11. Conclusions and Recommendations

The materialistic approach to chemistry began in 1789 with Lavoisier stating the Law of the Conservation of Matter as being axiomatic. Exactly 200 years later Professor Dr. L.W.J. Holleman stopped work on his own attempt to prove that these chemical laws do not [always] apply to living organisms. This provisional review of Holleman's Chlorella work is [and was] written with the intention that others may be able to continue this work.

The reasons for and against such further work were given by Holleman in section 5. Apart from a large body of theoretical and experimental research on sub-atomic physics, the results of which strongly preclude the possibility of biological transmutations, no direct experimental proof for the conservation of matter and the indestructibility of elements has been conducted since the 19th century; no complete elemental analysis of the development of a biological organism in a closed system has been done using modern analytical methods. Further research work is therefore strongly recommended. The basis of such research [by definition] should be essentially empirical rather than based on theory.

I recommend that the exact details of Holleman's Chlorella experiment II (sections 6.3, 6.3.1, 7 and 10) be replicated as closely as possible; the improved repeat experiments failed to produce any measurable effects. It is also recommended that the insoluble precipitate occasionally observed after ash hydrolysis should be investigated as a possible cause of trivial error. In fact, I consider that his chemical analysis difficulties are very much worthy of further research, independent of the rest of this work. If the observed potassium results remain unexplained then all subsequent improvements adopted by Holleman (covered in the previous section and elsewhere) should be considered. The method described for experiment VI in section 6.3.3 showed the greatest potential for studies on the possible role of the different developmental stages of Chlorella (see also sections 9 and 10.

The philosophical background of Holleman and his work, as detailed in section 10, should not be considered as compulsory reading. The Goethean phenomenologist and Anthroposophist Dick van Romunde (Beekman1992) stated that there is no compulsory connection between anthroposophy and phenomenology. I have included it, however, for I felt that it was difficult to separate Holleman's beliefs from a complete understanding of his research. Nevertheless, I feel that the quality of such work can only be improved should the approach described in section 10 be adopted. For a further understanding of Wim Holleman and his motivations I have taken the liberty to include a translation of his obituary, as co-written by his close friend Dick van Romunde and his daughter Sophia Holleman (appendix I).