Jozef Zon

John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin · Faculty of Philosophy

The question of whether plasma physical phenomena are compatible with biological structures is discussed using as examples the electrons in mitochondria and the electrolytes in cytoplasm interstices. The criteria for the occurrence of the plasma state are fulfilled only if the static dielectric constant epsilon r of the medium through which the ele...

The variety of standpoints relating to the creation and/or evolution is dealt with. In order to systematize them, the studies and discussions devoted to either creation or evolution were labeled domains of problematics and their separate or joint realizations in theology, philosophy, and natural sciences is considered. As domains consist of studyin...

A comparison was made between the concept of bioplasma put forward in the realm of the present biophysics and the doctrine of pneuma of the Old Stoa. It was shown that both of them were considered as unifying factors throughout the cosmos as a whole, as well as all animated and unanimated beings. Pneuma and bioplasma are seen as performing similar...

Włodzimierz Sedlak claims that the fundamental role in the origins and continuance of life and consciousness is played by the phenomena and processes that belong to the domain of quantum mechanics. They constitute the submolecular level of biotic reality. Among other, electronic conduction, piezoelectricity of the components of organisms and electr...

This is a biographic essay devoted to the characterization of the activity of rev. prof. Włodzimerz Sedlak in the field of research and teaching at the Catholic University of Lublin, Poland. The metaphor of Don Quixote and his squire Sancho Panza (i.e. Sedlak and Zon) was proposed, as a) there was a striking disproportion between scientific aims se...

Electronic plasma in biological membranes Summary At the end of the 1920s I. Langmuir and L. Tonks discovered the basic principles governing the behavior of ionized gases which, in view of their peculiar properties, were called “plasma”. About a quarter of a century later it was found that free charge carriers in solids (i.e. metals, semiconductor...

There is a category of metaphors that play pragmatic roles. They do it by imparting positive or negative valuation to the verbal expressions, thereby evoking acceptance, neutralizing existing positive or negative attitude, or even changing it to the opposite one. No wonder that they also play important role not only in the decision-laden discussion...

The metaphor of „skin effect” drawn from the tissue anatomy of man was introduced at the end of XIXth century as a technical term for the outermost layer of the electrical conductor, where the external electromagnetic field is mostly concentrated. Presently, when fierce discussion on the effect of radio-frequency and microwave fields on the human b...

In this education-oriented paper essential features of science and pseudoscience are contrasted and representative examples of the latter are shortly characterized. The group of these examples consists of essential features of antievolutionism, racism, eugenics, homeopathy, telepathy and radiesthesia. All of them are treated in the following aspect...

Albeit among W. Sedlak’s statements on the living organisms there are some that may be considered as characteristic of epistemic or methodological reductionism, most of them are typical of the ontological reductionism. The basic feature of the las one is that all systems of any level of complexity are recognized as stemmed from the interactions bet...

As was earlier suggested (2005), in the brain may occur sets of mobile charge carriers which may undergo phase transitions between the plasma state (classical or quantum) and the state in which they interact individually. This article, referring to prof. Włodzimierz Sedlak’s remarks on the brain and consciousness, presents an extension the above me...

Ewolucja jest specyficznym procesem przemian określonej domeny rzeczywistości, podczas gdy ewolucjonizm mieści się w domenie filozofii lub ideologii. Zarówno w teorii ewolucji świata żywego, jak też w ewolucjonizmie zawartych jest wiele ogólnych twierdzeń o naturze filozoficznej (z zakresu ontologii, epistemologii oraz aksjologii). [Evolution is a...

This is a relation of one of the rev. prof. Włodzimierz Sedlak’s students and later – a subordinate. It concerns his didactic activity at the Catholic University of Lublin during the 1970s and 1980s in Poland. This activity comprised of the lectures and the seminars (earlier only leading to the master degree ones, later also leading to the Ph.D. de...

The rise and development of the electromagnetic telecommunication contributed heavily to the change of the electromagnetic component of the environment. Parallel to many obvious advantages, it brought also about many concerns related to the safety of people and the living nature. All of them are situated on the plain of axiology, i. e. the philosop...

An attempt is made at examining the question whether — and if so — to what extent the thesis formulated by the Stoic philosophers on the analogy between the human individual (Microcosm) and the entire world (Macrocosm) may find its counterpart in the present knowledge of the life and the Universe. From Antiquity up to the Modern times both types of...

The hypothesis of bioplasma (sometimes called „the bioplasma concept”) claiming that in living beings a state of matter that is analogous to the physical plasma occurs was put forward more than 40 years ago. However, it was not published in the journals and books presenting the results of investigation in biophysics or theoretical biology. The reas...

In some publications the claim is made that there is a necessary relationship between life and electromagnetic processes and phenomena. First a trivial justification for it is excluded. It boils down to the following inference: 1) in all living phenomena molecules and atoms are involved, 2) atoms and molecules exist and their properties are depende...

The brain is considered to be a seat of vast number of subvolumes of limited size containing mobile charge carriers. The ensembles of these carriers may undergo phase transitions between the states of noncollective and collective behavior. It is shown that these phase transitions may take place depending on the values of concentration, effective ma...

There are similarities between the doctrine of pneuma as formulated by the Old Stoa philosophers and the present knowledge of the physical plasma. Pneuma originally was conceived as a subtle medium composed of the air and the creative fire. The latter one was considered to differ substantially form the ordinary one, that is able only to decompose a...

The abstract and contents are available in the file I provided in lieu of the entire content of the book

A number of authors (W. Bulanda, W. Majewski, A. Paszewski, and K. Wierzchowski) claimed that works of W. Sedlak devoted to the concept of bioelectronics and bioplasma do not conform to the criteria of scientific publications. In their opinion the degree of nonconformity is so great, that they ought be considered pseudoscientific. Having accepted m...

In the antiquity, the essence of life processes was considered a kind of creative fire (Heraclitus, the Stoa). Also, in modern times, some concepts were formulated according to which a common fire was supposed to be essential for life (E. Pflüger, W. Preyer). However, results of some investigations carried out in the last decades indicate that the...

There is a plenitude of the sources of artificial electromagnetic radiation in the present environment. Most of them belong to the following categories: • systems of electric power generation and distribution (the sources of the 50/60 Hz electric and magnetic fields), • electrically powered industrial facilities, home appliances and devices, wirele...

The philosophers of the Old Stoa claimed that the pneuma, a very subtle fire mixed in various proportions with air, is an essential component of all entities of the Cosmos, the living ones included. As its qualities were considered to be different from the ordinary fire, they also called pneuma „creative fire". Ubiquitous in the Cosmos and permeati...

Environment is a common good. The process of the destruction of the primeval state of its electromagnetic component has been taking place on the scale of the whole Earth. It may well be claimed that the extent of it surpasses the destruction of the natural environment in the chemical domain. Therefore, there is a moral obligation not only closely f...

This subdiscipline of bioelectronics (i.e. physiological electronics) deals with electronic properties of biological microstructures (molecules, aggregates of them, and cellular substructures as well as their possible roles in living systems. To realize this goal, two basically different approaches are feasible. The first one is to apply purely phy...

In the first paragraph the subject, methods, aims, as well as some typical problems of bioelectronics are presented. It is defined as a branch of biophysics, based on the conceptual and methodological basis of both physical and technological electronics, dealing not only with structures at various levels of biological organization, but also with ex...

The basic aim of the article is to show that free electrons constituting physical plasma in biological structures may offer an additional primary mechanisms for the reception of the static and low-frequency magnetic fields by organisms. In the introductory paragraph, a review of the effects of these magnetic fields on biosystems is made. Next, the...

Suggestions for physiological tests aimed at the detection of physical plasma in biosystems It is difficult for many reasons to apply the typical plasma diagnostics techniques to the detection of physical plasma in living organisms. It seems, however, that the hypothesis on the occurrence of plasma in these structures may be tested in strictly phys...

In their critical examination (Physiol. Chem. Phys. Med. NMR, 18, 89-101 (1986)) Quickenden and Tilbury failed to understand adequately the present author's claim about the range of the values of electric permittivity that are necessary to allow the existence of physical plasma in mitochondria and cytoplasm. These ought to be high, but not necessar...

Bioelectronics is a branch, of science of bioelectricity dealing with biological systems and life processes from the angle of either physical or applied electronics with an aim to describe the electronic properties of biosystems and to establish their role in physiological phenomena, including the coupling that exists between the biological systems...

The decrease of vitality as a result of the weakening of the conditions of the existence of the plasma state in organism It has been hypothesized that the existence of plasma state is the necessary condition of continuity of life processes in biological structures. The physical plasma seems to be the basic factor coordinating and transforming all p...

The article reviews the works devoted to the study of electronic processes in natural biomembranes which may be considered as the evidence of their electronic conductivity. The main theoretical reasons for this type of conductivity (i.e. realized by electrons, holes or electrons and holes as charge carriers) are: 1) in biochemical redox reactions e...

An attempt is made at answering the question what physical characteristics biostructures should have to make possible physical plasma existence in them. Two sub-cellular elements, i.e. mitochondria and cytoplasm, were chosen for tentative analysis. In the first type of biostructures mobile electrons in respiratory chains were taken into account, an...

The Polish title: Występowanie plazmy fizycznej w strukturach zywych From the estimations comprised in the article follows that physical plasma can occur in living structures. The density of charge carriers and the value of the static dielectric constant are such, that the two basic conditions of the plasma state are satisfied: a) the value of Deb...

Observed semiconductor properties of biological material in vitro indicate possible involvement of semiconduction in biological processes. Since in inorganic semiconductors solid-state plasma occurs, it is hypothesized that in organic semiconductors solid-state plasma similarly occurs. Some results of experimental investigation of resonant effects...

A general characteristics of the science of bioelectricity Science of bioelectricity (electrobiology) is a part of biophysics. It deals with: 1) electric, magnetic and electromagnetic properties of the materials extracted from organisms, as well as these properties of intact biological structures; 2) the role played by these properties in normal an...

Changes in the bioelectric properties of tissues constitute one of manifestations of ageing. The changes consist in the decrease of protein conductivity and are manifested as a drop in the total density of electrons carried by the electron transfer chains of the organism. The related degenerative changes in the mitochondria may be observed as well....