Science and Internationalism in Germany: Helmholtz, Du Bois-Reymond and Their Critics (2009)
Wegener, Daan (Author)
Centaurus: International Magazine of the History of Mathematics, Science, and Technology
Volume: 51
Pages: 265--287
In the wake of the Franco-Prussian war, scientific nationalism became a subject of scientific controversy in Germany. This paper explores the controversy between the cosmopolitan physiologists Hermann von Helmholtz and Emil du Bois-Reymond on the one hand, and the nationalistic economist-philosopher Eugen Dühring and the astrophysicist Johann Carl Friedrich Zöllner on the other. It argues that Helmholtz' frequent visits to Britain helped him keep abreast of scientific developments there and shaped his ideas of science and society. They also changed his conception of the conservation of energy. German nationalists objected to his British contacts with offensive accusations. They alleged that he had plagiarized his fellow-German Julius Robert Mayer and tried to imitate British physicists. Thus Dühring and Zöllner defended and constructed enduring national stereotypes of German and British science. Whereas Helmholtz put scientific cosmopolitanism into practice, Du Bois-Reymond defended it as an ideology. In contrast to the received view of Du Bois-Reymond as a fervent nationalist, it is argued that he was actually an untimely scientific cosmopolitan. He placed himself in the tradition of Goethe and Schiller's Weimar cosmopolitanism.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Article
Cahan, David;
(2012)
The Awarding of the Copley Medal and the “Discovery”of the Law of Conservation of Energy: Joule, Mayer and Helmholtz Revisited
Thesis
Oldham, Kalil T. Swain;
(2008)
The Doctrine of Description: Gustav Kirchhoff, Classical Physics, and the “Purpose of All Science” in 19th-Century Germany
Article
Henning Schmidgen;
(2015)
Leviathan and the Myograph: Hermann Helmholtz's “Second Note” on the Propagation Speed of Nervous Stimulations
Article
Stromberg, Wayne H.;
(1989)
Helmholtz and Zoellner: Nineteenth-century empiricism, spiritism, and the theory of space perception
Article
Kenneth L. Caneva;
(2019)
Helmholtz, the Conservation of Force and the Conservation of Vis Viva
Article
Cahan, David;
(2012)
Helmholtz and the British Scientific Elite: From Force Conservation to Energy Conservation
Book
Kenneth L. Caneva;
(2021)
Helmholtz and the Conservation of Energy: Contexts of Creation and Reception
Book
Dierig, Sven;
(2006)
Wissenschaft in der Maschinenstadt: Emil Du Bois-Reymond und seine Laboratorien in Berlin
Chapter
Finkelstein, Gabriel;
(2014)
Emil du Bois-Reymond's Reflections on Consciousness
Book
Finkelstein, Gabriel;
(2013)
Emil du Bois-Reymond Neuroscience, Self, and Society in Nineteenth-Century Germany
Article
Dierig, Sven;
(2001)
Nach Art einer Fabrik - Der “eiserne Arbeiter” und die Mechanisierung des Labors
Article
Darrigol, Olivier;
(2003)
Number and Measure: Hermann von Helmholtz at the Crossroads of Mathematics, Physics, and Psychology
Article
Palma, Armando de;
Pareti, Germana;
(2007)
The Ways of Metaphor in Neuroscience, or Being on the Right or Wrong Track
Thesis
Anderton, Keith M.;
(1993)
The limits of science: A social, political, and moral agenda for epistemology in 19th-century Germany
Essay Review
Ursula Klein;
(2020)
Science, Industry, and the German Bildungsbürgertum
Article
Staubermann, Klaus B.;
(2001)
Tying the knot: Skill, judgement and authority in the 1870s Leipzig spiritistic experiments
Chapter
Staubermann, Klaus;
(2011)
Aim at the Stars, Reach the Nicol: The Zöllner Photometer
Article
Staubermann, Klaus B.;
(2001)
Making stars: Projection culture in nineteenth-century German astronomy
Book
Helmholtz, Hermann von;
Du Bois-Reymond, Emil;
(1986)
Dokumente einer Freundschaft: Briefwechsel zwischen Hermann von Helmholtz und Emil Du Bois-Reymond, 1846-1894. Bearbeitet von einem Herausgeberkollektiv unter Leitung von Kirsten, Christa. Mit einer wissenschaftsgeschichtlichen Einordnung in die naturwissenschaftlichen und philosophischen Bewegungen ihrer Zeit von Hörz, Herbert und Wollgast, Siegfried
Chapter
Dierig, Sven;
(2010)
Apollo's Tragedy: Laboratory Science between Classicism and Industrial Modernism
Be the first to comment!