Vision and visualization

The art of visual communication is not restricted to the fine arts. Scientists also apply art in communicating their ideas graphically. Diagrams of anatomical structures, like the eye and visual pathways, and figures displaying specific visual phenomena have assisted in the communication of visual ideas for centuries. It is often the case that the development of a discipline can be traced through graphical representations and this is explored here in the context of concepts of visual science. As with any science, vision can be subdivided in a variety of ways. The classification adopted is in terms of optics, anatomy, and visual phenomena; each of these can in turn be further subdivided. Optics can be considered in terms of the nature of light and its transmission through the eye. Understanding of the gross anatomy of the eye and visual pathways was initially dependent upon the skills of the anatomist whereas microanatomy relied to a large extent on the instruments that could resolve cellular detail, allied to the observational skills of the microscopist. Visual phenomena could often be displayed on the printed page, although novel instruments expanded the scope of seeing, particularly in the nineteenth century.     

Economic and Social Thinking at the UN in Historical Perspective

This article begins to examine the history of economic and social ideas launched or nurtured by the United Nations (UN). In 1999, the United Nations Intellectual History Project was initiated, to analyse the UN as an intellectual actor, and to shed light on the role of the UN system in creating knowledge and in influencing international policy‐making: this article is based on the first five books and the oral histories from that Project. The starting point is that ideas may be the most important legacy of the UN for human rights, economic and social development, as well as for peace and security. For the authors, this ‘intellectual history’ provides a way to explore the origins of particular ideas; trace their course within institutions, scholarship, and discourse; and in some cases evaluate the impact of ideas on policy and action.     

Cortical epileptogenesis and David Ferrier

There was an increasing medical interest in the localization of representation of function in the cerebral cortex after Broca in 1861 identified a cortical area that appeared responsible for expressive speech. By the late 1860s, John Hughlings Jackson—based on clinico-pathological correlations mainly in persons with focal motor seizures—had reasoned that contralateral somatic motor function was represented in another area of the cortex. This localization was supported by Fritsch and Hitzig (1870) in experimental cortical stimulation studies in dogs. These authors also reported producing events resembling contralateral motor convulsing in their animals. Their work, and Jackson’s ideas, prompted David Ferrier, in Great Britain, to begin a program of cerebral cortical stimulation studies in various vertebrate species, trying to locate cortical sites of representation of functions other than expressive speech and motor activity. In his initial report of his investigations (1873), he noted that appropriately sited Faradic stimulation evoked immediate or delayed contralateral focal motor seizures, some of which evolved into generalized convulsions. On this basis he reasoned that focal motor and generalized seizures were expressions of the same disorder; that nearly all epilepsies originated in the cerebral cortex and not in the lower brain stem, as hitherto thought; and that the clinical pattern of epileptic seizure phenomenology depended on the function of the cortical site of origin and the extent and direction of spread of seizure activity in the brain. He not only provided experimental verification for Jackson’s reasoning about epileptic seizure mechanisms but expressed the ideas a good deal more clearly than Jackson ever managed to do. Ferrier’s achievement in this regard has tended to escape notice, lost sight of because of the great importance of his investigations into localization of cerebral function.     

‘Fragments of Cultural History'? Recent work on south-east European cultural history

Abstract

In his review of Jean-Baptiste Duroselle's ‘Europe. A History of Its Peoples’, Paschalis Kitromilides lamented that in most general accounts, Europe has been reduced to a history of Visigothic Europe. In these two volumes reflecting his oeuvre until 1994 — one a valuable monograph on a crucial figure of the Balkan Enlightenment, the other an updated collection of essays written in the course of fifteen years and covering some of the central processes of the past two centuries — Kitromilides is rectifying this short-sighted view of Europe. What he shows is a Europe as a common playground of ideas where elements from the core regions are transmitted and transformed to other, adjacent and peripheral territories. His focus is on the Balkans (or Southeastern Europe in his preferred nomenclature). What he also shows admirably is the reverse relationship of core and periphery in scholarship. Even good scholars of the core are parochial in their exclusive confinement to the centre. Conversely, good scholars of the Balkan region are, as a rule, deeply knowledgeable and conversant with ideas and trends outside their immediate geographic sphere of expertise (immensely complex in itself). Paschalis Kitromilides happens to be not simply among the good scholars of and from Southeastern Europe; he is one of the best. At present director of the Centre for Asia Minor Studies in Athens and professor of political science at the University of Athens, Kitromilides is considered the leading Greek authority on the history of ideas, particularly the history of political thought. He himself describes his work as ‘fragments of cultural history’; I would add, cultural history at its best.     

The White Paper: Wilder Penfield,the Stream of Consciousness,and the Physiology of Mind

ABSTRACT

Wilder Penfield is justly famous for his contributions to our understanding of epilepsy and of the structure-function relationship of the brain. His theory on the relationship of the brain and mind is less well known. Based on the effects of the electrical stimulation of the cortex in conscious patients, Penfield believed that consciousness and mind are functions of what he referred to as the centrencephalic integrating system. This functional system comprised bidirectional pathways between the upper brainstem, the thalami, and the cerebral cortex of both hemispheres, and was the physical substrate from which memory, perception, initiative, will, and judgment arose. It was the source of the stream of consciousness and the physical basis of mind. This paper reviews how Penfield arrived at this conception of the mind-brain relationship. Although Penfield ultimately felt that he had failed in his attempt to unify brain and mind, his work shed new light on the relationship of memory to the mesial temporal structures and to the temporal cortex; and his association of consciousness and the brainstem preceded the conceptualization of the reticular activating system by a generation. In these, as in so many aspects of neurobiology, Penfield was prescient.     

Valentin Magnan and Sergey Korsakov: French and Russian pioneers in the study of alcohol abuse

This study focuses on two outstanding psychiatrists: the Frenchman Valentin Magnan (1835–1916) and the Russian Sergey Korsakov (1854–1900). Their international renown is primarily associated with their investigations into health consequences of alcohol consumption; they were pioneers in this field, and happened to know each other well. The similarities and differences are shown in social and scientific approaches adopted by these two scientists. In his work, Magnan focused mainly on absinthe and epilepsy; he considered alcoholism to be a hereditary mental disorder. Korsakov, after a period of work in Paris under Magnan’s guidance, represented a more modern generation and was advancing fundamental ideas on the nature of psychoses and merging clinical features, somatic, psychological, and social factors. Although Magnan has practically disappeared from the current literature on alcoholism, Korsakov is still clearly present today.     

The singular vision of William Charles Wells (1757-1817)

William Charles Wells retained an interest in vision throughout his life. His first book was on single vision with two eyes; he integrated vision and eye movements to determine principles of visual direction. On the basis of experiments and observations he formulated three principles of visual direction, which can readily be demonstrated. In the course of these studies, he also examined visual acuity, accommodation and convergence, visual persistence, and visual vertigo. Insights into visual processing were mainly derived from observations of afterimages that were used to provide an index of how the eyes moved. His experiments enabled him to distinguish between the consequences of active and passive eye movements (later called outflow and inflow) as well as describing nystagmus following body rotation. After providing a brief account of Wells's life, his neglected research on vision is described and assessed.     

Brown-Séquard and cerebral localization as illustrated by his ideas on aphasia

Brown-Séquard's concept of localization was built on the phenomena of inhibition and dynamogenesis, constituting a dynamic system in which reflex mechanisms, that played a part not only in the spinal cord but in the brain as well, were considered of particular importance. The use of this concept is considered in Brown-Séquard's discussion of the subject of cerebral localization, and especially of aphasia. The origin and development of Brown-Séquard's ideas on aphasia from 1861 onwards are discussed, as is the part he possibly played in the transfer of knowledge from Paris to London (Broca and Jackson). In the 1870's Brown-Séquard debated on cerebral localization with Charcot before the Société de Biologie. Opposing the cluster theory of localization, Brown-Séquard developed the theory of "réseau de cellules anastomosées", a kind of network theory in which scattered cells subserving the same function are connected by nerve fibers. This was to him a plausible theory, with which he was able to explain the fact that damage in several locations may produce the same effect, and, to account for observations that some functions remain unimpaired despite extensive brain-injury. Although Brown-Séquard's arguments were not always valid, because they were based on imprecise observations, his dynamic model, nowadays, seems valuable. He influenced "anti-localizers" such as Goltz, but also Jackson and probably Von Monakow and Sherrington.     

The loyal dissident: N.A. Bernstein and the double-edged sword of Stalinism

Nikolai Aleksandrovich Bernstein (1896-1966) studied movement in order to understand the brain. Contra Pavlov, he saw movements (thus, the brain) as coordinated. For Bernstein, the cortex was a stochastic device; the more cortexes an animal species has, the more variable its actions will be. Actions are planned with a stochastic "model of the future," and relevance is established through blind mathematical search. In the 1950 neoPavlovian affair, he came under strong attack and had to stop experimenting. It is argued that the consistency of his work derived both from both dialectical materialism and the relentless attacks of the neoPavlovians.     

Anthropological neurology: symptoms and their meanings according to Joseph Prick (1909-1978)

This article describes the life and work of the Dutch neurologist Joseph Prick (1909-1978) and his idea of an anthropological neurology. According to Prick, neurological symptoms should not only be explained from an underlying physico-chemical substrate but also be regarded as meaningful. We present an outline of the historical and philosophical context of his ideas with a focus on the theory of the human body by the French philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908-1961) and the concept of anthropology-based medicine developed by Frederik Buytendijk (1887-1974). We give an overview of anthropological neurology as a clinical practice and finally we discuss the value of Prick's approach for clinical neurology today.     

Gendered Archetypes of Wartime Occupation: ‘New Women’ in Occupied North China, 1937–40

This article examines the creation and use of gendered archetypes by the Provisional Government of the Republic of China (PGROC), the first collaborationist government established in China following the Japanese invasion of 1937. Drawing on a wide range of visual sources, it traces how this regime's messages about where women ‘belonged’ in an occupied China resulted in the creation of unique and complex archetypes which were deployed to convince Chinese women of the advantages of PGROC rule. Chief among these archetypes was the figure of the ‘PGROC new woman’. I show how this figure developed in PGROC poster art and propaganda, and eventually in film, as well as how it evolved out of early wartime and pre‐war precedents. In addition to detailing the uses and meanings of this (and other) archetypes, the article suggests that comparative analyses of gendered archetypes of collaboration developed in cognate regimes during the same period can help shed light on the extent to which the peculiar circumstances of wartime collaboration often resulted in specific ideas by male collaborationist leaders about the roles women were expected to play under occupation.     

Identifying artificially deformed crania

In this paper we report on a new discriminant function for the identification of artificially deformed crania. Development of the function, based on a sample of deformed and undeformed crania from the Philippines, required visual classification of the sample into deformed and undeformed groups. Working from the observation that deformed crania display flattened frontal and occipital regions, the sample was seriated based on degree of flattening; classification was based on the results of this seriation. The discriminant function, calculated using curvature indices, required only six simple measurements: arc and chord measurements for the frontal (glabella to bregma), parietals (bregma to lambda) and occipital (lambda to opisthion). The function was designed to be conservative, in that a deformed cranium may be classified as undeformed, but the opposite should not occur. Our function classified the undeformed crania with 100% accuracy and deformed crania with 76.9% accuracy, for a total of 91.9% agreement with visual classification. In order to evaluate whether the function is applicable for samples from outside the Philippines, a double blind test was conducted with a large sample of deformed and undeformed crania from a broad geographical and temporal range. For this sample, the function agreed with visual classification in 89.7% of cases; 98.8% of undeformed crania were correctly classified, while deformed crania were identified with 73.7% accuracy. These results demonstrate the utility of the new discriminant function for the classification of artificially deformed crania from diverse contexts. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The neurophysiological aspects of Pavlov's theory of higher nervous activity: in honor of the 150th anniversary of Pavlov's birth

Whereas Ivan P. Pavlov (1849-1936) is well-known for his work on classical conditioning, his contribution to neuroscience, particularly his interest in the function of neural centers in the central nervous system, is not as widely known. During the last three decades of his life, Pavlov explored cortical processes by salivary reflex conditioning, a method he used to develop his theory of higher nervous activity. This theory outlined the function of the brain in higher organisms in their interaction with the changing environmental contingencies. As early as 1908, Pavlov outlined a neurophysiological theory as the physiological basis of his theory of higher nervous activity. He maintained that the neural processes of excitation and inhibition irradiate and concentrate among the cortical neural centers. Most of all, he emphasized the plasticity of the cortex in higher organisms' in the Darwinian struggle for existence.     

Edward Harold Fulcher Swain's Vision of Forest Modernity

Edward Harold Fulcher Swain (1883–1970) developed a unique idea about the importance of forests, advocating the creation of a new society based upon forests, and he pursued policies to implement his unique vision of forestry when he served as the Director of Queensland's Forestry Board from 1918 to 1924 and the Forestry Commissioner for New South Wales from 1935 to 1948. Swain's beliefs developed out of a combination of his Australian experiences and connections with foresters in the British Empire and America. When he could not convince Australian elites about the need to create a forest-based society, he asked foresters at the 1947 Empire Forestry Conference in London to assert the primacy of forestry in land management in the British Empire. Many foresters positively received parts of Swain's argument, but his ideas could never be fully implemented in the British Empire because of the dominance of agrarian doctrines of development in post-Second World War colonial planning and the rapid process of decolonization. Swain's life sheds light onto current debates among historians about the origin and legacy of forestry in Australia and the British Empire. His ideas, many that parallel the basic tenets of modern environmentalism, require historians to rethink the relationship between Empire forestry and environmentalism.     

The discovery of motor cortex and its background

In 1870 Gustav Fritsch and Edvard Hitzig showed that electrical stimulation of the cerebral cortex of a dog produced movements. This was a crucial event in the development of modern neuroscience because it was the first good experimental evidence for a) cerebral cortex involvement in motor function, b) the electrical excitability of the cortex, c) topographic representation in the brain, and d) localization of function in different regions of the cerebral cortex. This paper discusses their experiment and some developments in the previous two centuries that led to it including the ideas of Thomas Willis and Emanuel Swedenborg, the widespread interest in electricity and the localizations of function of Franz Joseph Gall, John Hughlings Jackson, and Paul Broca. We also consider the subsequent study of the motor cortex by David Ferrier and others.     

The Discovery of Motor Cortex and its Background

In 1870 Gustav Fritsch and Edvard Hitzig showed that electrical stimulation of the cerebral cortex of a dog produced movements. This was a crucial event in the development of modern neuroscience because it was the first good experimental evidence for a) cerebral cortex involvement in motor function, b) the electrical excitability of the cortex, c) topographic representation in the brain, and d) localization of function in different regions of the cerebral cortex. This paper discusses their experiment and some developments in the previous two centuries that led to it including the ideas of Thomas Willis and Emanuel Swedenborg, the widespread interest in electricity and the localizations of function of Franz Joseph Gall, John Hughlings Jackson, and Paul Broca. We also consider the subsequent study of the motor cortex by David Ferrier and others.     

Re‐examining the relationship between cranial deformation and extra‐sutural bone formation

The relationship between cranial deformation and the occurrence of extra‐sutural bones remains poorly understood. Scholars are divided about whether or not cranial deformation causes an increased occurrence of these bones, and even those who agree that deformation does have an influence often disagree about which locations on the crania are most impacted. Part of this issue clearly stems from the difficulties in finding appropriate samples from which to test the hypothesis that deformation leads to an increased expression of extra‐sutural bones. The present study examines the effects of fronto‐occipital and occipital‐only deformation on the occurrence of extra‐sutural bones through an analysis of 59 deformed and undeformed crania from the Philippines. Relative to the undeformed crania, both deformed samples showed an elevated number of extra‐sutural bones. Using two different statistical tests, we identified a significantly higher occurrence of extra‐sutural bones at two distinct cranial localities for both the fronto‐occipitally deformed crania (coronal suture and asterion) and for those showing only occipital flattening when compared to the undeformed crania (lambdoidal and asterion). However, as our data reveal, individuals with highly elevated occurrences of extra‐sutural bones are not necessarily deformed. As such, we argue that deformation practices may have a positive impact on the formation of extra‐sutural bones; however, future studies using larger samples of deformed and undeformed crania—ideally from the same site—will be necessary to distinguish between the influence of cranial deformation on extra‐sutural bone formation relative to other population factors which may play a role in shaping variation in this feature. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Joseph Retinger's conception of and contribution to the early process of European integration

The origins of the European Union are especially connected to its so-called founding fathers. One of them was Polish politician Joseph Retinger, who represented a functionalist point of view. This article aims to throw light on Retinger's contribution to uniting the Old Continent. The method applied in this article is a comparative analysis of Retinger's ideas with the early phases of integration. Many significant initiatives taken with a view to the future integration of Europe, such as the founding of the European League for Economic Co-operation (1946), the Congress of Europe held in The Hague (1948), the founding of the European Movement (1948), or the establishment of the Council of Europe (1949) to give just a few examples can all be associated with Retinger's activity. The author concludes that the importance of Retinger's European activities (concerning the early period after the Second World War) were so huge that he should be ranked among the pioneers of the modern European Union.