Heiner Fangerau

In modern discourse about the history of science, it seems to be widely accepted that at the end of the nineteenth century, Germany was one of the leading countries in the production of science. In the past, historians of science tried to trace back a specific ‘German style’ of science that—in combination with other factors—determined this German dominance around 1900, especially in the life sciences. Considering the theoretical concept of ‘national styles’, it has to be kept in mind that around 1900, contemporaries already proclaimed ‘national styles’ of science as representations of national identity. Thus, the question arises as to how far existing historiographical conceptions of national styles may include earlier claims and prejudices. Careful reconstructions of contemporary discourses on national styles and inquiries into the ‘stylisation’ of a dominant, successful ‘German style’ are necessary. One of the contemporary critics of a ‘German style’ of science was the physiologist Jacques Loeb (1859–1924), who emigrated to the USA in 1891. Loeb corresponded regularly with the physicist and philosopher Ernst Mach (1838–1916). Ernst Mach can be considered Loeb's intellectual father with whom he corresponded about strategic, philosophical, and epistemological questions. Using the Loeb–Mach correspondence, the aim of the paper is to reconstruct Loeb's conception of a ‘German style’ of science and its differences to an ‘American style’. Changes in his views are discussed as well as the roots of his views and some of their consequences. Finally, Loeb's ideas on national styles and his working profiles before and after his emigration are compared to historiographical analyses of ‘American’ or ‘German’ styles of science around 1900.

Kaum ein Thema scheint im privaten wie gesellschaftlichen Leben so umstritten zu sein wie die gesunde Lebensfuhrung - Pravention ist ein Kampfplatz von politischen Steuerungsinteressen, okonomischem Kalkul und weltanschaulichen Positionen. Durch die Aufarbeitung der soziohistorischen Entwicklung verschiedener Praventionsverstandnisse tragt dieser interdisziplinare Sammelband zu einem umfassenden Verstandnis von Gesundheitsfursorge und -vorsorge bei und lasst die politischen, soziologischen, rechtlichen und philosophischen Aspekte klar hervortreten.

Representations of medicine in pop culture often have an iconographic character. Thereby, they set in a double sense of self-evidence. They represent on the one hand, self-evidently a medical context, and on the other hand, they act to transport or at least illustrate self-evident medical pieces of knowledge. In this contribution, we will give an overview of the current research about the visual self-evidence. Different strategies that serve the production of self-evident images in medicine are described and their representation in popular culture will be displayed on the basis of three case studies. The case studies include the use of curves to record and display physiological movements, radiology as a tool to produce images from the interior of the body and neuroimaging techniques that were designed to illustrate the working brain.

The pyrano‐phenazine derivatives 6 were synthesized by an efficient procedure using the reaction between benzo[a]phenacin‐5‐ols with the condensation product of an aldehyde with Meldrum's acid in the presence of a catalytic amount of Et3N at ambient temperature. The procedure is very simple, and products could be separated from the reaction media by simple filtration. High functional‐group tolerance both in the benzo[a]phenazin‐5‐ol and aldehyde moieties, facile reaction procedure, medium‐to‐high yields, and simple separation of the products from the reaction media are the advantages of this route.

Future for the History of Science? An Interjection Oriented towards Science Policies Inspired by the History of Medicine. The author argues that diversity is the great strength of the history of science. It allows for flexible reactions to intellectual challenges posed by its various reference disciplines. This strength, however, might turn into a weakness, if diversity results in arbitrariness. These claims are illustrated by the example of the history of medicine as a sub‐discipline of the history of science: The history of medicine is currently able to acquire project funding because it is diverse and flexible. Simultaneously, it experiences the risks of flexibility and third‐party funding. Basic funding, scholarly interaction, and organized exchange seem necessary to ensure professional standards. It is concluded that the future for the history of science is bright, if it is able to preserve both its diverse creativity and a disciplinary sense for academic standards.

Sowohl auf der Ebene der Konzepte von Gesundheit und Krankheit als auch auf der Ebene der Personen, die miteinander in medizinischem Kontext in Kontakt stehen, spielt Anerkennung eine Rolle in der Medizin. Im Beitrag werden drei wesentliche Ebenen der Anerkennung in der Medizin betrachtet: a) Die Anerkennung von Krankheits-/Gesundheits-/Diagnostik- und Therapiekonzepten, b) die Anerkennung des Anderen in der Arzt-Patient-Beziehung, c) die Anerkennung von Kolleginnen und Kollegen innerhalb der medizinischen Professionen.

The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated and magnified the vulnerability of convicts, psychiatric patients, elderly and disabled people in need of care, and children in institutional care or custody. Taking the move from the media coverage of “Total Institutions” during the pandemic, this paper explores the ways in which Goffman’s concept was mobilised in the public discourse to raise awareness of the extreme predicament of these vulnerable groups, as well as of the whole locked-down society. Whereas the metaphoric expansion of this terminus technicus to cover the whole community under lockdown threatens to dilute its specific meaning and overshadow the special vulnerability of inmates, we argue that the feeling of shared experience of “totalisation” bears a transformative potential. The possibility of taking stock of the multilayeredness (cognitive, rational, emotional) of the shared experience may enable collective cognizance of the structural roots of special vulnerability, thriving in the extant total institutions.

The German-born American scientist Jacques Loeb (1859–1924) was one of the most important promoters of experimental biology around 1900. He was best known for his physico-chemical explanations of psychological processes and his biotechnological approach to artificial parthenogenesis. At the start of the First World War, Loeb was deeply troubled by the deterioration of the international scientific community and the growing alienation of his German and American colleagues. The aim of this paper is to examine Jacques Loeb's activities aimed at advancing scientific internationalism before, during, and after the war. Loeb, for example, tried to negotiate the publication of German authors in American journals during the war, at a time when this was categorically rejected by publishers. Immediately after the war, he tried to create a specific system aimed at disseminating scientific literature and funding selected European colleagues, in order to overcome what he considered reactionary and hegemonic forces within German scientific institutions. His correspondence with eminent scientists from all over the world (amongst them Albert Einstein, Richard Goldschmidt, Otto Meyerhof, Otto Warburg, Paul Ehrlich, Wolfgang Ostwald, Wilhelm Roux, and Ross Harrison) will serve as a source for the analysis. Special emphasis will be placed on the question how Jacques Loeb integrated epistemology, his particular world view, and his social commitment into the workings of his own life and how he tried to extend his scientific goal of controlling biological systems to the sphere of international science

By revisiting some of the main concepts surrounding the rationale of our work, this introduction further explores the topic implicit in our book’s title. In other words, this introduction develops the argument that, given its authoritative voice, biomedical knowledge not only has been influential with cultural producers but that it also plays a major role in creating expectation and meaning for the general public. Video games, TV series, novels and even art: all those products can, in a way, be affected by biomedical and scientific knowledge. As such, the consumption of those artefacts, coupled with the anticipation created by it, may serve as a proxy for how people comprehend and understand this particular area of scientific production. Here we also emphasise that the influence of biomedicine on culture is not a one-way process. Given that specialists and researchers are also consumers, the opposite is also true: cultural products, then, may also inform biomedical knowledge. Finally, at the end of this introduction, we discuss our chapter’s threefold division. Since this book intends to introduce our topic to a wider audience, we present it from a multidisciplinary point of view whilst providing our reader with particular examples in the form of focused case studies and larger historical and social perspectives.

The historical development of so-called ‘biomedicine’ is closely linked to the rise and evolution of new ethical fields, such as bioethics and medical ethics. In this chapter, we explain what is understood by ‘biomedicine’ today, highlight the major steps in the development of biomedicine, and discuss its association with the evolution of basic ethical theories into applied ethical arguments. Both biomedicine and bioethics have left their traces and were transformed in popular cultural products, including games and film. We will show how bioethics and biomedicine can be used to analyse these products and reveal their potential contributions to actual debates about the problems, fears, and hopes associated with certain biomedical technologies — debates that are set within the triad of biomedicine, bioethical reasoning, and popular culture.

Alter, Altern, Zeitlichkeit und Geschichte sind eng miteinander verwoben. Nur ein irgendwie geartetes Verständnis der Zeit und ihres Verstreichens erlaubt es überhaupt, Altern als einen Prozess zu beschreiben, der unaufhörlich mit dem Beginn der Existenz eines belebten oder unbelebten Objekts beginnt und chronologisch voranschreitet. Nicht notwendiger Weise ist dieser Prozess von einem Aufeinanderfolgen von Ereignissen begleitet, die positive oder negative Effekte auf das alternde Objekt ausüben, wie sie sich beispielsweise in Lernprozessen oder einer verminderten Resistenz gegen Schädigungen ausdrücken könnten.