Disziplinerneuerung und Universitätsreform: Das Ius publicum Romano Germanicum

What caused the reforms which permitted the universities in the Holy Roman Empire to become leading places of scientific communication and mental orientation for centuries? In most cases, outside influences - pressures from governments, princes, scholars, councillors, consistories, or, as we would say today, state and churches - were decisive. But some reforms were the consequences of paradigm-changes within the universities themselves. Such shifts were less likely to originate with faculties concerned with medicine or the natural sciences than with those which were concerned directly with the political community or human societies. This changed only in the nineteenth century, which cannot be dealt with here.     

Die Embryologie im Spannungsfeld zwischen Tradition und Empirie

Already in classical antiquity people dealt with the principle of formation, developing different theories. Researchers in the renaissance, working in the conflict zone between tradition and experience, tried to prove one or the other of these theories by the means of new observations, especially of chicken development. Aldrovandi was the first to see the real principle of formation of the hen's egg, i. e. the blastodisc, but he didn't recognize the importance of his discovery due to his close adherence to Aristotle in the theoretical field. Fabricius even thought that traditional knowledge was of more importance than his own excellent observations. Parisano was the first to succeed in making a correct interpretation of the function of the blastodisc, but only by holding to a ‘false’ classical theory. Harvey combined his attempt to restore the developmental theory of Aristotle with a religious interpretation postulating God's intervention in all development. Subsequent to atomism, Highmore evolved a two seed theory of development, which in his view made a permanent engagement of God superfluous. Also the first observations using the microscope did not contribute to any improvement in developmental theory. Malpighi used them to confirm the theory of epigenesis, whereas Croone attributed to a piece of blastoderm the proportion of a whole embryo to demonstrate his ovistic theory of preformation. The founder of animalculism Leeuwenhoek, an amateur researcher, was at first not influenced by the trends of the scientific community. He postulated that the spermatozoa, which he discovered, contained perfect miniature animals. His investigations are a good example of where prejudices can lead, even when the observations are excellent. In the 17th century the tension between experience and tradition shifted in favour of experience, but a final solution had not by any means been reached.     

Der Naturwissenschaftler und sein Körper. Naturwissenschaftsgeschichte aus anthropologischer Perspektive

Since it's early days modern science is confronted with the following dilemma: Scientific investigation of nature requires the availability of the scientist's body in nearly all of its activities, though on the other hand science feels obliged to minimalize any influence of this body for methodological reasons. How has science dealt with this dilemma? How has it managed to keep the balance between using the body in favour of knowledge and keeping the required distance to it? In answering these questions the paper tries to reconstruct the history of early modern science from an anthropological perspective.     

Das türkische Exil als Geschichte von Frauen und ihr Beitrag zum Wissenschaftstransfer in die Türkei von 1933 bis 1945

When the National‐Socialists from the year 1933 forced jewish civil‐servants and professionals to leave their jobs with restrictive laws against different professional groups, among those who left the country in order do find new openings were many women. For many of them the exile meant the break up of their academic career. However, those who found a new occupation in the Turkish university reform the Turkish state started in 1933 made an important contribution to a successful project of science transfer the large group of emigrants from Germany and Austria carried out in Turkey between 1933 and 1945. The article shows how exiled German and Austrian women especially in the medical professions took part in the innovational shift of science and learning of the Turkish universities and the clinical practice in the institutions of public health.