Third Annual Meeting of the International Society for the History of the Neurosciences (ISHN)
Annapolis, Maryland, USA
7 - 9 June 1998
Go to 1998 ISHN Meeting Program
Geneviève Aubert <aubert@nops.ucl.ac.be> and Christian Laterre
This lecture will present the beginnings of medical cinematography and particularly its early use in neurology. Paris had been the hub of the rich interactions between nascent neurology, photography and chronophotography. At the Salpêtrière, Charcot and his co-workers, particularly the photographer Albert Londe, had used photography extensively. The role played by the French physiologist Marey in the development of chronophotography and later cinematography had been decisive. Finally it is again in Paris that the Cinématographe of the Lumière brothers was first shown. Very soon cinematography became a popular entertainment but medical applications were being developed simultaneously. As early as 1898, Doyen, surgeon in Paris, had himself filmed whilst operating. The screening of these films in non-medical circles and at fairgrounds brought cinematography into disrepute in official French medical society. At the same period, the Romanian Georges Marinesco, with his assistant Popescu, began to film neurological patients with various gait disorders, in Bucharest. He published several papers illustrating the interest of this technique in clinical research. He was followed in 1905 by Arthur Van Gehuchten, Belgian neuroanatomist and neurologist. Van Gehuchten underlined the pedagogic and documentary interest of this technique. He used it extensively up to his death in 1914. Examination of the neurological patient, highlight of clinical signs of various medical disorders, and evolution of symptoms after surgical treatment were among the many subjects which he documented in his films. These nitrate films are the oldest Belgian films surviving. They are preserved at the Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique.
Dominique Aubert1 and Harry Whitaker2
1Université du Québec à Montréal, Canada; and 2Department of Psychology, Northern Michigan University, Marquette, Michigan, USA
Franz Joseph Gall (1758-1828), Pierre Flourens (1794-1867) and Jean-Baptiste Bouillaud (1796-1881) offer conflicting views on methods and results regarding brain physiology. We suggest that a hierarchical link can be traced from Gall to Flourens to Bouillaud about functional relationships, reflecting the differences in current paradigms, thus the proper methods for studying the brain and the results therefrom. We examine how Etienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire's (1772-1844) evolutionary perspective of organs and brain organization relates to Gall's ideas as opposed to Georges Cuvier's (1769-1832) teleological functionalism and its significant influence on Flourens' views. These two paradigms, one on organs the other on functions, should be contrasted to the dominant medical theme, also on organs because of the focus on human autopsy material, which so influenced Bouillaud, a practicing physician. Gall's organology focuses on the organ by which a function can express itself; his concept of functions is that each is accompanied by consciousness, perception, and even sensation. For each state involving a sensation there is a unique function; the plurality of cerebral centers follows logically. This one-to-one correspondence survived, but changed under Flourens' assumption that there is a single function, intelligence, and a unitary substrate, the cerebral lobes. In his view intelligence is conceived as the brain's goal, something that Flourens borrowed from Gall and the spirit of the time. In Bouillaud's position the cerebral regions are reinstated when he asks if different parts of the brain are lesioned when one or multiple functions are affected. While refraining from taking Flourens' unitary position, Bouillaud's agreement with Gall is explicit only when asking the question in the reverse order, that is by the brain sites not the brain functions. Each of these researchers proposed a functional order to the brain, from "sensations" to "intelligence" to "cerebral regions", reflecting both the competing paradigms, such as Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire's "unity of composition" or Georges Cuvier's "finalism", as well as a growing medical influence and improving research technology. Even if all of them agreed on the localization thesis, allegiance, if not patronage, dictated their methods and their descriptive observations remained highly subjective. To illustrate these ideas, we focus on the functions of motor activity and briefly sketch the different methodologies: organology, ablations and the clinico-pathological correlation technique.
M. Boucher and A. Boucher
54 avenue de Saxe, 69006 Lyon, France
In Ancient times, primitive man did not seek to locate the site of the soul but was preoccupied with other questions: What is this life that comes from birth? Why do we sleep and dream? What is illness and death? Later, the existence of a breath is proposed, a higher creative thought which gives life at birth and takes it away at death: the last breath. This breath is linked to the soul, itself linked to the reigning divinity in the Universe. Perhaps one of the first, Empedocles, thought that each living being had a soul seated in the blood: a warmth which brought body heat. Herophilus evokes the Calamus Scriptorius as the seat of the soul. For Hippocrates, the soul was in a good or bad state depending on diet as this brought about the harmony between body and soul, explaining that "meditation is for the mind what a walk is for the body". Hippocrates emphasizes the fact that the soul is a vital function coming to the brain with the air, freeing its higher part, bringing great power to the brain.
Democrites supports the material approach of a soul composed of atoms whose master is the brain. Plato suggests a lower vegetative soul and a higher animal soul, both depending on the rational soul. The soul is, he says, "a coachman leading two horses, one that is good, the other bad, but the soul rules Measure, which in turn rules Science, which in turn rules Justice, itself." Later, Galen writes that the soul is seated in the fourth ventricle; it is the principle and cause of voluntary movements as it sends the "pneuma", a breath which spreads through the organism via the "medullar canals". With early Christianity, for St. Paul, man is a psychic mortal creature whose mind approaches him to God and whose soul is experience of faith.
In 1500, Leonardo da Vinci located the soul in the third ventricle; it must be corporeal: "if it were incorporeal, it would be inexistent and represent a void which is nonsense." For his part, Paracelsus thought there was concordance between the microcosm and the macrocosm; that the soul was the expression of the Universe and the stars. Later, Descartes located the soul, a unique organ, in the pineal body, "suspended" between the ventricles. Willis, in England, proposed that the corpus striatum was the seat of sensitivity and that the corpus callosum enabled the mind to cross between the hemispheres. In 1809, Vieussens located the soul in the "oval center" while Lancisi and Lepeyronnie proposed the corpus callosum. Then, attention was drawn to the brain stem, area attributed to the lower instincts of the "depths" (or in French "séant") of the soul. Malebranche and Spinoza disagreed with this determination to locate the soul. With the 19th century, Science was unwilling to accept any authority: "nothing has been done and all remains to be done." Sommering wrote of a vaporous fluid in the ventricle walls. Gall proposed the existence of innate faculties and the cerebral cortex is, indeed, the seat of numerous faculties, such as language in the left hemisphere. Flourens refuses to accept the localization approach and subdivide the brain as "Word" precedes language.
Lowell Bradshaw
Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
The English physiologist David Ferrier has been widely acknowledged as one of the Nineteenth-Century's leading investigators and proponents of cerebral localization. His influence upon neurophysiology may be gleaned from the attention his early experimental papers drew and from the success of his book The Functions of the Brain, originally published in 1876, revised and expanded in 1886, with successful translations in French (1878) and German (1879). While historians have traced Ferrier's intellectual development to Alexander Bain, Thomas Laycock, Herbert Spencer and John Hughlings Jackson, such a notable lineage says little about Ferrier's acquired competence within the laboratory or his experimental technique. My paper will briefly examine the period prior to, but also including, Ferrier's landmark 1873 experimental investigations with electricity; a time spent working closely within a network of medical men whose aims to establish the experimental sciences within British medical education and clinical practice not only helped shape Ferrier's approach to brain research, but also played a prominent role in confirming Ferrier's experimental conclusions. Given the contentious debate surrounding Ferrier's methods, I will examine the interrelationship between his immediate social and cognitive affiliations, his technical decisions, and their place in how Ferrier's localization scheme was negotiated/rejected. In the broadest sense, I hope to contribute to our understanding of how the instruments , standardization, and local knowledge helped to shape neurophysiological understanding during the late nineteenth century.
At the urging of Scott Burdon-Sanderson, David Ferrier arrived in London in the Spring of 1870, where he took up Burdon-Sanderson's recently vacated Lectureship on Physiology at the Middlesex Hospital, and also assisted in Sanderson's nascent investigations of experimental pathology at the Howland Street laboratory. Among the influential group of scientists associated with Howland Street--Thomas Lauder Brunton, Edward Emmanuel Klein--Burdon-Sanderson himself, among others, played a key role in confirming Ferrier's experimental investigations on the excitability of the cerebral cortex at West Riding Lunatic Asylum. Often overlooked in the history of the neurosciences is the relationship these physiologists had to experimental apparatus. If, as Robert Young and others have pointed out, new methods bring new results, then the role of instruments in shaping nineteenth-century neuroscience remains an area ripe for further investigation. The work of David Ferrier, and the responses it evoked, offers an exciting opportunity to explore this issue.
J.W. Brown
66 East 79th Street, New York, New York, 10021 USA
A.R. Luria was a transitional figure who inherited a 19th century substantialist doctrine, a sensory or associational psychology, and attempted to reconfigure the doctrine in terms of a dynamic of process. We see the tendency toward process thought in those individuals from whom he most borrowed and admired, Anokhin on functional systems, Vygotsky on hierarchy and micro-ontogeny, Bernstein on kinetic melodies and action theory, as well as Hughlings Jackson, Arnold Pick, von Monakow, Lashley and the Gestalt psychologists.
It has been the fate of A.R. Luria to achieve celebrity at the price of an accurate interpretation of his views. Thus, in neuroscience, he is best known for the concept of the functional system, which shifts the localization of functions from centers in the brain to widely distributed cooperative networks. This concept, however, has been misinterpreted as a cerebral circuit board or flow diagram. The functional system is not a congery of elements or collection of sub-centers, but was proposed as an alternative to the notion of function localization. Similarly, the concept of the aphasias as linguistic deficits of simultaneous and serial processes in relation to hierarchic systems of action and perception has been misconstrued as a rehash of the Wernicke-Lichtheim typology. The Luria-Nebraska battery employs quantitative methods to which he was vigorously opposed.
Some 20 years after his death, the work of A.R. Luria is still influential in neuropsychology. However, this work has survived largely because it has been reshaped into a psychology at odds with his original intentions. Indeed, it is characteristic of process thought, of which the writings of A.R. Luria are a good example, that either it is distorted to fit substance doctrine, and survives, or it is just forgotten. A psychology must change to remain relevant and underscore its provisional status, but not at the expense of a distortion of the past for the sake of current theory.
Paul Eling <eling@nici.kun.nl>
Department of Psychology, University of Nijmegen, The Netherlands
The starting points of this study are Wernicke's opening statements in his dissertation: "The work here submitted is an attempt to provide just such a practical application of Meynert's teachings of brain anatomy to the study of normal speech processes and the disorder generally recognized as aphasia" and "But at any event, whatever merit may be found in this work ultimately reverts to Meynert, for the conclusions here submitted issue naturally from a review of his writings and pathological studies."
The question is what Wernicke really meant by this. Is it merely the traditional acknowledgment of the teacher? Or does it indicate that Wernicke indeed learned a lot from Meynert, but primarily how to do neuroanatomy? Or was Wernicke aware of an intellectual debt to Meynert, in the sense that Meynert had discovered how brain lesions can cause sensory aphasia and how language is represented in the brain? Did Meynert conceive of language as a system with centers and connections?
Schulz (1972) has prepared a detailed bibliography of Meynert's works. It not only contains references to books and original articles, but also to minutes of meetings--for instance of the Academy of Science in Vienna, where Meynert apparently had spoken frequently. In this listing, there are nine references to papers on aphasia. This paper will give an overview of the content of these. It appears that Meynert's first case report of an aphasic patient, presented and published in 1866, was his only clinical report on aphasia. Several other papers refer to this same patient. At the end of 1866, Meynert's colleague, doctor Chrastina, presented case reports of three aphasic patients. Meynert was invited by Chrastina to make neuroanatomical comments. These comments are also listed in Schulz's bibliography. After a description of the contents of these papers, I will address the question of the interpretation of Wernicke's statement. Elements of this discussion will be the time interval between Meynert's and Wernicke's work, Meynert's activities at the time of Wernicke's stay in Vienna, and Meynert's interpretation of the nature of the language disorder in relation to Whitaker and Etlinger's suggestion that Meynert should be credited for describing language comprehension disorders.
E.J. Fine and Linda Lohr
Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Buffalo, New York 14215 and State University of New York at Buffalo, USA
Alteration of reflexes by sound defines the audiospinal response. Jendrassik in 1883 noted if a "patient clinches the hand" the "coincident" patellar tendon reflex could be increased.(1) In 1886, S. Weir Mitchell and Morris Lewis noted reinforcement of patellar reflexes by antecedent painful stimuli. They were unable to determine "the interval between the reinforcing act and knee jerk."(2)
In 1890, Bowditch (B) and Warren (W), of Harvard Medical School, devised electromechanical devices to deliver a constant intensity force to elicit patellar reflexes, to measure amplitudes of knee jerks and to select intervals between stimuli and responses in human subjects.(3) An electrically driven iron solenoid hit a wooden hammer with constant force to elicit strike knee jerks. Knee jerk amplitudes were recorded on a rotating kymograph drum by a lever connected to a hinged brace that was attached to and suspended subjects' legs. A device turned on a time marker and simultaneously released a torpedo containing fulminating powder which exploded with a loud sound. Sounds delivered 100 to 1000 ms before knee reflexes were elicited, increased their amplitudes. Maximum amplitude responses appeared at intervals of 200 to 250 ms before the knee jerk.(3) Illustrations demonstrate the extraordinary art of the physiological apparatus B and W designed.(3)
Rossignol (R) and Jones (J) in 1976 confirmed, loud sounds given 100-250 ms before eliciting H reflexes increased amplitude of these reflexes.(4) R and J stimulated the tibial nerve to elicit H reflexes from soleus muscle. Considering H reflexes are electrical equivalents of mechanical tendon taps, B and W must be credited for prescient studies of the audiospinal reflex and demonstrating that external stimuli can modify tendon reflexes.
References:
Research support by Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Buffalo, NY.
Stanley Finger1 <sfinger@artsci.wustl.edu> and Edward J. Haupt2 <haupt@mail.njin.net>
1Department of Psychology, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri 63130; and 2Department of Psychology, Montclair State University, Upper Montclair, New Jersey 070403-1624 USA
Although Hermann von Helmholtz made monumental contributions to at least 7 different disciplines, the subject of this presentation will be our debt to Helmholtz as a neuroscientist. It will begin with his thesis on the relationship between nerve cells and fibers, a project completed before Cajal championed neuron theory. In 1850, Helmholtz estimated the speed of nerve conduction in animals and humans. This work contributed to the demise of "vitalism" and stimulated the birth of modern neurophysiology. It provided early evidence for synapses and led to estimates of the time needed for higher mental processing. In 1850, Helmholtz also invented the ophthalmoscope, a tool for looking into a living eye -- a window to the brain. The ophthalmometer for measuring lens curvature, was another of his inventions. It permitted him to determine how the lens changes shape to focus objects on the retina. During the 1860s, he revived Young's 3-receptor theory of color vision. He also proposed a resonator theory for hearing. In both cases, he modified Müller's law of specific "sense" energies to account for sensory qualities within a system (i.e., specific "nerve" energies). Helmholtz distinguished between sensation and perception, emphasizing that learning, experience, and unconscious factors contribute to perception. Although his extreme empiricism was controversial, his theories about perception caused many people to think about the active role of the brain. His ideas stimulated explosive growth in sensory neurophysiology and behavioral neuroscience; indeed, he was the model scientist many new experimentalists sought to emulate.
R.S. Fishman
Department of Ophthalmology, Washington Hospital Center, 106 Irving Street NW, Washington, DC 20010 USA.
René Descartes' picture of the human brain, notorious as it is for placing the soul or mind in the pineal gland, had yet within it the basic idea of the brain as a highly organized sensori-motor mechanism with topographical sensory mapping and localization of function. Descartes was directly led to this by his study of Johannes Kepler's concept of the intraocular refraction of light as producing an image in the retina. Descartes, alone of all thinkers at the time, understood what that retinal image implied, not only for the nature of vision, but for the operation of the brain in general. Kepler's retinal image was a geometrical representation of the outside world, inside the body. It thus was a powerful argument that however the soul gained understanding from it, the image's organization would be crucial. If this organization was not to be lost in its passage to the brain, there had to be a corresponding, internalized model of external reality within the brain. The crucial linkage between Kepler and Descartes is not widely appreciated but is one of the best examples of synergism in the history of science.
Duane E. Haines1 and Brad Franklin2
1Department of Anatomy, The University of Mississippi Medical Center, 2500 North State Street and 2Belhaven College, Jackson, MS 39216 USA
Contemporary research on the structure of the meninges, the membranes surrounding the brain, reveals that the so-called subdural space (spatium subdurale) does, in fact, not exist. In the normal situation the arachnoid mater is attached externally to the dura mater by a friable layer called the dural border cell layer and internally to the pia mater by the arachnoid trabeculae. Cerebrospinal fluid is located in the subarachnoid space; the space traversed by the arachnoid trabeculae.
Recognizing these facts, how did the concept of a subdural space, that is a space located between the dura and arachnoid, develop? In 1875, Kety and Retius showed that the subarachnoid space around the brain was continuous with that around the spinal cord. Following on the heels of this observation, and building on the reports of Bichat, Kölliker and others, Frank Warren Langdon (1852-1933), using the method of dissection (fetal and adult), concluded in 1891 that the arachnoid consisted of visceral and parietal layers that enclosed an arachnoid cavity. Beginning in about 1912-14 Lewis Hill Weed (1886-1952) conducted experimental studies on cerebrospinal fluid and meninges. He concluded (1917) that the subdural space appeared during development (50 mm stage) and that it became a mesothelial lined fluid containing space that did not communicate with the subarachnoid space. The interpretation of separate subdural and subarachnoid space was confirmed by Harvey Williams Cushing (1869-1939) and Wilder Graves Penfield (1891-1976). Cushing reported that infections could involve one, but not the other, of these spaces while Penfield measured the fluid content of the presumed subdural space and offered clinical evidence that the fluid contained in this space was different from that in the subarachnoid space. In 1933, Leary and Edwards reported no evidence of a mesothelial-lined subdural space and pointedly stated that this space did not correspond to serious cavities as previously claimed. Weed completely ignored this opposing view when, in 1937, he summarized the modern view of meningeal structure and function. In retrospect it is clear that the appearance of a subdural space was the result of technical limitations (in experimental studies) or the result of pathological processes (clinical studies). This presentation reviews these early views and correlates them with contemporary interpretations.
Lauren Julius Harris <LJHARRIS@MSU.edu> and Jason B. Almerigi <ALMERIGI@PILOT.MSU.edu>
Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, USA
Roberts Bartholow's 1874 study of the patient Mary Rafferty is widely cited as the first demonstration of the motor excitability of the human cerebral cortex, although some question its priority (Thomas & Young, 1993), and others question whether Bartholow even stimulated the cortex in the first place, given the depth of penetration of the electrodes (Kolb & Whishaw, 1996).
Our paper addresses these and other issues. We begin by reviewing the theoretical and empirical background of the story. We then present Bartholow's own account of the experiment, along with our proposal about which structures were stimulated. To do this, we reconstructed the experiment by referring to the same brain atlas used by Bartholow to establish his anatomical coordinates, by examining Bartholow's electrical stimulation method, and by considering the results in light of current research on motor functions. We then recall the effects of the experiment on the patient (why the experiment became notorious), and we analyze its influence on contemporaneous scientific opinion about the motor excitability of the human cerebral cortex. We close by discussing ethical issues raised by the case and the role the experiment deserves to play in the larger story of the search for functional localization in the nervous system.
Joy Harvey
Department of the History of Science, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
A strong case for the central importance of Rockefeller funding in shaping the future of neuroscience in the 1930s can be made through examination of the Medical Sciences Division, headed by Alan Gregg in the 1930s. Although the rhetoric of the Medical Sciences Division indicated its primary concern with "psychiatry", the majority of funding provided an extensive and fundamental support for neurosurgery (through support for the Montreal Neurological Institute), as well as for basic research fields investigating neurochemical transmission, neuroanatomy, nerve conduction studies, etc., as well as neuroimmunology. The Rockefeller Foundation was not only crucial in training young investigators throughout the world in identified laboratories considered "centers of excellence" but in equipping these laboratories with expensive new technical apparatus. Among these central laboratories were those of Sherrington, Adrian and A.V. Hill in England, A. Monnier in France, the Vogts in Germany and (surprisingly) Pavlov in Soviet Russia. An important consideration is the unexplored role of the Rockefeller Foundation in focusing on support for the Gasser-Erlanger oscillograph immediately after its demonstration at the XI International Physiological Congress in Boston in 1929. The paper will also inquire whether the pattern of funding of nervous system research, and especially the encouragement of purchases of large scale scientific technology, represented Gregg's attempt to compete with Warren Weaver's Natural Sciences Division at the Rockefeller and display a similar endorsement for a reductionist "hard science" on an international scale.
Edward J. Haupt <haupt@mail.njin.net>
Department of Psychology, Montclair State University, Upper Montclair, New Jersey 070403-1624 USA
There are a number of indications that G.E. Müller's psychophysical axioms were seen as a crucial part of the development of experimental psychology. These indications include Boring and Herrnstein's placement of the axioms between Hering's reductionism and Köhler's isomorphism, Boring's rather embarrassing attempt to make an "operational" restatement of these axioms, as well as Koffka's dismissal of these axioms as "casual."
The term psychophysical axioms itself is not epistemologically or metaphysically neutral. The lineage of this terminology includes Fechner's description of the strict parallelism between psychical acts and physical states as the "psychophysical axiom," and the parallelism of "psycho-"physical to the "bio-"physical materialism of Dubois-Reymond and his colleagues of 1847. Since many of the physiologists and early experimental psychologists held materialist convictions, we tend to miss the importance of the anti/materialism debates of the 19th century in experimental psychology. These debates covertly continued when materialism was all but proscribed in Wilhelmine Germany. Thus Lotze used his role in 1854 as the keynote speaker to the Verein der Naturforscher und Ärzte as a pulpit to speak for mechanist causality in physiological processes, while he could not support materialism. In addition, Lotze promoted Fechner's doctrine of psychophysical parallelism, which, I think has to be understood as a de facto or "all but" sort of materialism. Müller continues this tradition.
The purpose of the current paper is to explicate the content of Müller's paper which contains these psychophysical axioms as an early example of modern physiological reductionism. Thus, Müller's analyses of visual sensory phenomena (such as his use of reversible chemical processes from the lectures of Walter Nernst) was used to characterize 2 retinal chemical processes for each receptor to generate Hering's 3 axes (and thus opponent processes). Müller then applied this physiological analysis to the phenomena of lightness, simultaneous contrast, color deficiency, and other problems. These expositions will be used to show the strength of Müller's commitment to a program of physiological reductionism.
Hansruedi Isler
Neurology Department, University Hospital, CH-8091 Zürich, Switzerland
17th century brain research relied on non-Cartesian concepts of body and soul where the soul was not "one and indivisible" as in Descartes' system but divided into three parts: the immortal, immaterial rational soul, found only in human beings; then a material, mortal "sensitive soul" providing sensation, simple mental functions, and movement in all animals, including humans; and finally, a material, mortal "vital soul" providing the vital functions of the body, in short, sustenance and maintenance. This hierarchy of one mind-soul supported by two body-souls was part and parcel of the combined Aristotelian and Galenic anthropology of the 13th century, completed by Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas, and accepted by most European universities up to the 18th century. In the 17th century it was given its final form by Pierre Gassendi, a friend of Kepler and Galilei, and a defender of Epicure and his atomism (1592-1655). He was one of the leading anti-Aristotelian philosophers, with Pierre de la Ramée and Descartes. Gassendi pointed out that mental activities in animals were evident whereas his slightly younger adversary, Descartes (1596-1650), thought that animals were mere clockwork automata. For Gassendi the "sensitive soul" of man and animals was the full array of the "animal spirits", the material agents within the nervous system which provided its functions. He also thought that muscular contraction resulted from internal explosions within the muscle fibres, a notion that was later adopted by Thomas Willis, and from Willis, by Liebniz. Gassendi felt the need for detailed descriptions of the functions of the body-souls, and he wrote his own textbook of sensory physiology. The first concerted effort by a research team to arrive at a synthesis of neuroanatomy, neurophysiology and clinical neurology, Thomas Willis' De Anima Brutorum of 1672, in the mainstream of the developing neurosciences, specifically quoted Gassendi's work as its theoretical mainstay.
Russell A. Johnson <rjohnson@library.ucla.edu>
Neuroscience History Archives, Brain Research Institute; and History and Special Collections Division, Louise M. Darling Biomedical Library, UCLA, Los Angeles, California 90095 USA
Since the first annual meeting of the International Society for the History of the Neurosciences (ISHN) in Buffalo in 1996, several tools have been developed to assist neuroscience historians in harnessing the chaotic and ever-changing Internet to supplement and in some cases replace other forms of communication and information distribution and retrieval: (1) HISTNEUR-L: The Neuroscience History Internet Forum <HISTNEUR-L@library.ucla.edu> is a listserv or e-mail distribution list for broadcasting announcements, queries, and scholarly and other opinions to its nearly 200 subscribers. Strategies for using it and increasing its exposure will be discussed. (2) The ISHN Home Page <http://bri.medsch.ucla.edu/archives/ISHNHOME.htm> on the World Wide Web is an attractive and efficient portal for learning about and contacting the society. In addition to introducing novices to the utility of the Web using the home page as an example, we will suggest mechanisms for ensuring quality control of content and presentation as more features are added to ISHN's Web site. (3) RETICULUM: Neuroscience History Resources <http://bri.medsch.ucla.edu/archives/RETICULM.htm>, an historical complement to Neil Busis's Neurosciences on the Internet utility (which focuses on information resources supporting contemporary neuroscience research, development, policy, and teaching), is a meta-site or gateway to the rapidly proliferating potpourri of individual resources which are of potential interest to historians of neuroscience. This presentation will report progress in collecting, organizing, and verifying pointers or links to existing sites as well as generating content, such as announcements, calendar items, and directory entries, which might not otherwise be available on the Web. For this project to flourish, we must also rely on input from ISHN members whose expertise and familiarity with specific topics, individuals and eras gives them the appropriate perspectives from which to evaluate the quality and relevance of RETICULUM's structure and content. Neuroscience historians will be asked to recommend or discourage existing and prospective categories and links according to their usefulness, interest and accuracy. Suggestions of other Internet resources for librarians and archivists to procure, create or refine will be appreciated as we continue to identify the concerns and expand efforts to meet the information needs of the neuroscience history community.
D.G. Joseph <dgjoseph@pantheon.cis.yale.edu>
Section of the History of Medicine, Yale University School of Medicine, L132 Sterling Hall of Medicine, 333 Cedar Street, New Haven, Connecticut 06510 USA
In two often-cited papers, J.B. Morrell and Gerald Geison proposed some of the factors responsible for the success or failure of research schools in science. The research school that developed at Washington University, under the leadership of Nobel laureate Joseph Erlanger, used the cathode ray oscilloscope with amplifier (CRO) for the quantitative study of the nerve action potential. Erlanger's research group exemplifies how research programs can develop around experimental instruments and techniques and can fail under even optimal conditions. The CRO went on to become a basic tool in neurophysiology, but neither Erlanger nor his school enjoyed the lasting influence that characterized comparable schools of American physiology at the time, such as those of William Howell, Walter Cannon, or Anton Carlson. Although the introduction of a new tool such as the CRO offered the opportunity for a school to define a new approach to neurophysiology, the school's potential impact was undermined by personal factors, such as Erlanger's authoritarian style of management and proprietary view of scientific research.
D.G. Joseph <dgjoseph@pantheon.cis.yale.edu>
Section of the History of Medicine, Yale University School of Medicine, L132 Sterling Hall of Medicine, 333 Cedar Street, New Haven, Connecticut 06510 USA
Between the World Wars, physiologists in the United States and Europe made important advances in understanding the activity of nerve fibers. New instruments and techniques, such as recording the action potential with a cathode ray oscilloscope and amplifier and recording intra-cellular conditions with sub-membrane electrodes, were two of the most pivotal developments. Reliance on a single instrument or experimental technique characterized much of the research in pre-World War II neurophysiology. Francis Otto Schmitt's research program, emphasizing both functional and structural studies of nerve fibers and employing multiple techniques, represented a departure among pre-World War II neurophysiologists. From 1927 to 1941, while at Washington University, Schmitt developed broad, interdisciplinary approaches to neurophysiology that would typify his pioneering Neurosciences Research Program at MIT. In seeking to understand the biochemical, physiological, and structural properties of nerves, Schmitt's ambitious approach stood at the forefront of what later was considered molecular biology and biophysics. This paper considers: (I) the influences that shaped Schmitt's cross-disciplinary approach; (ii) the specific features and aims of his research; and (iii) how Schmitt's research anticipated the Post-World War II development of molecular biology and biophysics.
Steven Kanne <smkanne@artsci.wustl.edu> and Stanley Finger <sfinger@artsci.wustl.edu>
Department of Psychology, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri 63130 USA
Roger Sperry and his associates at Chicago (Myers) and Caltech (Bogen, Vogel, Gazzaniga) collaborated on many "split-brain" studies between 1953 and 1980. They demonstrating that the corpus callosum plays an important role in inter-hemispheric communication in cats, monkeys, and humans. They also provided critical insights about hemispheric specialization in humans.
Nevertheless, the Sperry group was not the first to study the behavioral effects of sectioning the corpus callosum. In humans, Dandy performed callosal surgeries in the 1930s and, in the 1940s, Akelaitis followed a number of cases operated on by Van Wagenen. These men, however, did not recognize the so- called "split-brain" or disconnection syndrome. Nor did Karl Lashley, who studied the effects of cutting the corpus callosum in animals. Often overlooked is Konstantin Michaelovich Bykov (1886 1959), who conducted split-brain studies on dogs while working in Pavlov's laboratory in Russia. In this presentation, we plan to look at Bykov's career and present an English translation of one of his short articles from the 1920s. Bykov, it will be shown, clearly recognized the importance of the corpus callosum for the transfer of learned information from one hemisphere to the other.
We shall also show that Bykov's theoretical orientation, paradigm, and choice of publication vehicles, as well as international politics, all contributed to his findings not being recognized outside of the Soviet Union. Sperry's early publications provide no evidence to show that he even knew what Bykov's had done. Even today, Bykov's experimentally-derived insights about the corpus callosum remain relatively unknown in the West.
Kaplan and Henderson
Affiliation
Axel Karenberg and I. Hort
Department of the History of Medicine and Medical Ethics, Cologne University, Joseph-Stelzmann-Straße 9, D-50931 Cologne, Germany
According to many historians of the neurosciences, the Middle Ages were a "sterile period" in the annals of clinical medicine. The medieval era was perceived to be a period in which textual tradition dominated over independent empirical observation. When so interpreted, such a past was not very likely to contribute to a story of progress and discoveries. To reconsider this evaluation by a longitudinal study of original sources, we focus on a single disease, apoplexy, and analyze more than 50 Greek, Arabic and Latin texts. After a quick survey of methodology and chronology, the following points are discussed in our paper:
Peter Koehler <pkoehler@knmg.nl>
Department of Neurology, De Wever Hospital, POB 4446, 6401 CX Heerlen, The Netherlands
The relationship between medicine and the arts, literature in particular, has many aspects. One of the most obvious relations is the use of literature as a source for historical studies. We may learn about diseases that occurred in the past (diagnosis, treatment, social attitudes) and about the patients' experiences. Sometimes it is possible to follow scientific and medical movements by reading contemporary books. Many physicians are authors of novels and poems, or started a career in literature before they came to medicine. Literature may be considered important for medical education: reading a novel may be more instructive that studying a theoretical treatise on human communication. Finally, we may come across information about the character or prestige of physicians.
In this study I want to discus the occurrence of Charcot and his school in French literature at the end of the 19th (and early 20th) century. Several aspects will be highlighted, including 1) the ideas about denerative diseases as discussed in the work of Emile Zola, the main author of the naturalistic movement; 2) decadence and satanism in two "transitional" novels by Joris Karl Huymans who, once a supporter of the naturalistic movement, changed his ideas following observations in disease and cure that could not be explained in a scientific way. Charcot's work on hysteria and hypnosis, but also Brown-Séquard's rejuvenation experiments with testicular extracts, played an important role in this respect; 3) Charcot's relationship with the Daudets, in particular his treatment of Alphonse's tabes dorsalis and the ambivalent attitude of his son Léon Daudet towards Charcot; 4) the influence of the lectures at the Salpêtrière on the work of De Maupassant, who attended the lessons in the mid-1880s. He finally died from dementia paralytica. Attention will be paid to the neurological symptoms and signs he had at the end of his life; and 5) Marcel Proust's fear of aphasia and the consultation by several pupils of Charcot, including Dejerine and Babinski.
Reading novels and biographies of these persons provides information about Charcot, his school, and most importantly, the context: Paris at the "fin-de-siècle."
L. Kruger <lkruger@neurobio.medsch.ucla.edu> and T.C. Correll
Department of Neurobiology and 17th and 18th Century Studies Center, University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Los Angeles, California 90095 USA
Samuel Collins (1618-1710), an important figure in the creative period of science in Tudor England, is credited with the earliest attempts to illustrate the brains of a broad variety of mammals, birds, teleosts, and elasmobranchs in a remarkable two volume folio edition of over a thousand pages which was published in London in 1685. Collins was a noted anatomist, serving as Gulstonian lecturer, later as the Lumleian lecturer for 15 years, and in his seventies was elected President of the Royal College of Physicians in 1695. His son, the younger Samuel Collins, was also an "anatomical writer of international repute" in the 18th century.
Collins's anatomy draws largely upon the works of Thomas Willis and Edward Tyson. In the opening Epistle-Dedicatory to James II he claims that various chapters "are illustrated by the Dissection of other Animals (which I have performed with Care and Diligence, speaking the wonderous Works of the Glorious Maker) rendering the Parts of Man's Body more clear and more intelligible." In volume two of his huge work he describes numerous folio copper plates engraved by W. Faithorne containing the most extensive comparative anatomy of the brain then extant, an expansive account of the functional significance of his findings, as well as practical clinical commentary. The terminology and interpretations of brain anatomy as exemplified in Collins's work will be discussed in the context of the evolving discipline of comparative neurobiology.
Howard I. Kushner
History of Medicine, San Diego State University, San Diego, California 92182-8147 USA
In the late 1950s and early 1960s increasing clinical evidence indicated the antipsychotic agent haloperidol was effective for controlling the involuntary motor tics and vocalizations attached to a number of childhood movement disorders including Tourette syndrome. The action of haloperidol as a dopamine antagonist, particularly in the substantia nigra to basal ganglia pathway, provided additional evidence in support of a neurobiological substrate for these disorders. Even though psychoanalytic psychiatrists had conceded since the late 1940s that psychoanalysis was ineffective in controlling these behaviors, their admissions heightened rather than lessened claims that psychoanalytic theory exposed the underlying forces that produced these involuntary movements. Insisting that tic disorders resisted psychoanalytic interventions because "the role of the tic" was, in the often quoted words of J.E. Heuscher, "the last desperate defense against psychosis," the psychoanalytic establishment belittled the psychopharmacologic evidence tying tics to organic factors. The dominance of psychoanalytic psychiatry was overwhelming, including control of the editorial boards of most American psychiatric journals, that it was often impossible for those who challenged this paradigm to obtain venues for publication of their clinical findings. As a result, in deference to the cultural power of psychoanalysis, psychopharmacological findings often were framed in psychoanalytic language and their implications were often muted. Thus, even though by 1964 two groups of University of Iowa medical researchers had demonstrated that haloperidol was effective in every ticcing patient they treated, these physicians continued to urge that patients undergo psychotherapy. In fact, every study of haloperidol and tics that was published in the United States until 1970 followed a similar strategy of laying out persuasive evidence for a neurobiological substrate, while concluding that psychoanalytic treatment was indicated. The one exception was in 1968 when Cornell researchers Arthur and Elaine Shapiro submitted similar results to these same journals, but in language that attacked rather than deferred to psychoanalytic insights. Their article, now regarded a classic study, was rejected by every North American psychiatric journal. As a result, as hundreds of patient testimonies reveal, it was extremely difficult for patients with Tourette's syndrome to obtain an effective diagnosis and treatment. Not until the early 1980s would the tide turn against the psychogenic frame for childhood movement disorders. But, the shift toward an organic frame proved to be impossible without the organizational support of patients and their families who, unlike the majority of psychiatrists, refused to accept the psychoanalytic claims that contradicted their everyday experience.
Marie Lazure1 and Harry Whitaker2
1Université du Québec à Montréal, Canada; and 2Department of Psychology, Northern Michigan University, Marquette, Michigan, USA
Denis Diderot (1713-1784), French philosopher and encylopedist, personifies the modernism and the "avant-garde" of the Enlightenment. Although he is a well studied figure of this era, he is hardly known in historiography of the neurosciences. This paper discusses his contribution to the development of neuroscientific concepts in the 18th century. Diderot's ideas were eclectic; he never developed complete systems. Sometimes, however, his analysis of a problem opened a new perspective. His ideas on sensory substitution, for example, seem to be relevant even by today's standards. La lettre sur les aveugles (1749) illustrates the originality of his thought. In this work, Diderot explores the nature of visual phenomena by thinking about blindness. He anticipates the mechanism of sensory compensation and substitution by trying to reconstitute the genesis of ideas among those born blind. He analyses different aspects of perception and learning by modifying the terms of Molyneux's famous question. Although we can criticize Diderot's lack of intellectual rigor--he himself confessed to the limit of his "audacity"--we should acknowledge that there is an important role for intuition in the process of scientific discovery. Diderot's speculations made him a forerunner of some 20th century research on visual processes such as that by Bach y Rita.
J.B. Lyons
Department of the History of Medicine, Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland, The Mercer Library, Lower Mercer Street, Dublin 2, Ireland
Born in Castlebar, County Mayo, Ireland, John Hennen (1779-1828) graduated from the Edinburgh College of Surgeons and served in Wellington's army throughout the Peninsular War. His Principles of Military Surgery considers, among other things, the management of injuries of the nerves, tetanus, and wounds of the head. Neurophysiology did not yet exist in the modern sense, but Hennen's attempts to gain even a glimmer of understanding are very evident.
Nancy McCall and Lisa A. Mix
The Alan Mason Chesney Medical Archives of the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
Born in 1894, Curt Richter had a long and productive scientific career. For nearly six decades he directed the Psychobiology Laboratory of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine where he conducted research on the physiological basis of behavior. Richter's experimental studies focused primarily on ingestive behavior, the motor and sympathetic nervous systems, and biological rhythms. Shortly after his death in 1988 Richter's voluminous collection of research records were transferred to the Alan Mason Chesney Archives of the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions. This collection includes logbooks (800), activity charts (15,000 to 20,000), Esterline Angus charts (20,000), skin resistance charts (1,500 to 2,000), still photographs (1,000), lantern slides and photographic negatives (7,000). In an effort to make these research records more widely available for scientific and historical study, the staff of the Medical Archives has digitized various selections of records and placed these on the World Wide Web.
The paper intended for the ISHN meeting will concentrate on an effort to convert the print version of Curt Richter's Biological Clocks in Medicine and Psychiatry (Charles C Thomas, 1965) into an electronic format for the World Wide Web. The projected electronic version will include the original data from experiments that were presented in the 1965 publication. An objective of the project is to provide electronic access to experimental protocols and original data to a broad audience of neuroscientists, historians, and students in these respective fields. Our aim is to give users an opportunity to manipulate Richter's data and to study research methodologies that he employed in his ground-breaking studies of biological clocks. We will provide an overview of the text on biological clocks and will discuss the methodologies and instrumentation used for the biological clock studies. Finally, we will demonstrate the manipulation of data from several experiments in Biological Clocks in Medicine and Psychiatry that have been converted to a digital format. At the conclusion of the paper, we would like to allow time for discussion with the audience. We are particularly interested in learning how historians of the neurosciences respond to this new form of electronic publishing which includes original data.
David Millett <DMillett24@aol.com>
Committee on the Conceptual Foundations of Science, University of Chicago, Social Sciences #205, 1126 E. 59th Street, Chicago, Illinois 60637 USA
Cerebral physiology was revolutionized in 1870 when Gustav Fritsch and Eduard Hitzig demonstrated that galvanic stimulation of the cerebral surface in dogs could produce localized contraction in contralateral muscles. Three years later, David Ferrier conducted a similar series of experiments in the new physiological laboratory of the West Riding Lunatic Asylum in Wakefield, UK. Fritsch and Hitzig's discovery and Ferrier's subsequent work have now acquired a canonical status in the history of cerebral physiology, neurology and neurosurgery. Yet the relationship between their different clinical backgrounds, models of cerebral physiology, experimental techniques and interpretations of stimulated movements have not been analyzed.
Fritsch and Hitzig's experimental physiology derived from Hitzig's prior clinical and experimental work in electrotherapy. Hitzig was prompted to pursue experimental stimulation of the cortex when he discovered an association between a long-recognized side of effect of electrotherapy, galvanic vertigo, and stimulated eye movements. When it was found that eye movements could be produced even when the stimulating currents were too weak to reach deep structures known to control eye movements (e.g. colliculi), Hitzig turned to the study of cortical excitability. Thus, the most important issue addressed by Fritsch and Hitzig, namely the potential for diffusion of current, emerged in a clinical setting. Contrary to most historical accounts, Fritsch and Hitzig did experiment with faradic stimulation of the cortex, but rejected this form of stimulation as well as superthreshold currents because they gave rise to variable and non-localized movements (e.g. epileptic attacks, aftermovements), thus indicating a cortical diffusion of current. The physiological interpretation these authors gave to stimulated movements may also be traced to Hitzig's clinical study, in which he explained the combination of perceptual and motor responses in galvanic vertigo on the basis of an illusory sensation of muscle activity caused by polarized galvanic stimulation of the head. A similar mode of explanation reappeared in Fritsch and Hitzig's account of the physiological function of cerebral centers, when they suggested that these "motor" centers were actually foci of muscle sensation (Muskelsinn).
David Ferrier's researches in cerebral physiology were guided by a very different set of principles. Ferrier's intention of experimentally corroborating the views of Hughlings Jackson is well known. Yet three basic physiological assumptions of Jackson's also guided Ferrier: (1) cerebral convolutions contain only representations of movements and sensations; (2) all motor functions, from voluntary movements to epileptic convulsions, are based on the same physiologically mechanism; and (3) cerebral hyperemia signified the normal physiological function of the cortex. Thus, currents sufficient to produce epileptoid movements were considered unacceptable by Hitzig, but perfectly suitable for cerebral localization by Ferrier according to (2). Similarly, while Ferrier held that the "positive character" of cerebral hyperemia indicated the superiority of his method of faradic stimulation, Hitzig interpreted the cortical suffusions and punctate hemorrhages which accompanied faradic stimulation as indices of cortical destruction. Understanding the complex interactions between clinical knowledge, physiological assumptions, and experimental techniques will enrich our understanding of the "opening phase" of cerebral physiology.
David Millett <DMillett24@aol.com>
Committee on the Conceptual Foundations of Science, University of Chicago, Social Sciences #205, 1126 E. 59th Street, Chicago, Illinois 60637 USA
Historians have occasionally presented the history of cerebral localization as a sequence of illustrations or diagrams (e.g. Clarke and Dewhurst, 1972/1996). Despite recurrent critiques of "diagram makers," illustrations of cerebral function consolidate a tremendous amount of data and carry great conceptual power. While nineteenth century illustrations of brain function reflected the unavoidable assumptions and biases of pioneering work in this immensely difficult field, they were crucial for the achievements of both neurosurgeons and physiologists.
Experimental technique, theoretical preconceptions, and clinical aims significantly shaped the construction of cerebral diagrams during the latter nineteenth century. Eduard Hitzig's technically ascetic approach to cerebral localization, emphasizing the use of only threshold current and requiring repeated experimental trials, resulted in the production of brief muscle twitches and of the identification of just five clustered centers in the dog. On the other hand, theoretical and clinical influences in David Ferrier's experimental physiology led him to use superthreshold stimulating currents and consolidate partial data from various experiments, resulting in the construction of initial maps of the dog brain with over twenty widely distributed cerebral centers. When these researchers turned to cerebral localization in monkeys during the mid-1870s, these methodological differences persisted. Although Hitzig's boundaries of the "motor" cortex in the macaque were more accurate, the cerebral diagrams which accompanied Ferrier's 1874 manuscript The Localisation of Function in the Brain were considerably more influential in the late nineteenth century. Once again, Ferrier's contentious illustrations were an amalgamation of many experiments, with each cerebral "center" being stimulated in only four or five of these. They were sketched by Ernest (later Sir Ernest) Albert Waterlow, a young London landscape painter, and soon appeared in Ferrier's Experiments on the Brain of Monkeys and the widely influential Functions of the Brain. These illustrations and the direct transposition of their cerebral centers onto Ecker's diagram of the human brain were tremendously important for the clinical application of cerebral localization; either Waterlow's illustrations of the monkey brain and/or their human analogs were reproduced in most leading anglophone texts of anatomy, physiology, or neurology by the 1880s. Although Ferrier initially provided a textual disclaimer for these diagrams, emphasizing the indefinite and imprecise boundaries of cerebral centers, the pictures told a different story. Indeed, Bennet and Godlee state that "a very definite localisation" was possible in their neurosurgical work from "the topography of the brain constructed by Professor Ferrier."
Tensions between physiological data and cerebral illustrations reappeared in the work of Horsley as well as Sherrington and Grünbaum, who, despite their own evidence of and emphasis on functional instability, depicted a detailed and constant map of motor representation. Like many other "localizers," they recognized the importance of variability and recovery, but nevertheless produced summary diagrams of stimulation data which suggested discrete localization. Recognizing the limitations imposed on the construction of cerebral diagrams in the face of complex and often contradictory physiological data allows us to better understand historical debates and to appreciate the subtle ways in which experimental, theoretical, and clinical contexts shape our spatial and temporal conceptions of brain function.
Régis Olry
Department of Chemistry-Biology, University of Québec at Trois-Rivières, C.P. 500, Trois-Rivières, Québec, Canada G9A 5H7
In the past centuries, metaphors intended to make understandable the description of some special parts of brain anatomy. That was how neuroanatomical terminology included many terms related to zoology, such as turtle, sea horse, silkworm, ram and hippopotamus. The fornix was compared with a turtle by Isbrand van Diemerbroeck (1695); the body of fornix on the one hand, and the columns and crura on the other were represented by the shell of the turtle and its paws, respectively. In 1587, Julius Caesar Arantius called sea horse (hippocampus) an intraventricular formation which had been previously outlined by Constanzio Varole in 1573. This hippocampus, called also silkworm by Arantius who seemed to hesitate between those two metaphors, turned into ram in a communication of Jean Georges Duvernoy to the Academy of Imperial Sciences of St-Petersburg in 1729 (published in 1735). Still more surprising, it was called hippopotamus by Johann Christoph Andreas Mayer in 1779. Were some of these metaphors related only to zoology, or also mythology? Arantius was probably under both influences: zoology by the curled morphology of the cerebral hippocampus which looks more or less like a sea horse, but also mythology by the omnipresence of sea horses in the art of the time (the allegory of water of the artist Giuseppe Arcimboldo, the famous salt box of King Frangois I described in Benvenuto Cellini's autobiography, and the Bolognese fountain of Neptune made by Giambologna between 1563 and 1567). Mayer probably referred also to mythology when he proposed the term hippopotamus, for the float of Neptune was drawn either by hippocampus or by hippopotamus (Belon, 1553). This study aims at comparing both influences (zoology and mythology) in the development of metaphors in ancient neuroanatomical terminology.
Ynez V. O'Neill and Mark H. Infusino
Department of Neurobiology, UCLA School of Medicine, Los Angeles, California 90095-1763 USA
The overly broad brush with which modern medical historians generally have treated medieval ideas concerning cerebral form and function is only now beginning to be discarded. Medieval views on this topic are often described as simplistic, but new findings tend to indicate that the term would be more accurately applied to the blind and often uncritical acceptance by modern scholars of prior investigative efforts. Since 1913, when Walther Sudhoff published his classic study on the medieval ventricular localization doctrine, many modern scholars have believed Sudhoff's contention that the theory which he propounded was universally accepted during the Middle Ages. According to Sudhoff and his followers, the ventricular localization doctrine remained virtually unaltered from the fourth century when Nemesius wrote his treatise on the nature of man, through the eleventh, when Alfanus of Salerno translated it into Latin, until 1543, when Vesalius denied that cognition was located in the cavities we know as the cerebral ventricles. Recent research refutes the belief that there was virtually no development in medieval views concerning the physiology of ideation. A careful reading of relevant medieval texts, together with a detailed examination of manuscript illustrations support a contrary thesis. We will demonstrate that as medieval surgeons and anatomists became increasingly knowledgeable through human dissection about cerebral anatomy, they developed a constantly evolving doctrine of cerebral physiology. This presentation will be supported by readings from pertinent medieval texts and by slides of the illustrations which sustain our argument.
M.B. Parlee
Women's Studies Program, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139 USA
The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation awarded $12.2 million between 1969 and 1976 to foster the development of "one of the most important frontiers of science...the brain and its relation to behavior." Seeking to emulate the Rockefeller Foundation's role in the emergence of molecular biology, the aim of the Sloan Foundation's program in the neurosciences was to shape the new "discipline in the making" by supporting interdisciplinary research that applied concepts and techniques from physical sciences and molecular biology to problems of brain function and behavior. This research strategy embodied a reductionist vision of "neuroscience" that was vigorously contested by some of the behavioral scientists consulted by the Sloan Foundation's program officer Kenneth Klivington in the early stages of the neuroscience program's formulation. Most notable among them was Hans-Lukas Teuber, Chairman of MIT's Psychology Department. Formally and informally, in correspondence, visits, and grant proposals, Teuber argued that concepts and techniques for analyzing behavior should have equal priority in the emerging new field: "we need methods for the analysis and control of behavior just as rigorous as are the evolving methods for the measurement of events in the brain." Teuber's Psychology Department was among the first awardees under the SF's neurosciences program; it was designated a "center of excellence" and received a total of more than $1.8 million from the program. Between 1969 and 1976, however, the 25 institutional awards made under the SF's neuroscience program increasingly became more "molecular" (reductionist) in orientation, less concerned with behavioral analysis. This was due in part to the views and influence of Warren Weaver, former trustee and then consultant to the SF, and to the composition of the outside Neuroscience Advisory Committee formed to review the program. Similarly, during this period both research and curriculum in the MIT Psychology Department became more reductionist and less focused on behavior. This was related to institutional pressures operating on and in the Psychology Department, which was located in the School of humanities and Social Science but had considerable faculty strength in neuroanatomy and neurophysiology, and also to changes in the discipline of psychology nationally.
Steve Anderson Platt <splatt@nmu.edu>
Department of Psychology, Northern Michigan University, Marquette, Michigan 49855USA
Since the rediscovery and reapplication, at the turn of this century, of Mendel's 1866 pioneering pea plant research, the discoveries of genetics have been used and abused in attempts to classify the intellectual potential of various genotypes. Once the intellectual fervor of evolutionary theory took hold, the idea was intriguing and simplistic that "genes made the man" (or, at least, some part thereof). The idea of being able to partition the relative contribution of genes and environment to intelligence is founded on a dangerous half-truth. Genes, of course, contribute to the phenotype but the contribution is in the form of a unique interaction with the environment.
The basis of this misunderstanding seems to lie within the concept of genetic potential embodied in the term "reaction range." The reaction range is a misnomer for the norm-of-reaction. The norm-of-reaction (Reaktionsnorm) was first defined by Richard Woltereck (1909, 1928), professor of zoology at Leipzig. It is an array of phenotypes expressed by a given genotype under a controlled set of environments. Theodosious Dobzhansky clarified the concept in his classic introduction of genetics to the United States, Evolution, Genetics, and Man (1955).
The term, reaction range, was introduced by Gottesman (1963) as a synonym for the norm-of-reaction but it carried with it an entirely different meaning. The reaction range concept can be characterized as "genes set the limits, but the environment determines where in those limits the phenotype will fall." There are two major problems with this prevalent but wrong concept. First, it makes no logical sense at the genetic level. Genes do not have potential. Genes are merely instructions for the production of proteins and/or enzymes. The actual activity of any particular gene in influenced by a wide range of micro and macro environmental interactions. Any "potential" is in the complex interaction of a specific genotype within a circumscribed set of environments. Changing either the genotype or the environments may change the "potential."
The second problem is there is no database for the reaction range concept. The data cited to support the reaction range concept (Thompson, 1954, and Cooper and Zubek, 1958) is inadequate and inappropriate. There is no rationale for determining or comparing genetic intellectual potential.
Ian C. Robinson, John T.E. Richardson <>, and Alistair C. Robinson
The complex historical relationship of both affective and cognitive symptoms to the disease category which came to be known as multiple sclerosis has gradually been unraveled, in particular in relationship to euphoria, as well as in relation to the separate construction of cognitive as distinct from affective symptoms. However one of the most intriguing aspects of the history of multiple sclerosis is the changing relationship between different affective disorders in the context of emotional lability. From the earliest clinical descriptions such emotional lability became increasingly recognized as a key signifier of the disease, indeed it could be argued that it some respects it was the disease. Whilst in view of its clinically unusual association with other disorders it is tempting to consider euphoria as the crucial historical distinguishing element of multiple sclerosis, it is more sound in many ways to focus on the issue of lability itself, and how this was perceived to manifest itself. In this paper, in contrast to previous analyses, we concentrate on other aspects of affective disorder than euphoria, particularly those of a depressive disposition, and seek to document the extent to which emotional lability was deemed to express itself through such a disposition. This analysis suggests that depression was recognized at a later stage in clinical descriptions of the disease than euphoria, but as an increasingly logical corollary to euphoric states resulting from emotional lability. In this respect the history of affect in relation to MS is one in which the full implications of "emotional lability" have become recognized and documented.
O.A. Selnes <Ola_Selnes@cogneuro.med.jhu.edu> and Argye Hillis
Broca's first patient presented in support of a relationship between a lesion of the left frontal lobe and aphasia was Laborgne (nicknamed Tan-Tan, because that was the extent of his verbal output). Although Pierre Marie himself refers to this case as "indisputably aphasia of Broca," the clinical diagnosis of presumed "Broca's aphasia" does not appear to have been examined in any detail. Superficially, the patient's extremely limited verbal output and intact comprehension appear to fit with the diagnosis of Broca's aphasia, but a more careful examination of the onset, evolution and nature of the patient's speech symptoms suggests alternate interpretations. The details of the onset of patient Tan-Tan's speech and language difficulties are scant, due to the fact that he developed the symptoms of aphasia 21 years prior to being examined by Broca. Laborgne was described as having "lost the ability to speak," but it is not known whether the onset was sudden (suggesting a stroke-like mechanism) or progressive (suggesting a possible focal degenerative mechanism). It is also of note that the patient was described as having a history of seizures since childhood. He was admitted to the Bicêtre hospital at the age of 30, and at that time had not spoken for 2 or 3 months. When asked questions, he would respond with the monosyllabic utterance "tan," repeated twice in succession. This was often accompanied by gestures of the left hand. It is not known whether the intonation of this stereotypical utterance was modulated to convey different meanings. If not understood, the patient would become easily angered, and would add the swear-word "Sacré nom de Dieu" (God damn). Although this information is clearly limited, it does provide some rather interesting clues. Stereotypical fluent speech has not been described in association with Broca's aphasia, but this is a common finding with Global aphasia. In fact, verbal output limited to stereotypical consonant-vowel (CV) syllables, such as "da-da", "di-di", may well be diagnostic of global aphasia. There is no other aphasia associated with this type of speech output. However, the patient's auditory comprehension was described as normal. Nonetheless, it appears that Laborgne's comprehension was, in fact, not always intact: "At times, finally, his answers were clear but wrong; thus he falsely pretended to have children." Although the status of patient Laborgne's comprehension remains uncertain, consideration of the nature of his speech output strongly argues in favor of a diagnosis of Global rather than Broca's aphasia. The atypical history and course of his disease, with loss of spoken language at a very young age, and with progressive hemiparesis subsequent to the development of his aphasia, in turn argues for an uncommon etiology.
C.U.M. Smith <c.u.m.smith@aston.ac.uk>
The influence of Descartes' philosophy of mind on British neurophysiology can be traced from Thomas Henry Huxley through Michael Foster, Charles Scott Sherrington to John Carew Eccles. This line of master-pupil influence will be outlined before attention is focused on the neurophysiology and neurophilosophy of Sir John Eccles (1903-1997). Eccles' scientific career spanned a large part of the twentieth century: his first publication was in 1929 and his last in 1993. His work on synapses gained him a share of the Nobel Prize for medicine in 1963. His principle contributions to neurophysiology will be reviewed. The major focus of this paper will, however, be on the nature of Eccle's two-substance neurophilosophy. Eccles reports that nine days before he died, Charles Sherrington urged him to devote himself to the field of philosophy1, and in a 1977 summing-up he reminisces that "the field which lured me into neurophysiology fifty years ago was the mind-brain problem."2 Eccles' contribution to this problem will be compared with its Cartesian forerunner and the influence of Karl Popper and of Eccles' extrascientific convictions examined. Towards the end of his career Eccles attempted to update Cartesian two-substance dualism in the light of twentieth-century developments in fundamental physics. The paper will end by considering how successful and how fruitful this attempt has been.
Department of Human Sciences, Brunel University, West London, Uxbridge, Middlesex UB8 3PH, UK
Patient Tan-tan revisited: a case of atypical global aphasia?
Department of Neurology, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Meyer 222, 600 North Wolfe Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21287 USA
René revisited: the neurophilosophy of John Carew Eccles
Vision Sciences, Aston University, Birmingham B4 7ET, UK
T.L. Sourkes
Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, McGill University, 1033 Pine Avenue West, Montreal, Quebec, Canada H3A 1A1
An earlier paper (J Hist Neurosci 5: 254, 1996) gave an account of the proposals of Georges Cabanis (1757-1808), physician-philosopher, about the role of phosphorus in the brain. Although his mechanistic views were soon forgotten, his concept of a central role of phosphorus in mental functions persisted throughout the nineteenth century. The first significant proposal came, without attribution, in 1834 from Jean Pierre Couerbe (1805-67), a chemist in the School of Pharmacy of Paris, who described his attempts to extract "immediate principles" from the brain. For him the phosphorus content of these principles was an index of mental status. Thus, he proposed that the brains of idiots are deficient in phosphorus, whereas those of insane persons contain an excess. Just the right amount is needed for mental normality. In subsequent years his hypothesis fell away in the face of evidence from several sources: (a) the chemical composition of the brains of animals and birds is not different from that of human brains (Ernst Freiherr von Bibra, 1806-72); (b) phosphorus is present in the brain in invariable proportions (Jean Louis Lassaigne, 1800-59); (c) the phosphorus content of brain measured post-mortem does not vary with the degree of intelligence of the subject during lifetime (Adam Addison, fl. 1860s). The phosphorus concept was kept alive by the physiologist Jacob Moleschott (1822-93). He insisted that dietary phosphorus is of vital importance to brain function. In this he was supported enthusiastically by Ludwig Feuerbach (1804-72), who put the imprimatur of materialist philosophy on Moleschott's views. In the second half of the nineteenth century the continuing attempts to relate phosphorus metabolism to mental activity focused on dietary intake and urinary output. The idea received approbation from Henry Maudsley (1835-1918), psychiatrist, Jules Bernard Luys (1828-97), neurologist, and Alexander Bain (1818-1903), philosopher, but widespread skepticism was brought to focus by critical analyses such as those of Theodor Meynert (1833-92), neurologist, and Otto Folin (1867-1934), biochemist. The legacy of Cabanis's hypothesis can not be regarded as simply negative. It unleashed a great deal of research on the chemistry of the brain and the metabolism of phosphorus in mental health and disease. This research may be regarded as the inauguration of the search for an experimental solution to the mind-body relation.
Yves Turgeon1 and Harry Whitaker2
1Université du Québec à Montréal, Canada; and 2Department of Psychology, Northern Michigan University, Marquette, Michigan, USA
Pierre Jean Georges Cabanis (1757-1808), French physician and philosopher, has been regarded by some historians as the founder of psychophysiology as well as a reformist of psychiatry. Often, he is largely ignored, e.g., he is mentioned in two footnotes in Neuberger (1897/1981) and not at all in Finger (1994). As suggested in Clarke & Jacyna (1987), Cabanis may also be regarded as an early French neuropsychologist whose ideas helped shape the phrenological theory of Franz Joseph Gall (1758-1828); Clarke & Jacyna (1987) also discuss the link between Cabanis and Broussais, a late convert to phrenology. Cabanis suggested that different areas of the brain have different functions. In his Rapports sur le physique et le moral del l'homme, published between 1796 and 1802, Cabanis argued that the body portion of the mind-body problem is the proper domain of study. In part this was a response to Cartesian dualism which had led to the conclusion that if mind exists apart from the body, the functions of the mind require separate consideration. For Cabanis, although the mind may exist it cannot be studied using conventional techniques. Taking it a step further, he asserted that thought is produced by the brain, that is to say the body, and thus it can be studied just as any other bodily secretion. Cabanis should be considered a major transition figure, bridging the interval between the philosophical neuroscience of the 18th century and the experimental neuroscience of the 19th.
Vincent Wan
Committee on the Conceptual Foundations of Science, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637 USA
The results of a neuroscience experiment are determined by the brain's properties, the experimenters' beliefs, and their experimental practice. In this talk, I examine the role of experimental practice--that is, experimental design, instruments' characteristics, and how instruments are used--using a case study. Between 1937 and 1980, three different electrophysiological techniques (the evoked potential, the single unit, and the multi-unit methods) were used to determine how the monkey's primary somatosensory cortex represents the body. I will examine each of the three methods' instruments to show how, in principle, they affect the data collected and how their characteristics favor particular experimental designs. Then, to show how experimenters' beliefs about their instruments have affected both their experimental designs and their results in practice, I will examine actual studies by three different groups (Woolsey et al, Whitsel et al, and Kaas et al).
Jeff Wollock
Solidarity Foundation, New York, New York, USA
Many concerns of current speech research are foreshadowed in the writings of the 17th century London physician John Bulwer. While Bulwer nowhere presents his theory of speech perception/production in a systematic way, much can be reconstructed by careful analysis and synthesis of relevant discussions found in various of his writings. It will be shown that Bulwer's conception of speech belongs to an ancient tradition on the subject. Particularly relevant to interpretation are the Aristotelian/Galenic concept of animate motion and its application to speech by the medieval natural philosopher Pietro d'Abano (ca. 1250-ca. 1316). The investigation opens a window on the psychophysiological conception of the speech process as it existed in England shortly before the Restoration and the founding of the Royal Society.