The Human Body as Microcosm in India, Greek Cosmology, and Sixteenth-Century Europe

1982 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 172-190 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alex Wayman
Keyword(s):  
NAN Nü ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 284-329
Author(s):  
Ka Wong

AbstractDue to its explicit and outrageous sexual content, Xiuta yeshi is often deemed an "obscene book" that lacks literary sophistication. Precisely because of its obscenity, however, the novel provides a unique perspective from which to study the discourse of sex and sexuality in the late Ming period. By examining Xiuta yeshi on its own terms as pornography, one can explore more fully the dynamics of gender, desire, and male-female relationships in this supposedly decadent era. In its construct of eroticism, the novel hinges as much on the detailed recounting of the material world and, in particular, a new interpretation of the human body, as on sex itself. Using foul language to exploit most of the modern pornographic tropes—from rape to orgy to both male and female homosexual acts—this late sixteenth-century work not only redefines a popular genre but also reveals the exhilarating, extravagant, and even grotesque aspects of a libertine culture captivated by and capitalizing on sex.


2014 ◽  
Vol 369 (1656) ◽  
pp. 20130571 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. G. Joakim Larsson

As long ago as the sixteenth century, Paracelsus recognized that ‘the dose makes the poison’. Indeed, environmental concentrations of pharmaceuticals excreted by humans are limited, most importantly because a defined dose is given to just a fraction of the population. By contrast, recent studies have identified direct emission from drug manufacturing as a source of much higher environmental discharges that, in some cases, greatly exceed toxic threshold concentrations. Because production is concentrated in specific locations, the risks are not linked to usage patterns. Furthermore, as the drugs are not consumed, metabolism in the human body does not reduce concentrations. The environmental risks associated with manufacturing therefore comprise a different, wider set of pharmaceuticals compared with those associated with risks from excretion. Although pollution from manufacturing is less widespread, discharges that promote the development of drug-resistant microorganisms can still have global consequences. Risk management also differs between production and excretion in terms of accountability, incentive creation, legal opportunities, substitution possibilities and costs. Herein, I review studies about industrial emissions of pharmaceuticals and the effects associated with exposure to such effluents. I contrast environmental pollution due to manufacturing with that due to excretion in terms of their risks and management and highlight some recent initiatives.


2014 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 75-77
Author(s):  
Glenn Harcourt

The early 1540s saw the publication of several printed and illustrated books that are properly identified as masterpieces of scientific publishing, including, in 1542, Leonhart Fuchs’s De historia stirpium (On the history of plants); and, in 1543, the De humani corporis fabrica libri VII (Seven books on the fabric of the human body) by the Paduan professor Andreas Vesalius. Now, Sachiko Kusukawa, a Fellow in History and Philosophy of Science at Cambridge, has produced a masterful study of Fuchs and Vesalius that advances a powerful argument about the strategies developed by the two authors, working apparently on two very different . . .


Author(s):  
Filippo Camerota

Daniele Barbaro’s treatise on perspective is one of the most authoritative technical-scientific sources of the sixteenth century. Although largely based on the unpublished work of Piero della Francesca, the treatise had the precise and original purpose of filling a gap in the Vitruvian text about the contents of the so-called ‘scaenographia’, a discipline based on optical geometry of which Vitruvius provided only meagre and sibylline words. The subdivision of the treatise, examined here into the individual parts that constitute it, follows a clearly Vitruvian structure, with the first three parts dedicated to ichnographia (perspective drawing of plans), orthographaia (perspective drawing of solid bodies) and scaenographia (perspective drawing of the buildings and their ornaments), and with two other parts specifically dedicated to the measurements of the human body and to the drawing of the planisphere, themes treated by Vitruvius respectively in the third and ninth books of De architectura. In this sense, La pratica della perspettiva, published in 1568, should be considered as an integral text of the most authoritative commentary on Vitruvius’ I Dieci libri dell’architettura, published in 1556 and 1567.


Itinerario ◽  
2000 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 62-79
Author(s):  
W.J. Boot

In the pre-modern period, Japanese identity was articulated in contrast with China. It was, however, articulated in reference to criteria that were commonly accepted in the whole East-Asian cultural sphere; criteria, therefore, that were Chinese in origin.One of the fields in which Japan's conception of a Japanese identity was enacted was that of foreign relations, i.e. of Japan's relations with China, the various kingdoms in Korea, and from the second half of the sixteenth century onwards, with the Portuguese, Spaniards, Dutchmen, and the Kingdom of the Ryūkū.


Author(s):  
Shulin Wen ◽  
Jingwei Feng ◽  
A. Krajewski ◽  
A. Ravaglioli

Hydroxyapatite bioceramics has attracted many material scientists as it is the main constituent of the bone and the teeth in human body. The synthesis of the bioceramics has been performed for years. Nowadays, the synthetic work is not only focused on the hydroapatite but also on the fluorapatite and chlorapatite bioceramics since later materials have also biological compatibility with human tissues; and they may also be very promising for clinic purpose. However, in comparison of the synthetic bioceramics with natural one on microstructure, a great differences were observed according to our previous results. We have investigated these differences further in this work since they are very important to appraise the synthetic bioceramics for their clinic application.The synthetic hydroxyapatite and chlorapatite were prepared according to A. Krajewski and A. Ravaglioli and their recent work. The briquettes from different hydroxyapatite or chlorapatite powders were fired in a laboratory furnace at the temperature of 900-1300°C. The samples of human enamel selected for the comparison with synthetic bioceramics were from Chinese adult teeth.


Author(s):  
Tong Wensheng ◽  
Lu Lianhuang ◽  
Zhang Zhijun

This is a combined study of two diffirent branches, photogrammetry and morphology of blood cells. The three dimensional quantitative analysis of erythrocytes using SEMP technique, electron computation technique and photogrammetry theory has made it possible to push the study of mophology of blood cells from LM, TEM, SEM to a higher stage, that of SEM P. A new path has been broken for deeply study of morphology of blood cells.In medical view, the abnormality of the quality and quantity of erythrocytes is one of the important changes of blood disease. It shows the abnormal blood—making function of the human body. Therefore, the study of the change of shape on erythrocytes is the indispensable and important basis of reference in the clinical diagnosis and research of blood disease.The erythrocytes of one normal person, three PNH Patients and one AA patient were used in this experiment. This research determines the following items: Height;Length of two axes (long and short), ratio; Crevice in depth and width of cell membrane; Circumference of erythrocytes; Isoline map of erythrocytes; Section map of erythrocytes.


1998 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 382-387 ◽  
Author(s):  
James O. Ochanda ◽  
Eva A. C. Oduor ◽  
Rachel Galun ◽  
Mabel O. Imbuga ◽  
Kosta Y. Mumcuoglu

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