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69 (3): LA FARMACIA: DE LA FÍSICA A LA BIOLOGÍA

SUMMARY
Pharmacy: from Physics to Biology. On the existence of “phantoms”

The scientific and philosophical problem about the dependence or independence
of Biology from Physics constitutes a historical constant since the initial founding of
both disciplines as modern sciences. The development of the problem along the second
half of twentieth century has been taken as a guide for this study. The perspective chosen
is that suggested by the nature of both scientific disciplines, and it is made through the
literary recourse to the “phantoms” introduced by Schrödinger. The frame of reference is
two-dimensional: with historical and Spanish coordinates.

Two opposite but convergent attitudes towards this issue have flourished along
history: the expansionism of Physics towards Biology, and the reductionism of Biology
to Physics. At the present moment genetic reductionism and molecular reductionism are
governing in Biology.

The conclusion is sound: the knowledge of the structural constitution of matter -
or of the elements which constitute a certain system- is not enough for knowing the
complete complex system, with its intrinsic relationships and its behaviour in and at the
face of its environment. This is confirmed not only in Biology but in Chemistry and even
in Physics as well.

Key words: Reductionism.— Mechanicism.— Pharmacy.— Physics.— Biology.— Er-
win Schrödinger.— Julio Palacios.— Severo Ochoa.

<<Es de suponer que la física actual no sea bastante
para explicar todos los fenómenos biológicos; pero si se
descarta de antemano la existencia de “fantasmas”, se da
por supuesto que toda la biología quedará dentro de la futu-
ra física.>>

(Julio Palacios, “De la Física a la Biología”, 1947)

1. El problema objeto de estudio.
¿Dónde? ¿Cómo? ¿Con quién? ¿Por qué surge el problema? La

vuelta definitiva a España de Severo Ochoa tuvo lugar en 1986. Hacía po-
co que se había fallado el Premio Nacional de Investigación Científica
“Santiago Ramón y Cajal” (1), único Premio Nacional entonces existente
junto al Cervantes y en su primera edición, que se concedió de forma
compartida a Severo Ochoa y Xavier Zubiri. También acabábamos de edi-
tar Xavier Zubiri: Breve recorrido de una vida, de Carmen Castro, biogra-

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