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Claude Bernard
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1813–1878

Claude Bernard

Claude Bernard was a French experimental physiologist whose operative technique shaped later physiology.1 He showed vaso-dilator nerves by stimulating the chorda tympani.2 He argued that a constant internal environment is the condition of free life.3 He also tested anaesthetics on a plant and drew general conclusions about sensitivity.57

Born
12 July 1813
Died
10 February 1878
Country
France
Field
physician writer, politician, psychologist
In the library
1 work, named in 12 passages elsewhere
Facts from
Wikidata · Wikipedia · Open Library
18501875190019251950197520002025Verworn, M., 18991Bayliss, W. M., 19152Bernard, C., 19573Lotka, A. J., 19254Verworn, M., 18995Lillie, R. S., 19236Baluška F, Levin M, 20167Loeb, J., 19168
01

The internal environment

It rested on a few scattered observations on the composition of blood.3 Lotka later used the idea in his own account of higher organisms. He wrote that their tissues are bathed from within by a fluid, the blood, which they carry around with them, and he set this out by citing Bernard.4

02

Anaesthesia of plants

Verworn credited Bernard with showing that the turgescence movements of Mimosa pudica are depressed by narcosis.5 Baluška and Levin describe the same work. The plant stayed unresponsive in ether vapour that immobilised mice, and Bernard concluded that plants and animals share a principle that anaesthetics disrupt.7 Lillie quoted his statement that whatever is living is sensitive and can be anaesthetized.6

03

Parts and the whole

Loeb disputed one side of Bernard's outlook. In Loeb's reading, Bernard sought a physicochemical account of single life processes. He held that the harmony of the whole organism came from other forces and could not be investigated.8 Loeb explained this as a product of what was unknown then, such as development, regeneration and Mendelian heredity. He added that Driesch and von Uexkull held a position not very different today.

SourcesEach quotation was checked word for word against the passage it opens.
  1. Claude Bernard guided operative physiology to its highest development, without at the same time becoming narrow. He was a philosophical investigator who in his researches kept in view the general problems of life.Verworn, M., 1899 · General Physiology: An Outline of the Science of Life · open at passage 83
  2. At a later date (1858) Bernard proved the existence of vaso-dilator nerves by stimulating the chorda tympani nerve, and observing the greatly increased outflow from the vein of the submaxillary gland.Bayliss, W. M., 1915 · Principles of General Physiology · open at passage 2882
  3. A few scattered observations on the composition of blood sufiiced to justify, in his opinion, the assertion that the constancy of the internal environmentBernard, C., 1957 · An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine · open at passage 12
  4. Their tissues are bathed from within by a fluid (the blood) which they carry around with themLotka, A. J., 1925 · Elements of Physical Biology · open at passage 107
  5. Among the phenomena of motion Claude Bernard has shown this for the turgescence-movements of Mimosa pudica.Verworn, M., 1899 · General Physiology: An Outline of the Science of Life · open at passage 956
  6. We may say that everything living is sensitive and can be anaesthetized; whatever is not sensitive is not living and cannot be anaesthetized.Lillie, R. S., 1923 · Protoplasmic Action and Nervous Action · open at passage 323
  7. He showed that the Mimosa plant (Mimosa pudica), closing leaves upon touch, was unresponsive when exposed to a diethyl ether atmosphere which immobilized mice.Baluška F, Levin M, 2016 · On Having No Head: Cognition throughout Biological Systems · open at passage 30
  8. Bernard thinks it his task to account for individual life phenomena on a purely physicochemical basisLoeb, J., 1916 · The Organism as a Whole, from a Physicochemical Viewpoint · open at passage 12
In the library1 work
An Introduction to the Study of Experimental MedicineBernard, C.
1957
An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine
Bernard, C.
1957 · read
Quoted inArticles that quote this person's work