THE ‘INTRODUCTION’ TO CARL LUDWIG'S TEXTBOOK OF HUMAN PHYSIOLOGY

Abstract

TRANSLATORS' NOTE Carl Ludwig (1816-95) published the second edition of his Lehrbuch der Physiologie in 1858-61, at the onset of the political and industrial ascendency of Germany in Europe and the beginning of 'the greatest ferment of ideas and revolution in attitudes since the middle ages.'" In Ludwig's laboratories physiology, still only an 'embellishment' of anatomy, joined with the burgeoning physics and chemistry of the day to form a new, independent, science. The two volumes of the Lehrbuch presented the first fruits of that merger. Even as Claude Bernard in Paris conducted his investigations in a damp basement, the physiological institutes of Germany multiplied and grew strong, so that by 1879 an unnamed observer was able to describe the 'development of physiology during the last quarter century in Germany' as 'by general acknowledgement unprecedented in the history of science."' 'Ludwig's Physiology,' wrote Wilhelm His, 'appeared like a meteor on the scientific horizon. It attacked the scientific knowledge of the day, demolishing former theories and conceptions with critical severity."9 The physical movement in physiology was quantitative and objective in outlook, in contrast to the older trend, which was descriptive, impressionistic and vitalistic. According to Burdon-Sanderson, the book exerted an 'extraordinary influence." It 'gave the coup de grace to vitalism in the old sense of the word."' The treatise began with a 'discussion of the elementary endowments of the structure or framework of the living body, and of the processes in which these endowments manifest themselves; seeking to arrive at a clear conception of each vital function by regarding it as a complex of constituent processes severally definable in chemical or physical terms. The book set forth no 'biological principles,' and therefore had no interest for the general reader. It was for students and for students only, but for them it was a revelation, a forecasting of the physiology of the future for those who were about to make it."4 The Introduction to the Lehrbuch was especially influential and sums up the essential argument of that work. Unlike that of his colleague Emil Du Bois-Reymond, the fame of Ludwig did not spread far beyond his field. He never became a major public figure. Nevertheless, his enormous capabilities and his versatility, both as an investigator and as a teacher, attracted students to his laboratories from all over the civilized world, with the end-result that the schools of physiology which arose during the latter half of the nineteenth century in Germany, England, America, Austria, Italy, Russia, and Scandinavia bore the stamp of his influence. At the turn of the century nearly every important physiologist then active had once been a student of Carl Ludwig. Ludwig's disciples have not been entirely unanimous in regard to the outlook put forward in the Lehrbuch. According to Robert Tigerstedt, Ludwig wrote as a mechanist, that is, he tried to give a 'purely mechanical explanation of life."' William Stirling wrote th...

The revolutionary developmental biology ofWilhelmHis,Sr.

“…He was inspired by Carl Ludwig's transformation of physiology into a ‘new physiology’ that aimed to explain biological phenome in terms of the underlying chemistry and physics, and to do so using the research methodology of the exact sciences: rigorously planned experiments amenable to mathematical analysis (Ludwig, 1852 , 1856 ; His, 1895c ; His, 1898 ; Rádl, 1909 , pp. 549–554; Drischel, 1965 ; Frank & Weiss, 1966 ; Rosen, 1973 ; Fye, 1986 ; Zimmer, 1996 ).…”