Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 64.djvu/120

116 different question from that as to whether the nucleus or the cytoplasm of the egg determines which of the two possibilities that are potentially present in the nucleus shall be awakened.

5. Our general conclusion is that while recent theories have done good service in directing attention to the early determination of sex in the egg, those of them which have attempted to connect this conclusion with the assumption of the separation of male from female primoidia in the germ-cells have failed to establish their point of view. The egg, as far as sex is concerned, appears to be in a sort of balanced state, and the conditions to which it is exposed, even when it is not fully formed, may determine which sex it will produce. It may be a futile attempt to try to discover any one influence that has a deciding influence for all kinds of eggs. Here, as elsewhere in organic nature, different stimuli may determine in different species which of the possibilities that exist shall become realized.