The Origin of the Term Plasticity in the Neurosciences: Ernesto Lugaro and Chemical Synaptic Transmission

The Italian psychiatrist Ernesto Lugaro can be regarded as responsible for introducing the term plasticity into the neurosciences as early as 1906. By this term he meant that throughout life the anatomo-functional relations between neurons can change in an adaptive fashion to enable psychic maturation, learning, and even functional recovery after brain damage. Lugaro’s concept of plasticity was strongly inspired by a neural hypothesis of learning and memory put forward in 1893 by his teacher Eugenio Tanzi. Tanzi postulated that practice and experience promote neuronal growth and shorten the minute spatial gaps between functionally associated neurons, thus facilitating their interactions. In addition to discovering the cerebellar cells known by his name and advancing profound speculations about the functions of the glia, Lugaro lucidly foresaw the chemical nature of Synaptic transmission in the central nervous system, and was the first to propose the usage of the terms “nervous conduction” and “nervous transmission” in their currently accepted meaning.     

The original spaciality of the body itself: phenomenology and neurosciences

The phenomenological tradition stands opposed to contemporary cognitive science in this, that so far from being a mere thing in the physical world, a thing whose mind would contain some mental representation, the lived body is constituted in its sense of being for the subject by being used and actively appropriated by this self-same subject, as agent. Though not already generally acknowledged, there are important similarities between this conception and one, which emerges from the literature of brain cartography over the last twenty years, that of a functional morphogenetic neurodynamics, induced and modulated by experience in a relatively autonomous way, in relation both to the anatomic structures of the body, as well as the cytoarchitectonic frontiers of brain tissue. Taking advantage of the latter similarities, neuroscientific data can be employed to confirm the Husserlian theory of constitution against the attempts on the part of cognitive science to discredit it, and this whether we are talking about its later modification at the hands of Merleau-Ponty or the original version, which is that of a subjective (transcendental) auto-constitution of the lived body on the basis of the practico-kinaesthetic experience of .     

Neurobiographies: writing lives in the history of neurology and the neurosciences

This essay surveys the present state of biographical writing in the history of neurology and neuroscience. Individual lives play a significant role in practitioner-historians' narratives, whereas academic historians tend to be more nonindividualistic and a-biographical. Autobiographies by neurologists and neuroscientists, and particularly autobiographical collections, are problematic as an historical genre. Neurobiographies proper are published with several aims in mind: some are written as literary entertainment, others as contributions to a cultural and social history of the neurosciences. Eulogy, panegyrics and commemoration play a great role in neurobiographical writing. Some biographies, finally, are written to provide role-models for young neuroscientists, thus reviving the classical, Plutarchian biographical tradition. Finally, a recent cooperative biography of Charcot is mentioned as an example of how the biographical genre can help overcome the alleged dichotomy between the historiographies of practitioner-historians and academic historians.     

The Golgi Stain: invention, diffusion and impact on neurosciences

The black reaction, invented in 1873 by Camillo Golgi (1843-1926, was the first technique to reveal neurons in their entirety, i.e. with all their processes. This important development passed unnoticed at first and only received wide international attention after a long delay. The Golgi stain was widely employed for almost thirty years and was directly responsible for major advances in our knowledge of the microscopic anatomy of the nervous system, as well as in other fields of study. In the hands of other researchers, the black reaction provided vital evidence that helped to establish the neuron theory. The Golgi stain was almost forgotten in the period between the two World Wars, but the introduction of the electron microscope to neurocytological resarch revived its use around the middle of the twentieth century. Today, the black reaction is still used extensively not only in combination with electron microscopy, but also as an autonomous technique in studies on the evolution, ontogeny, and organization of the nervous system.     

Inclusiveness and coherency in the history of the neurosciences

The International Society for the History of the Neurosciences (ISHN) defines "neurosciences" broadly, and we want to encourage the widest possible range of scholarly approaches to our subject. However, this deliberate inclusiveness could potentially cause problems with internal coherency in our organization and in the scholarship that we are trying to create. In other words, we need to avoid the pitfalls of the internalist-externalist tension without losing the benefits of both perspectives. In fact, I think that there is a large and interesting "gray zone," where the boundary between these supposedly separate approaches is both artificial and porous. This should be one of the most rewarding intellectual domains for the study of neuroscience history, because our subject is always culturally loaded by the mind/body problem and by the assumptions that it entails. Of course, neuroscience history is also influenced by all of the other cultural and scientific aspects of the milieus in which it is conducted. Understanding neuroscience history in all of its multiple historical contexts will require the participation of a wide range of scholarly viewpoints. To keep ourselves coherent in the process, we will have to educate each other.     

Women and the history of the neurosciences

Since the closing decades of the nineteenth century, women have been contributing in a significant way to the neurosciences. This article looks at the contributions of some of the leading women pioneers in this field. It also deals with women who have written on the history of the neurosciences and the representation of women in the International Society for the History of the Neurosciences, the largest neuroscience history organization. Trends suggest that books and articles from and about women in the history of the neurosciences will increase markedly in the future.     

Memorializing Gregory the Great: the origin and transmission of a papal cult in the seventh and early eighth centuries

This article examines the origins and early development of the cult of Pope Gregory the Great (590–604) in Rome, England, Gaul and Ireland. A first section analyses the earliest Life of the pope, written between 704 and 714 at the Northumbrian monastery of Whitby, arguing that it depended not upon oral tradition but upon early writings originating among Gregory's disciples in Rome and in part at least recorded by John Moschus. A second section relates this material to the development of Gregory's cult in the seventh and early eighth centuries, highlighting the activity of Archbishop Theodore in England. Although clerical rather than popular, the cult thus promoted established Gregory's reputation as a pastor, evangelist and father of the Latin liturgy.     

A history of the concept of the stimulus and the role it played in the neurosciences

The term stimulus, as it was used in science from its earliest appearance in the sixteenth century up to the beginning of the nineteenth century, shows a gradual progress in denotation from the physical object designed to produce nervous and muscular excitation to the generically conceived event or object that initiates sensory or motor activity. To this shift corresponds a shift in the understanding of sensory experience. Johannes Muller's law of specific energy of sensory nerves played a major role in the shift, and Hermann von Helmholtz gave the shift its most thorough philosophical explanation.     

陶寺文化与唐尧、虞舜——论华夏文明的起源（上）

中国历史悠久,文献典籍丰富,在考古学文化方面。近40年来无论是田野发掘。还是课题研究,均获得了一系列的成果。然而如何将考古材料与历史传说相结合,复原中国史前史或上古史的本来面目,重建中国古代文明,这是近几十年来几代人所关注和企盼的。但这项极有意义的考古学研究工程的进展。     

陶寺文化与唐尧、虞舜 论华夏文明的起源（下）

五、陶寺龙山文化的特征 和社会性质 陶寺文化在中原龙山文化中,有一群由铜器、木漆器、彩绘器、玉（石）器等组成的别具自身特征而又与众不同的器物群［２２］。足以说明它的社会组织形态是一个部落联盟古国的国家载体。其中最具代表性者,为下列遗存。 （一）文化特征 １．铜器 在陶寺墓葬中,发现了一件铜铃或铜铎,它虽出自晚期墓葬,但却是一件工艺复杂的迄今年代最早的复合范的大型铜器。由于它是合范铸造,表明陶寺铜器由来有时,是其在早期就已出现的佐证。所以我们说陶寺文化的社会已进入了文明古国,铜器就是一个时代的标志。 ２…