Die Idee einer historischen Entwicklung der Krankheiten des Menschengeschlechts und ihre Bedeutung für die empirische Medizin des frühen 19. Jahrhunderts

In early 19th-century German medicine many doctors had a strong interest in historical pathology. They investigated the historical records of fevers and epidemics in detail, trying to find out how the changing influence of the epidemic constitution worked and hoping that history would help them to define specific disease entities. The underlying theory of this endeavour was that diseases undergo a historical development similar to the evolution of plants and animals. This paper tries to show that historical pathology was, in its time, a legitimate attempt to solve the most urgent problems of empirical medicine.     

„Und setzet eure Worte nicht auf Schrauben”︁ Medizinische Semiotik vom Ende des 18. bis zum Beginn des 20. Jahrhunderts - Gegenstand und Forschung

There is no doubt that medical semiotics are having a revival at the moment. Different aspects of yesterday's and today's interest in semiotics and in the historical interpretation of signs of disease in the context of theory and history of medicine can be illuminated: their deciphering as the history of the sign in medicine by historic science, their overestimation by philosophy during the Age of Enlightenment, their reduction to a phenomenology of medicine and natural science during the first half of the 19th century and their transformation to medical diagnostics since the middle of the 19th century and recently even their functionalization as methodical instrument within the history of science. The following will show the change in meaning of medical semiotics. Modern development and especially the transition to medicine, based on natural science, will be emphasized.     

Wissenschaft im Gehäuse: Vom Nutzen und Nachteil institutionengeschichtlicher Perspektiven

Research is realized in social and cultural context, it is established in institutions, as far as different forms and conditions of practice are concerned. In this article some German examples demonstrate how flexible and varied the institutions of research can be during the course of history of science. The first part deals with historically grown, yet chronologically overlapping institutions of research: beginning with the lonely scholar, going on to hierarchally organized big science and ending up with virtual institutions. In the second part, at the intersection of political‐social administration and styles of scientific thought terms like German Realpolitik, science in context, and science policy are discussed within the modernization process.     

Deutsch-italienische Wissenschaftsbeziehungen im 18. und 19. Jahrhundert — Dimensionen und Perspektiven

The scientific interrelationships between Italy and Germany in the 18th and 19th centuries — a hitherto neglected area of research — are discussed in an overview according to the following ten dimensions: language knowledge and translations; reviews and bibliographies; library content; personal contents and correspondance; travel reports and travel guides; diaries and autobiographies; university studies and research sojourns; membership in academies and scientific societies; practical and theoretical resonance; comparisons to other countries. This approach, which has to be concretized in future studies, promises at the same time general insights into the logic of science and its progress.     

Dualistische Entwürfe zur Einheit der Naturphänomene und die Anfänge der Romantischen Naturphilosophie

The importance of German Naturphilosophie for the development of a unified view of nature is often emphasized. The search for ultimate unity of natural phenomena, however, was already too common among physicists of the waning 18th century to ascribe its popularity to the influence of philosophers. To avoid the plethora of imponderable fluids, many ?atomists”? reduced electric, magnetic, thermal, and chemical phenomena to a dualism of contrary principles, thereby prefiguring the ?dynamic”? ideas of romantic Naturphilosophen. In particular we show how Schelling's early account of his Naturphilosophie was shaped by J. A. Deluc's atomistic theory of gases and vapours.     

Von der „Natur der Sache”︁ zur Geschichte der Sprache Der Übergang von der Sprachforschung zur Sprachwissenschaft zu Beginn des 19. Jahrhunderts

From the “nature of things” to the history of language: The transition from the study of language to historico-comparative linguistics. This brief essay deals with a somewhat problematic phase in the history of linguistics and tries to investigate the process by which language could be understood as a historical phenomenon with a history of its own. This new understanding of language turned out to be the starting condition for a new and very prolific way in the study of language. The conjecture is that this is due to certain alterations in the semantic field of some important notions relating to language and its study. The process of alteration began by the end of the eighteenth century with conceptual achievements which could adequately be termed as temporalization of aspects of language and the notions related to these aspects. In connection with the so called discovery of the Sanskrit language and the gradual reception of its grammatical structure, looking upon language as an organic entity with autonomous and internal structures of developpement became possible after the German romantic language philosophy had developped a strictly abstract concept of language as a notion of form. This essentially metaphorical mode of speaking nevertheless inaugurated that languages were concieved of as having their own history totally independent of their speakers. With language as an autonomous object the study of language rapidly became the science of language.     

Eine naturwissenschaftliche Forschungsbibliothek des 18. Jahrhunderts: Die Bibliothek der ‚Naturforschenden Gesellschaft’︁ zu Jena

The ?Naturforschende Gesellschaft’?, founded in 1793, proved instrumental for the development of science at the University of Jena around 1800. Its library can be considered as one of its most important facilities provided for research and for the education of students. Since this library has been preserved almost without losses, we can ask whether this library served the purpose of a research library in the newly established field of ?science’?. In consequence, the role of scientific societies and the genesis of specialised libraries in the area of science can be investigated in an exemplary case, with implications for the concept of scientific research around 1800.     

Der Kampf gegen den „Schwarzen Tod”︁. Quarantäne und Epidemiebekämpfung der frühen Neuzeit im Mittelmeer aufgezeigt am Beispiel Maltas

During early modern period Mediterranean people feared epidemics far more than war and other destructive activities. Where epidemics, especially the plague, struck, all communications broke down and trade just withered away. With the coming of the Knights of St. John in 1530 the Maltese Islands became increasingly important as an international boarding place in the very center of the Mediterranean. Soon the maritime development of the Order's State was enhanced by the high regard in which the Maltese Quarantine System was held by European countries in the 17th and 18th century. The aetiology of plague was then unknown and the restrictive measures adopted by the Maltese Quarantine System too were in accordance with the approved epidemiological practices and theories of the time. This article tries to single out the importance of the Maltese Quarantine as a kind of medical “shield” for the southern European countries.     

Verzeitlichungs- und Historisierungstendenzen in der frühen Geologie und Paläontologie

Steno described in 1669 geological sections which were interpreted as the result of a series of earlier events. Steno used actuogeological methods. This was the first step towards temporalizing nature. Steno was succeeded by a lot of other researchers from different European countries. It is amazing to see, that “actualism” was widespread during the 18th century. The next step was the discovery that fossils are extinct beings (Ray, Hooke and others). Using methods of comparing anatomy W. Hunter (forerunner of Cuvier) could prove in 1769 that the Mastodon is an extinct vertebrate. The work of Soulavie in France (1780) is stressed. He held in his hand the key for solving the problem of index-fossils. About 1800 the importance of fossils for stratigraphy and describing a history of the earth was recognized. Theories and hypotheses were needed to explain the fossil documents (strange shells in older strata and higher developed mammals in younger strata). All these theories couldn't propose a feasible mechanism for the change of beings during the history of the earth. But it could be said, that all fossils proove a history of life and the earth i. e. a progressive development in one sense, a development which is not reversible.     

“… daß der Liebhaber etwas Erfreuliches und Nützliches zu leisten im Stande ist.” Goethe,Soemmerring und das Os intermaxillare beim Menschen

Goethe's theoretical comments on the acknowledgement of the natural sciences dilettante differ considerably from his own experiences in this role (Farbenlehre, Zwischenkieferknochen) of dilettante. Therefore, it seems necessary to raise general questions on the concept: dilettante of natural sciences during Goethe's time, furthermore, on the characterization and labeling of such a dilettante in an historical-scientific context. This is especially important since up to the present time this particular problem has hardly ever been examined. In addition, there is a summary of an historical case study, the discovery of the human intermaxillary bone by Goethe and of the specialists' reactions on this discovery, especially that of Soemmerring.     

Analogie und mathematisches Denken

This article deals with six aspects of analogical thinking in mathematics: 1. Platonism and continuity principle or the “geometric voices of analogy” (as Kepler put it), 2. analogies and the surpassing of limits, 3. analogies and rule stretching, 4. analogies and concept stretching, 5. language and the art of inventing, 6. translation, or constructions instead of discovery. It takes especially into account the works of Kepler, Wallis, Leibniz, Euler, and Laplace who all underlined the importance of analogy in finding out new mathematical truth. But the meaning of analogy varies with the different authors. Isomorphic structures are interpreted as an outcome of analogical thinking.