bay of Honduras.
They are about 500 (Merchants and Slaves,) and have taken up
their Residence at a Place called Barcaderas, about 40 Miles up a
narrow River full of Alligators; and what is a greater Inconvenience
against transporting their Effects, is a strong Current in it from the
Freshes up Land, and the Banks being covered with Shrubs, that
makes it difficult to walk and tow the Boats; covered also with infinite
Numbers of Sand-Flies, and Muskitos. They live in Pavilions; a
Servant at their time of lying down to rest, shaking them till cleared of
these Vermin, that are an unsufferable Plague and Impediment to
Sleep.
At the Season (once a year) they move their Pavilions from the
pleasurable Spots, the better to attend the Logwood cutting, which
carries them sometimes many Miles from this principal Residence, to
follow the Wood, which runs in a Line or Vein (like Minerals in the
Earth) of some Miles perhaps, and then as many, without a Stick of
it. They cut it into large Pieces, and leave it on the Ground till the
Land-Flood favours their bringing it into the River, and then Canoos
are laden away with it, to lay in store at Barcaderas, where the Chief
are still left residing.
They have all good Arms, and knowing the Spanish Clemency,
defend themselves desperately, if attacked; which has happened
seldomer than at Campechy, and always by Sea.
A Servant, which is the first Step with Seamen into the Trade, is
hired at a Tun of Logwood per Month, and has one Day in seven for
himself, making together about 10l. a Month to him; hence, if
thoughtful and sober, they in time become Masters, join Stock, and
trade independently. They have a King, chose from among their
Body, and his Consort is stiled Queen, agreeing to some Laws by
common Consent, as a Guide to them.
The Ships that come into the Bay, are on their Guard also, fetch it
down in flat-bottomed Boats, each Crew being allowed on the
Voyage, a Bottle of Rum and some Sugar, and row generally in the
Night, as freest from those stinging Flies, and rest in the Day.
The Exchange with Ships is for Money, Beer, Flower, or any sort of
Provisions and Necessaries; these, the cunningest reserve in Store
against the Wants and Demands of the Inconsiderate, and so make
extraordinary Returns.
It may not be improper to conclude this Head with an Observation
or two on the Channel and Current of Florida, which I submit to the
more Skilful.
This Gulph is as dangerous a Navigation as any known; the
Spaniards often experience it, because it’s an Addition to the
Danger, that they have unwieldy Ships, and lubberly Seamen. We
commit Errors, I imagine, by our common Charts, which lay down the
Channel double the Breadth it is; the most intelligent in the Passage
having assured me, it is not above 16 or 18 Leagues over; and
therefore when a Storm happens, build on a false Supposition.
The Spaniard is likewise over-careful to be safe; the nicer
Observations made on Shoals, Currents, or Winds, either here or in
the Bay, when and how to make them advantageous, are from an
imagined Security against any maritime Power, committed only to
their Admiral (according to common Report) whose Light the Fleet
are to follow; and for their better Recovery of any shipwrecked Cargo
in the Gulph, (frequent in losing the Admiral,) they have a Garrison at
St. Augustine, on the Florida Shore, a barren Spot where they are
almost starved, and which would not be worth keeping but for this.
Ships and Vessels may, and often have sailed through this Channel
from the N End to Cuba, or the Bay of Mexico, notwithstanding the
common Opinion, on account of the Current, that is against it. They
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