Abstract
THE daily increasing recognition of the importance of Physiology as an element of liberal culture, no less than as a distinct branch of science, may be said to be intimately connected with the gradual displacement of the old vitalist conception. The old conception of Life as something essentially mysterious and removed from out the circle of natural causes, has been set aside in favour of the conception of Life as something more complex, indeed, but not otherwise more mysterious than other natural phenomena, and dependent upon the physical and chemical agencies recognised in operation in other provinces of research. The consequence of this changed view has been to disclose the need of an incessant application to Physiology of those instruments and methods which have enlarged and given precision to our views of Nature; and a further consequence has been that the problems are found to be more capable of popular exposition, that is to say, the great results of research can now be shown to an intelligent public, and made thus to form an element in general culture.
Populäre Physiologische Vorträge gehalten in Akademischen Rosensaale zu Jena, 1867-1868-1869.
Von Prof. Dr. Joh. Czermak. (Wien, 1869. London: D. Nutt.)
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LEWES, G. Populäre Physiologische Vorträge gehalten in Akademischen Rosensaale zu Jena, 1867-1868-1869 . Nature 1, 353 (1870). https://doi.org/10.1038/001353a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/001353a0
