Galileo Church v. Hero Essay -- Religion Philosophy Essays

Galileo Church v. Hero It is a volatile point in history the intersection of science and religion at the crown of the Inquisition it is a time when the Church reigns and a man, a physicist, must choose life or death, himself or science. Galileo Galileis legendary dilemma and the circumstances surround it ar presented in Bertolt Brechts Galileo from a perspective that is clearly criticizing institutions with such controlin this case, the Catholic churchwhile reminding us that men are exactly men, no matter how heroic their actions appear. These issues are expounded throughout the play however, Scene 11 has the most significant role in Galileos development, as it simultaneously reveals the bound of the Churchs control and humanizes Galileo in just a few lines. Despite his courage to venture into unexplored realms of science and thought, Galileo is not a hero. He is only a man. Scene 11 is the shortest scene in the play and angiotensin converting enzyme of only three scenes in which the title character does not appear. Yet it is here that Galileo is do completely human. In the quest for a hero, one might ignore his almost hedonistic desire for food, thought, and fine wine and the sacrifices that he makes to acquire money. These characteristics of Galileo are revealed early in the play, when he plagiarizes another mans telescope invention in order to get a salary raise from the city (Scenes 1 and 2), and therefore again in Scene 11 when the Pope says, He has more enjoyment in him than any other man I ever saw. He loves eating and drinking and thinking. To excess. He indulges in thinking bouts He cannot say no to an old wine or a new thought ( Brecht 109). However, one cannot ignore a heros cowardice in the face of physical pain. I... ... Nobody has planned a part for us beyond this wretched one on a worthless star. There is no meaning in our misery (Brecht 84). The people rely on the Church to lead them to a better life in heaven their faith is all that they know. It is the Popes duty to preserve the unity that comes from shared faith, and because he is controlled by that which he governs, he cannot refuse to punish Galileo for fear of loving collapse. Brecht cleverly uses Scene 11 to plant seeds of thought in the minds of his audience members. Through the controversy of Galileos life and the circumstances surrounding his session with the Inquisition, Galileo explores both the dangers of institutional control and the folly of elevating men to a heroic status. One will only be disappointed when both prove fallible. Bibliography Brecht, Bertolt. Galileo. New York Grove Press, 1966.

Comparing John Constables Painting The Cornfield and William Wordswort

mental representations of Time Wordsworth and Constable I do not know how without being culpably feature I can give my Reader a more exact notion of the style in which I wished these poems to be written, than by informing him that I have at all times endeavored to look steadily at my subject consequently, I hope that there is in these Poems little falsehood of description, and my ideas argon expressed in language fitted to their respective importance. Something I must have gained by this practice, as it is friendly to one property of all honest poetry, namely, steady-going sense but it has necessarily cut me off from a large portion of phrases and figures of speech which from father to son have long been regarded as the ballpark inheritance of Poets.-- William Wordsworth, from the Preface to Lyrical Ballads (1800, 1802) It appears to me that pictures have been over-valued held up by a blind admiration as ideal things, and al or so as standards by which spirit is to be jud ged rather than the reverse and this false estimate has been sanctioned by the extravagant epithets that have been applied to painters, and the divine, the inspired, and so forth. Yet in reality, what are the most sublime productions of the pencil but selections of some of the forms of nature, and copies of a few of her evanescent effects, and this is the result, not of inspiration, but of long and patient study, under the instruction of much good sense Painting is a science, and should be pursued as an inquiry into the laws of nature. Why, then, may not landscape be considered as a branch of inherent philosophy, of which pictures are but experiments?-- John Constable, from a lecture at the Royal Institution (June 16, 1836)The styles of John... ...licity and consequently may be more accurately contemplated and more forcibly communicated.BibliographyGoldwater, Robert and Marco Treves (eds.). Artists on Art from the XIV to the XX Century. bare-assed York Pantheon Books, 1945.Hef fernan, James A. W. The Re-Creation of Landscape A Study of Wordsworth, Coleridge, Constable, and Turner. Hanover UP of New England, 1985.Helsinger, Elizabeth K. Rural Scenes and National Representation Britain, 1815-1850. Princeton, NJ Princeton UP, 1997.Kroeber, Karl. Romantic Landscape Vision Constable and Wordsworth. Madison, WI University of Wisconsin Press, 1975.Paulson, Ronald. Literary Landscape Turner and Constable. New Haven Yale UP, 1982.Wolfson, Susan and Peter Manning (eds.). The Longman Anthology of British Literature The Romantics and Their Contemporaries. Volume 2A. New York Longman, 1999.

The Selfishness of Oedipus in Oedipus the King :: Oedipus Rex, Sophocles

"Selfishness is the greatest curse of the human race, as quoted by William E. Gladstone, supports my thought that selfishness is what causes most of our problems in the modern world. Currently, we are living in an epoch that is filled with much gluttony and selfishness. However, selfishness is a trait that all of us possess, but the amount of selfishness that we have can determine the type of person we are. For instance, parents should ceaselessly put their childrens needs before their own. Selfish parents would rather buy materialistic items for themselves than anything useful for their children. In Sophocless Oedipus Rex, the protagonist is literally blinded by his own arrogance. This attitude begins before he even travels to Thebes, and that is apparent due to the circumstances of his fathers death. Oedipus seals his own fate with his egotistical attitude and he cannot change his destiny after everything is set into motion. During his journey on the road to enlightenment, O edipuss selfishness causes him to transcend from existence completely ignorant of his fate to holding on to the last shreds of denial to having an overwhelming sense of realization.The selfishness that Oedipus possesses causes him to have abundance of ignorance. This combination is what leads to his fathers death. After fleeing Corinth and his foster family, Oedipus gets into a skirmish with an older man. The sympathy for the fight was because, The groom leading the horses forced me off the road at his lords command (1336). Oedipus is filled with a rage after being insulted by the lord and feels the need to act. The two men fight, but Oedipus ends up being too much for the older man, and he kills him. What Oedipus is unaware of is that the man was really his birth father and by killing him, Oedipus has started on the path of his own destruction. Not only does Oedipus kill his father, but also everyone else, I killed them all (1336). The new(prenominal) men had no part in the scu ffle, but in his rage, he did not care who he was killing.As Oedipus becomes king, his selfishness only grows, as does his denial. As the king, he gained the burden of Thebes whenever a problem arose. To find a way to rid his city of the plague, he sent Kreon so that he would have some answers and be able to place the blame on something or someone.

Improving The Teaching of Physics :: Learning Education Papers

What this paper is all ab extinct I entrust attempt to reserve answers to the question of how one can facilitate the acquisition of deep conceptual generalizeing of physical concepts and make learning more meaningful to students. I get out do this by using the results of several physics education researches as anchored on some important difficulties physics educators exhaust in teaching physics.The problems in physics teachingOver the years, physics education has been beset with a multitude of problems. The most compelling is how to teach physics to the students so that they ordain understand it, and appreciate it. An offshoot of this difficulty is the problem of retaining in the program those students who have initially decided to major in physics. Seymour andHewitts (1997) study on wherefore undergraduates leave the sciences revealed that students switch not because they lack the mental ability. The three main concerns for shifting are the lack or loss of interest, belief t hat a non-SME offers a better education, and poor teaching of SME faculty.Looking at these reasons, we realize that the situation is not at all hopeless. I believe that we could do something to address these issues. The scenario would have been pathetic if the primary reason for the switch is the students lack of mental ability. As I see it, the issue of lack/loss of interest and the belief that SME offers a better education is brought about or aggravated by the issue of poor teaching of SME faculty. If we can address the issue of poor teaching we will essentially be addressing the two other issues. If we can better teach physics then this can be a source of motivation for students to placate in physics.Another major problem in physics education is that students do not appear to gain as much knowledge out of their physics courses as desired. The most probable reason for this is the over-dependence of physics instructors on using the traditional lecture. Lectures in physics can be a n improbably passive experience for students, particularly dangerous for those who believe that if they can follow the professor, theyve mastered the material (Tobias, 1990).In this paper I will be presenting ways in which we can improve large lecture classes in order to make learning more meaningful for students. The motivation for this is my belief that lecture halls will still continue to pervade physics departments. Reducingthe number of student- teacher ratio is a far-fetched reality.

Jamess Pragmatism and Platos Sophistes Essay -- Pragmatism Sophistes

Jamess Pragmatism and Platos SophistesABSTRACT In the offset printing chapter of Pragmatism, William James outlines two philosophic tendencys. He argues that though ones temperament modifies ones way of philosophizing, its presence is seldom recognized. This situatement by James led me to Platos Sophistes, especially the relationship between temperament and being. Although Plato describes authoritative temperaments, I hold that the main topic is being. The ancients restricted All to tangible being, e.g., the tangible or the immovable. This reading of the Sophistes puts a different face on the first chapter of Pragmatism. However, if we allow James to speak to present-day philosophers as well as his turn of the century audience, then this reading of the Sophistes will clarify the current philosophical temperament. Neither James nor the contemporary philosopher is satisfied with any restriction on All for this reason, both lack interest in being. Being, once the richest word, no perennial satisfies the philosophers greedy temperament.IntroductionIn the first chapter of Pragmatism (2) William James speaks about a rather unusual aspect of philosophy. He gives an outline of two common temperaments in philosophy. Temperament, he argues, ...is no conventionally recognized reason in philosophy... Yet a professional philosophers temperament really gives him a stronger bias than any of his more strictly premises. ... Yet in the forum he can make no claim, on the bare ground of his temperament, to superior discernment or authority. (3)James argues that, although ones temperament modifies ones way of philosophizing, its presence is seldom recognized. This statement by James prompted me to the reading of part of Pl... ... 1979) (5) The Greek words on and ousia are both translated as real, real being or reality.(6) Not surprisingly, in the Sophistes as in Pragmatism the fight between the temperaments is claimed to be of all times.(7) His name is not mentioned in th e dialogue.(8) cf. Apology 23c, Theaetetus 168a.(9) Cf. 216a-c, 224e-226a, 233a, 249cd, 253a-254b, 259d.(10) Cf. ai)sxu/vh 230d, ai)sxu/nein (247bc)(11) J. Souilh, tude sur le terme I dans les dialogues de Platon (Paris Librairie Flix Alcon, 1919) cf. p. 36, 112, 154 ff..(12) Real being ... is always in the same unchanging state .... (248a)(13) Cf. 258c-259b.(14) W. James, Some Problems of Philosophy A beginning of an Introduction to Philosophy (New York Longmans, Green adn Co., 1924)(15) James (1924), p. 37(16) James (1924), p. 46

Jamess Pragmatism and Platos Sophistes Essay -- Pragmatism Sophistes

Jamess pragmatism and Platos SophistesABSTRACT In the first chapter of Pragmatism, William James outlines two philosophical temperaments. He argues that though ones temperament modifies ones way of philosophizing, its presence is seldom recognized. This line of reasoning by James led me to Platos Sophistes, especially the relationship between temperament and being. Although Plato describes certain temperaments, I hold that the main topic is being. The ancients restricted All to real number being, e.g., the tangible or the immovable. This interpreting of the Sophistes puts a different face on the first chapter of Pragmatism. However, if we allow James to speak to present-day philosophers as well as his turn of the century audience, then this reading of the Sophistes will clarify the current philosophical temperament. Neither James nor the contemporary philosopher is satisfied with any restriction on All for this reason, both lack interest in being. Being, once the richest word, no longer satisfies the philosophers greedy temperament.IntroductionIn the first chapter of Pragmatism (2) William James speaks more or less a rather unusual aspect of philosophy. He gives an outline of two prevailing temperaments in philosophy. Temperament, he argues, ...is no conventionally recognized reason in philosophy... still a professional philosophers temperament really gives him a stronger bias than any of his more strictly premises. ... Yet in the forum he can make no claim, on the bare ground of his temperament, to superior discernment or authority. (3)James argues that, although ones temperament modifies ones way of philosophizing, its presence is seldom recognized. This statement by James prompted me to the reading of part of Pl... ... 1979) (5) The Greek words on and ousia are both translated as real, real being or reality.(6) Not surprisingly, in the Sophistes as in Pragmatism the fight between the temperaments is claimed to be of all times.(7) His name is not menti oned in the dialogue.(8) Cf. Apology 23c, Theaetetus 168a.(9) Cf. 216a-c, 224e-226a, 233a, 249cd, 253a-254b, 259d.(10) Cf. ai)sxu/vh 230d, ai)sxu/nein (247bc)(11) J. Souilh, tude sur le terme I dans les dialogues de Platon (Paris Librairie Flix Alcon, 1919) cf. p. 36, 112, 154 ff..(12) Real being ... is always in the same unchanging state .... (248a)(13) Cf. 258c-259b.(14) W. James, Some Problems of philosophical system A beginning of an Introduction to Philosophy (New York Longmans, Green adn Co., 1924)(15) James (1924), p. 37(16) James (1924), p. 46

Analysis of Durkheim’s “The Elementary Forms of Religious Essay

As described in Durkheims The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, a totem is apparent in every society. A totem is a symbolic inscribe of some creature, world, or thing that represents the sanctity and principle of god. Essentially, a totem is a profane, ordinary object that has been deemed by society to have some holy, sacred characteristics. With this being said, the object itself does not have any holy or sacred qualities rather it is merely the theatrical performance of the totem that holds these characteristics.For example, if a societys totem is a tip over then an actual turtle would merely be a turtle, but when the turtle is presented as a totemic emblem then this symbolic representation of the turtle is sacred. Durkheim argues that, because the totem is a socially constructed representation of god then the totem itself represents society as well. Durkheim makes this assumption evidently clear by stating that the god of the clan, the totemic principle, toilet therefore be nothing else than the clan itself, personified and represented to the imagination under the visible form of the animal or vegetable which serves as totem. From this, one fag end conclude that Durkheim viewed the worship of totem as worshipping society. Durkheim goes on to make the argument that god and society are equivalent. God is an outside, figurative force that holds the people worshiping it to certain courtesy and actions. The act of worshipping said god or totem is an indication that the followers, believers, or worshipers are dependent upon this force to determine the actions they partake in, the behaviors they exhibit and so on.God and exampleity exist in order to keep people in line via ritualized activities and setting moral and ethical guidelines that people abide by. Society, in and of itself, possesses the same qualities. The norms and determine of a society, which for the most part have been incorporated into the moral and ethical guidelines laid out in the soc ietys religion, are followed whether or not they are in line with the individuals intrinsic nature.Because of this characteristic, society is itself an outside force that people are dependent on, whether or not they acknowledge it. Lastly, Durkheim acknowledges that these ritualized activities and shared moral values foster the social solidarity and cohesion of society. By partaking in shared activities, whether it be the Islamic ritual of praying to Allah multiple times a day, the American impost of singing of the national anthem before the first pitch of a baseball game, or the Catholic ritual of aking communion, we are acknowledging that we belong to a assembly or society. Common activities help establish what Durkheim refers to as collective consciousness, that is a specified set of beliefs and values that are common to members of a accustomed society or group. Praying to the same god or praising the same society, which according to Durkheim are one in the same, encourages th e development and maintenance of a together with held set of morals, values, ethics, and beliefs.

Early Modern British Literature Essay

The period of British cultural history which saw the brittle gaiety of the mid-twenties, the cordial intelligence of the 1930s, the world war followed by the welf atomic number 18 state of the 1940s and the chastened readjustments of the mid-fifties, is non easy to describe in general terms. The Second population War does not appear in retrospect to retain been the cultural watershed that in several(prenominal) respects the First was.The increasing tempo of the reaction against Victorianism in the 1920s did not precipitate the revolution in values which was at unmatched judgment of conviction predicted, nor did the pattern of Left-wing thought which emerged in the next decade as a result of the depression turn verboten to be an accurate prediction of the mood and method of the great social changes that took place during and immediately subsequently the second war. In the matter of literary techniques, the 1920s proved to be one of the most fruitful periods in the whole hi story of face literature.In fiction, the so-called stream of consciousness method was born, matured and moved to its decline within this single decade. In poetry, the revolution wrought by Pound and Eliot and the later on Yeats, by the bare-ass influence of the seventeenth century metaphysicals and of Hopkins, changed the poetic map of the country. As far as technique goes, the period since has been one of consolidation. Nothing so radically novel in technique as Eliot Waste Land has appeared since, nor have later novelists ventured as far in technical innovation as Joyce did in Ulysses and Finnegans Wake.The sense of excitement which all this experimentation produced, the battles, the mutual abuse, the innovating exaltation of the atomic magazines, seem very far away directly in the 1950s and were already lost by the end of the 1930s. A period of consolidation is not exciting, nor is it easy to describe with the literary historians eye. (Christopher Ivic, Grant Williams, 2004 ) It dexterity perhaps be said that in the 1920s the most all principal(prenominal)(predicate) writers were much than serious as artists than as men, date in more fresh years they have been more serious as men than as artists.The Second World War forced a modern kind of glintiveness almost human affairs on many British people. This was nothing spectacular, nothing like the dramatic shift from the patriotic idealism of Rupert Brooke to the bitterly disillusioned banter of Siegfried Sassoon or Richard Aldington that took place during the earlier war. It was marked by such things as a sign in a capital of the United Kingdom bookshop in 1942 variant Sorry, no Shakespeare or War and Peace. There was a surprising amount of re-reading of the classicspartly attributable, it is certain, to the paper shortage which resulted in a reduction of the issuance of new books promulgatedand a great demand for historical pee-pees and discussions of general human problems in what might be called semi-popular form such phenomena as the Pelican books in the Penguin library are indicative of this demand. Even the most sophisticated tended to look for books with somewhatthing to say rather than for new methods of expression.The problem of the artist in groundbreaking society-his alienation, his inevitable bohemianismwhich had so agitated writers in the preceding two decades, suddenly lost much of its interest, and when some interest revived again subsequently the war it was more often than not c at one timerned with the sober question of how the writer was to make a living. The shift in emphasis from technique to content, if one can describe it thus crudely, did not represent a clear-cut movement.Indeed, at times it looked as though the first response of writers and critics to the Second World War was to emphasize their status and integrity as men of letters rather than as citizens concerned with the immediate problems posed by the war. The tone of Horizon, the lite rary periodical founded early in the war by Cyril Connolly as an assertion of the claims of current literature in the midst of international conflict, was from the beginning more aesthetic, more removed from the immediate pressure of events, even than T.S. Eliots Criterion which it can be said to have succeeded. And if we compare the tone of Horizon with that of John Lehmann raw(a) Writing the difference between the deliberate aloofness of the writer in the 1940s and his strenuous commitment to the issues of the day in the 1930s is even more striking. New Writing sincerely represented the mid-1930s, even in its war-time forms. Though it proclaimed its devotion to imaginative literature it continued the documentary reporting and social interests of the 1930s into the 1940s.And documentary writing of all kinds flourished during the war. But Horizon represented more fully the tone of literary London in the war days. It did not last, provided Horizon itself closed down a few years af ter the war ended, and Cyril Connollys elegant prose and uncommitted sophistication was suddenly seen to be old-fashioned. A general air of tired seriousness seemed to spread all over the face of English letters writers were no longer mandarins, but people seek to earn a living by their pen.When the London Magazine was founded in 1954, edited by John Lehmann, it was with no clear-cut programme or new artistic creed. From the first its general air was one of mild competence it was as though the magazine were standing by to transmit any new creative impulse when it came. (Joshua Scodel, 2002). Though little magazines continued to spring up sporadically after the Second World War, they no longer played the important part they had done between roughly 1914 and 1935, the great experimental period of modern English literature.These magazines reflected the fragmentation of the audience for literature, so characteristic of our period, in that they were produced by coteries and appealed t o particular sectional interests. Perhaps Rossetti seeded player was really the first of the little magazines in England but it was an exception in the Victorian period in its designedly limited appeal. The Yellow Book, which ran from April 1894 until April 1897, was in a sense the second English little magazine but it was much more popular than either the Germ or its own twentieth century successors.Arthur Symons Savoy, founded in January 1896 to continue and surpass The Yellow Book, was less popular, and barely survived a year. When we come to the Egoist, founded at the beginning of 1914, we are in the true modern tradition of the little magazine. The Egoist was started as a feminist magazine, but under the influence of Ezra Pound and differents it became for a time the unofficial organ of the Imagist movement, printing poetry by Pound, Aldington, H. D. , F. S.Flint, John Gould Fletcher, Amy Lo hale and D. H. Lawrence. T. S. Eliot also contributed, and in 1917 he became editor, continuing until the demise of the magazine in December 1919. separate of Joyces Ulysses first appeared in The Egoist. The political and literary weekly The New Age, under the editorship of A. R. Orage, printed T. E. Hulmes series of articles on Bergson in October and November 1911 and, in the course of the next few years, most of Hulmes important critical pronouncements.The political and literary influence of The New Age on some important critical and creative minds is seen clearly in Edwin Muirs autobiography. The Little Review, published in New York by Margaret Anderson, was well known in that small group of English avant garde writers and critics who followed its serialisation of Joyces Ulysses in twenty-lead parts from March 1918 to December 1920, when the serialization abruptly stopped as a result of a charge of raunch brought against the magazine by the U. S. Post Office.(Nicholas Mcdowell, 2004) T. S. Eliot Criterion ran from 1922 to 1939, acting in general as the organ o f the new classical revolution. Wheels, an annual anthology edited by Edith Sitwell from 1916 until 1921, published the Sitwells and some prose-poems by Aldous Huxley, and engaged in a species of brilliant verbal clowning which combined virtuosity with weariness. Wyndham Lewis Blast, Review of the Great English Vortex, appeared first in 1914 and once more in 1915 it pr all(prenominal)ed Lewiss views on art and letters and printed also Eliot and Pound.Far less of a little magazine was J. C. Squires London Mercury (he edited it from 1919- 1934) which represented the uncommitted traditionalists, reflecting a point of view which its holders would have considered central and its opponents middlebrow. Middleton Murry edited The Athenaeum from 1919 to 1921 and The Adelphi from 1923 to 1930. In the 1930s there were little magazines which responded to the tastes and ideals of the post-Eliot generation.New Verse, edited by Geoffrey Grigson, ran from 1933 to 1939 it was one of the most Catholi c of the avant garde anthologies printing new poetry that was original and interesting whether it was by Auden or by Dylan Thomas. more limited in scope and interest were Twentieth-Century Verse, edited by Julian Symons from 1937 to 1939, and Poetry ( London), started just before the Second World War by Tambimuttu to reflect what for a short time appeared to be a new romanticism. Looking back on all this from the middle 1950s one is sensible of a loss of excitement and experiment.There is today in England no literary avant garde. The quiet social revolution brought about by such innovations as the national health service, the Education Act of 1944, high taxation of the middle classes and full employment, produced an inevitable though not everlastingly a clearly glaring change in the patterns of English culture. The aristocratic implications, or at least the overtones of expansive middle-class leisure, that could be seen in different ways in the work of Eliot, the later Yeats and Virginia Woolf, had no meaning in the welfare state.Some recent novels show the post-war intellectual as a precarious provincial moving with a combination of bewilderment and sardonic observation in a world which loses any sort of tradition, a world where the older patterns of behaviouraristocratic or genteel-are parodied by vulgar and opportunistic pragmatists who get what they can out of from each one situation in which they find themselves. Social class, the theme which had been the background pattern of the English novel since its beginnings, now for the first time ceases to have meaning in a world where education and income bear no necessary relation to each other.Virginia Woolf had been accused by some critics of developing a kind of sensibility dependent on a certain full stop of wealth and leisure now it seemed that a society of working class prosperity, business fiddles to minimize income tax, and a sharp drop in the relative standard of living of the professional class es and intellectuals, left over(p) no room for sensibility. Was this a crisis of middle-class culture? We are too close to it all to be able to say.But we can point to some interesting facts. For example, the London Magazine was originally subsidized by the Daily Mirror, a popular tabloid newspaper, which thus employed some of the profits do out of vulgarity and sensationalism to support culture. And then there is the influence of radio and tv. The BBC recognized the distinction between lowbrow, middlebrow and highbrow in their three programmes, the Light, the Home and the Third.One of the aims was apparently to introduce a few good serious works, in music and drama, on the Light programme, in the hope that some listeners to it might be attracted to the Home, and to introduce on occasion a really highbrow feature on the Home Service in the hope of reservation a few converts to the Third Programme. The BBC has thus thought of its function as educational and cultural, not merely a s the provision of light entertainment. This artificial detachment of the different brows, however, reflects something not altogether healthy in the state of a culture.The Elizabethan groundlings saw Hamlet as a blood and-thunder murder riddle, while the better educated saw it as a profound tragedybut each saw the same work. In our present culture, the murder mystery and the serious tragedy are represented by different works, the former trivial and merely entertaining, the latter self-consciously highbrow and probably appealing to sole(prenominal) a tiny minority of sophisticates. This is one aspect of the problem of the fragmentation of the audience for works of literature which has long been a feature of our civilization.It is significant, for example, that the BBC programme which introduces new poetry is a regular Third Programme feature interest in new poetry is the mark of the extreme highbrow. (Constance C. Relihan, 1996) The BBC is a force, however, and is probably respon sible for(p) for the remarkable increase of musical knowledge and musical taste in the country. It is in the more popular forms of art that radio and television most ill threaten standards, by the very fact that they are catering to the same audience every night.The old music-hall entertainer perfected his act in months of playing it over and over at the same theatre, with a different audience each night, and then took it on tour in the provinces. He had time to develop an art-form of his own, however popular or crude it might be. But with a show going on the air every week, and the same audience listening each time, the situation is radically changed. The standard is bound to fall when there is the necessity of a weekly change of programme, no matter how talented the authors and performersand the same is true of television and of the cinema.All this has its effect in due course on literature and on the public for literature. Commercial television, which purveys merely entertainmen t and aims at the largest come-at-able audience, can obviously take no chances and is bound to appeal to the lowest common denominator. It cannot afford to risk losing part of its audience by trying out something difficult. It must entertain first and foremost, and entertainment must be directed at a wholly relaxed and passive audience. Is entertainment as such an important part of the life of a civilization?Few would deny that in some sense it is. But the relation between art and entertainment has perpetually been a shifting and a complex one, whereas the selling of guaranteed mass audiences to advertisers means immediate superficial entertainment at the most popular level at all costs. Is popular art bad art? The answer to that depends on the kind of society that fosters it. Today the answer is often but not always yes. In the past art has had its own complex relationship with entertainment on the one hand and with religion or at least with religious rite on the other.Modern com mercial entertainment has re-established contacts with rituala strange and frenzied ritual of herostars and personalities. (Theresa Krier, Elizabeth D. Harvey, 2004) It is not surprising, therefore, if the writer who is concerned with the problem of maintaining a acute audience for serious literature does not welcome commercial television even if he sees in it opportunity for improving his economic status. Noncommercial television has its own problems, but there can be no doubt that, like sound radio, it has played a part in the diffusion of culture. cipher who has seen farm laborers watching television at a rustic public house and observed the thrill with which they have responded to Swan Lake and the half comprehending fascination with which they have watched King Lear (these are two real instances) can deny that television can act, and in some respects in this country has acted, as a remarkable educational and cultural force. There seem to be two quite contradictory forces at wo rk in our culture.When we consider the exploitation of literacy by the yellow Press and all the stereotyped vulgarities of, say, the stories in some of the more popular womens magazines, to go no lower when we think of mass exertion ousting individualistic craftsmanship, the prevalence of bad films, the complete unawareness of even the existence of any such thing as artistic integrity or literary value among so many people when we think of the loss of that simple but genuine folk lore which the total illiterate possessed, for the interestingness of a minimal literacy which merely exposes its possessor to exploitation and corruptionwhen we think of all this, we are in despair about modern civilization.On the other hand, when we see the enormous numbers of relatively cheap paper-bound editions of the classics, as well as of serious works of history and biography, selling daily, or observe the unexampled numbers of people who appreciate good music and ballet, or reflect that an ind ustrial worker or farm labourer whose grandfather may well have led an almost animal existence has now the opportunity of reading and hearing and viewing works of art of various kinds to a degree hitherto impossible, then one takes a much more rosy view. Which is the true picture? Both are true, and, paradoxically enough, both are sometimes true for the same people. The diffusion of culture is a sociological fact, and, further, diffusion does not always imply adulteration. The real problem seems to be an utter lack of discrimination, a lack of awareness of the absolute difference between the genuine and the phoney.Where so much in the form of art and of pseudo-art is thrown at people, where the cultural centre of the nation is itself non-existent or at least problematical, discrimination on the part of the individual is most necessary, and lack of it most dangerous. The ordinary endorser in Popes day, though he belonged to a tiny minority when compared with his modern equivalent, w as probably no better able to discriminate between, say, real poetry and imitative sentimental rubbish which followed the conventional forms of the day but the coherence and stability of his culture and the critical tradition of his time made individual discrimination less necessary. The paradox is that individual discrimination is most necessary when it is least possible. (Cynthia Lowenthal, 2003) References Christopher Ivic, Grant Williams.Forgetting in Early Modern English Literature and husbandry Lethes Legacies Routledge, 2004 Constance C. Relihan. Framing Elizabethan Fictions Contemporary Approaches to Early Modern Narrative Prose Kent State University Press, 1996 Cynthia Lowenthal. Performing Identities on the Restoration Stage Southern Illinois University Press, 2003 Joshua Scodel. Excess and the think in Early Modern English Literature Princeton University Press, 2002 Nicholas Mcdowell. Interpreting Communities Private Acts and Public Culture in Early Modern England Criti cism, Vol. 46, 2004 Theresa Krier, Elizabeth D. Harvey. Luce Irigaray and Premodern Culture Thresholds of History Routledge, 2004

The Crucible: Troubles in the Proctor Household

Emotions Run High in keep an eye on Household In the beginning of Act II of Arthur Millers play, The Crucible, the story presents an interaction amongst can buoy Proctor and his wife, Elizabeth. The interaction between the couple emphasizes that their relationship is anything but normal than that of a married couple. The main cause of their awkward relationship stems from prats travel lust. can buoy Proctor has conflicting emotions towards Elizabeth because both of them are trying to avoid the huge concomitant that he committed adultery.The conflicting emotions are present when John Proctor tries to avoid confrontations with his wife, the small talk between them where John eonianly tries to please Elizabeth, and the lack of mutual agreement between them. Through come out the scene, John Proctor tried very expectant in order to avoid altercations with his wife. In a remote society of the 1600s, it would be very common for a cleaning woman to be subservient towards her hus band.In the Proctor household, it is no different since Elizabeth quietly questions her husbands authority because she fear(s) to anger him although she has all the leverage she needs in an wrinkle by simply stating the fact that he cheated on her (Miller 53). However, John displays the complete opposite behavior of what is expected of a staminate in a patriarchal society. Firstly, when John comes home and tastes the soup his wife prepared, he is not quite pleased with it for it was not seas aned well (Miller 49).After adding more salt himself, John notices that Elizabeth is intently watching him taste the soup. Instead of being a typical husband back in the 1600s by criticizing such a small mistake almost how his food is seasoned, he compliments on how good-tasting the soup is while knowing that it was the product of his handy-work. By holding his tongue, he avoids a confrontation between him and his wife over a very small issue of not putting enough salt in the soup.Additionall y, John seems not to be the typical male in his society when he, as gently as he can gestates for some cider (Miller 51). It is clear that this is not what his normal behavior would be because, as Elizabeth is fetching him his cider, she feels a sense of reprimandfor having forgot (Miller 51). Because Elizabeth felt as if she did something to wrong her husband, she expects that John will reserve a huge fuss over the issue. However, John casually brushes off her mistake by just changing the subject to him tending to the fields.His careful behavior towards Elizabeth makes him adopt the tone of a husband that has do something to immensely displease his wife and is trying not to anger her. Clearly, it shows that John has conflicting emotions towards his wife because he wants to act as a typical husband back in the 1600s, but he remembers the heinous crime he committed and tries to avoid confrontation and the possibility of the two of them talking approximately his mistake. John Proc tors entire conversation with Elizabeth is mostly saying things to please her in an attempt to make-up for his affair.For example, while eating his meal he makes constant remarks about their farm being extremely big and the reason for coming home so late was because he was busy planting far out to the forest edge (Miller 49). In this obvious attempt to please Elizabeth, John hints at the fact that he has worked very hard on their farm. By hinting at this, he hopes to show Elizabeth that he is working for the greater good of the family and that he is not spending time with Abigail.Furthermore, John wants to make sure that Elizabeth sees all his hard work when he suggests that on Sunday (theyll) walk the farm to together (Miller 51). The above passage clearly shows how much John is trying to please Elizabeth because he openly said that they would go explore the farm on Sunday which is supposed to be dedicated to a day of prayer where no one is supposed to do any work and if an individ ual skips church service, they would get in trouble.Secondly, John tries to please Elizabeth with material wealth when he breaks the awkward conquer between them by explicitly saying that if the crop is good Ill buy George Jacobs heifer. How would that please you? (Miller 50). By asking Elizabeth her opinion on what she thinks about his decision to buy a heifer shows an atypical relationship between a husband and wife back in the 1600s since the male usually does not ask for their wifes opinion on their decisions and that John is to a fault trying hard to please his wife.The typical male attitude toward women voicing their opinions on things is also present in Johns demeanor when he explodes at the slight thought that Elizabeth has lost all faith in him due to the fact that he faltered slightly at the thought of hurting Abigails reputation (Miller 54). The constant battle in Johns demeanor to act as the man of the house as well as the caring husband act he is struggling to put up in order to make up for his mistake is an example of the conflicting emotions he is experiencing while dealing with his wife.

Physician assisted euthanasia

Quality of support is not often guaranteed when one is suffering from a terminal illness. In fact quality of life and terminal illnesses simply seem to be complementary. For years debate has been ongoing on the morality and legality of physician administered active voluntary mercy killing also known as physician assisted suicide or PAS for short. Physician assisted suicide involves a physician, at the request of the patient, either withholding or administering some material body of procedure that would immediately or eventually lead to ending the patients life. Such an act becomes necessary when the quality of life for the patient is distort with cark and suffering, when alternatives do not seem to work and therefore the patient opts for death rather than a life in their current condition.The most surreptitious debate is often not whether physician assisted mercy killing is ethical in all cases but whether or not the state should legalize this perpetrate (Kamisar 1123 Kaveny 125). Numerous arguments have been put forward on the two sides of the argument and both seem feasible. However, whatever the opposing positions, the arguments for the legitimation of physician assisted euthanasia are quite an valid. Euthanasia should be legalized throughout the states of the U.S.A. as an excerpt for patients, in consultation with their families and physicians.Reporting on data from a questionnaire among physicians Gupta, Bhatnagar and Mishra highlighted that 60% supported the legalisation of physician assisted euthanasia at least in some cases. One argument for its legalization relates to an individuals right to choose what is in his best interest. One of the fundamental principles that prevails in the U. S. is the right of the individual to determine and charter his own life path (Gittelman 372). The political relation aims to be as obscure as possible when it comes to involvement in the affairs of the individual. Therefore the government should not restrict an individuals choice of death over life in situations where the former seems to be the better alternative. The patient, therefore, as ultimate decision maker should be empowered to make such a decision independently.Opponents of legalization would want to suggest here that if the individual is given such all-encompassing power then this will suggest further societal implications. As in the case with abortion, the line between acts that affect just the individual and those that impact wider fiat will become distorted. On the other hand it is the duty of the government to draft correct procedures that would kosherly guide the practice of euthanasia. It will not be left up to the individual at all times to overbearing decide when to die by accessing euthanasia but detailed and specific guidelines must be laid down in conjunction with the legislative instrument. As Gittelman argues, government must aim to control the actions of individuals in so far as they are overall harmful to s elf and other members in the society (372).Related to this argument is a further benefit of physician assisted euthanasia. Currently physicians are conducting euthanasia even though it is illegal in most states across the U.S. (Gupta, Bhatnagar and Mishra). Physicians who comply with the requests of patients are taking a legal risk. There is the implication that this practice is not uniformed as there are no standards by which euthanasia is being conducted on this non-legal basis. Furthermore very little is known of the extent to which euthanasia is practiced throughout the United States (Kamisar 1124). The benefit that legalization would assume is to make the procedures more standardized and administrators would have significantly more control over its processes.Opponents have been pointing to the case of Judith Curren as grounds on which legalization should not be explored. Curren was an obese woman of 42 suffering from chronic-fatigue syndrome who was assisted to death by Dr. K evorkian. Obviously her situation was not chronic enough to merit euthanasia (Kaveny 125) and other options could have been explored. It is, however, precisely because of these cases why physician assisted euthanasia should be legalized. Incompetence would be avoided and dealt with appropriately if necessary.A further argument for the legalization of euthanasia is the financial strain it would remove from families who have to chief(prenominal)tain care of terminally ill relatives. The medical costs incurred by individual families and the government when such hospital care is covered through it social services, are tremendous. Medical costs for terminally ill patients would therefore be significantly less because some would have the option of terminating life early rather than depend on a life support system that is not curative. Moreover more doctors would, as suggested by Gittelman, be willing to explore the possibility of euthanasia with patients (372).Another reason for legaliza tion is to protect doctors from unnecessary lawsuits and criminal penalties for acts done at the request of the patient. Doctors are now lay themselves at serious risks by carrying out euthanasia on their patients. Without the legislative backing physicians who persist with euthanasia go against the dictates of the law. Legalization, detailing the specific conditions and circumstances to a lower place which euthanasia could be performed, would avoid abuse by physicians ensuring that the proper procedures are followed. Therefore terminally ill patients would be protected in two main regards, they will be protected from the wrongful judgment of physicians to make poor decisions on their behalf and on the other hand patients would be protected from ceaseless pain and suffering.Many more arguments could be leveled in favor of the legalization of physician assisted euthanasia. What is evident is that the arguments that have been used to counter legalization are not quite sound. The rar e case where this practice was misused by unprofessional personnel is not a true reflection of its true potential. Furthermore lack of proper governmental regulation is what is contributing to these problems. Legalization would therefore dispel these problems.REFERENCESGittelman, David. Euthanasia and Physician-Assisted Suicide. Southern Medical Journal 92.4 (April 1999) 369-374.Gupta, Deepak, Sushma Bhatnagar and Seema Mishra. Euthanasia Issues Implied Within. Internet Journal of Pain, Symptom run across & Palliative Care 4.1(2006)1.Kamisar, Yale. Physician-Assisted Suicide The Problems Presented by the Compelling Heartwrenching case. The Journal of Criminal Law & Criminology 88.3 (1998) 1121-1146.Kaveny, M. Cathleen. Assisted Suicide, Euthanasia, and the Law. Theological studies. 58 (1997) 124-148.

Moving Away

I can still remember that day. If you asked me, I thought the world was coming to a blazing end. Well, at to the lowest degree my world. It was a very humid and hot summer afternoon. Unusually warm for New England, it was the type of weather found in the deep south of our awkward. It was sooner a coincidence actually since this was the type of weather I would ease up to be used to. After all here I was on my old agency down to the south moving to Kentucky. It was a slightly a socio-economic class before when I was first told by my p arents that we would be moving. At first I didnt believe them.I thought, What kind of sick joke is this? But after a few minutes I genuineized they were unplayful. More serious questions came popping into my mind. Why would we move? What slightly my friends? Who is going to buy this junky house? These were all questions that initially ran by means of my jumbled mind. My parents refused to answer my questions however. This got me extremely angry. H ow could they crush such a change in my animation and ignore my questions? My parents were being cruel, non because they were making me move but because they were completely ignoring my feelings and questions.My opinions and feelings meant nothing to them because they made the election on their own. I was a Essay on Moving Away Moving international from all of your best friends can be a real tragedy in a sixteen-year-old teenagers life. Its hard to get up and go eight hundred miles away from everyone you know and everything you grew up around. I had this happen to me about three years ago and it is the largest change I have ever had to array to in my life. It wasnt the changes around me that I was bothered by it was that I did not know one living soul for hundreds of miles and all I wanted was a friend.Two days into the summer after sophomore year at Governor Mifflin High School in the little townspeople of Shillington Pennsylvania I would find out the worse news that a sixtee n year old could hear. I found out that in four days my family and I would be moving to a suburb outside of Chicago because of my dads upstart job change. I was devastated, I ran to my room and cried for about an hour with thoughts of all my friends running through my head. It was like all the memories I had with all my friends were going through my head at the same time. It was beyond doubt one of the biggest challenges of my life.During the last few days I was there I went out with my friends every night ha Moving far away from family and friends can be tough on a child at a young age. It has its pros and cons. One learns how to sess with moving away from the people they love and also learn how to deal with placeing to new ways of life. Everything seems so different and at a young age one feels like they have just left the whole world behind them. That was an experience that changed my life as a person. It taught me how to deal with change and how to adjust. It veritable me f rom a young boy into a mature young man.The day I moved away, a mass of things were going through my young mind. As I took my last look at my home, I remembered all the fun times I had with my family and friends through out my life. Now I was moving 800 miles away from all of that with no insight on what lied ahead for me. As my family and I drove away from our Michigan home, I looked out the window question what Virginia would be, and what my friends were doing. A lot of things were going through my mind at the time. At the time my main worry was if I would make any friends, and how I would adjust to everything.During the whole drive down, my mother would often let me know that everything would be all right and I would like it. Trying to be immobile and clench back my tears, I just shook my head no, wondering why we had to move so far away. Life would be different for me and I knew it would. Adjusting to an cash machine and new people had its ups and downs. Everybody ta. The e ffects of moving to a new town or city Nowadays, as a result of looking for better conditions of life many people have been moving from their own city to another city or country.People in all over the world are developing the necessity of find their happiness, education and a better work. Moving to a new town or city can bring several(prenominal) negatives and positives effects to the person who is moving. The first effect of moving to a new town or city can be found in educational life. Since people are looking to a better education, they move to a country that can give them the possibility of be a good professional. For example, in Angola my country, if you want find a great job you have to have an international certificate. This means that the people who are living in another country have more possibility to achieve the work.Sometimes the companies on my country prefer consider people who are from another country. In short, I am the exactly example because I moved from my countr y to U. S. A to look for a spectacular certificate. The second effect of moving to a new town or city can be found in psychologist state of a person. For example, when I arrived here I had some mental problems because always I was hypothesiseing about my family that I left in Angola. A person who is homesick suffers the consequences alone and thinks a lot about the family that is away from her.In my opinion, think about the family who people left causes serious problem and the person cannot concentrate on her real objective there. In addition, people have to be strong and control all their feelings when they are in another town. The third effect of moving to a new town is that people spend a lot of money. To start a new life sometimes because of work or studies when people move they spend a lot of money with car, house, and school until adjust the new life with the new city. Starting a new life is kind of complicated because at first time you dont have where buy and find everything .

Rethink your Drink Essay

Based on the feedback that I received from my provider Mable Siow, a CFNP at the pueblo clinic, I chose a poster presentation. I am a school nurse in a Native American Pueblo and because of the mellowed obesity rate we have among our young people, I chose to teach about high caloric drinks. A poster presentation was appropriate because of my audience. The theme of my presentation was Rethink Your Drink Please see photo below. My school conducted a polished health fair in our gym, on Friday March 3rd 2010, I was able to create a poster board presentation exactly like the one depicted above.I added Red bull and Monster as I have confiscated these types of drinks from my middle school kids. The reaction and response I received from the kids and the parents was amazing. When you create a display such as this, it is easy enough to understand and the visual presentation is a very powerful tool in the teaching of how much sugar is consumed in each drink. By the time the parents and kids left my table, I received some very positive feedback. I besides had handouts of information that I downloaded from the internet on the amount of calories that equal one teaspoon of sugar.For example, each teaspoon of sugar is equivalent to 16 calories. If you drink a 20 oz Mountain Dew, you are consuming 312 calories and 19. 5 teaspoons of sugar. The community setting was a combination of a public health clinic and a child aid center. I am the school nurse and the audience consisted of my school kids, their parents and the school staff. I believe that this presentation made a big impact on how the parents will view these drinks in the future. Our dental hygienist was very happy to see the presentation and mentioned that she will borrow it for her clinic, as there are high numbers racket of kids with severe tooth decay.

Pros and Cons of Alternative Work Schedule

Many volume ar now opting to find flex records that would best fit their lifestyles and suit their needs in doing other tasks. Some people are having a difficult time adhering on the traditional report schedules or the produce schedules as prescribed by their company. That is why they look for schedules that impart best suit their needs and allow them to manage their time on their own. Everyone has their own perception of flexibility and take. Such perceptions whitethorn greatly depend on the personal needs, educational background, skills and the type of work that you are about to pursue.Alternative work schedules refer to the type of schedule that is not based on the conventional work schedule. Types of alternative work schedules include part-time employment, flexible pass along and subcontracting. Part-time employment has the advantage of doing many commercial enterprises effectively however, employing two part-timers may cost more(prenominal) than employing one full-tim e employee. However, part-time employment may be a better option than lay-offs (Rogovsky, Ozoux, Esser, Marpe & Broughton, 2005). On the other hand, subcontracting is the type of alternative work schedule that is detaching some of the employees in period of time.The employees still belong to the company but they will work for another company. Flexible leave allows the employees to avail limited leave that is agreed by the company and the employee (Rogovsky et al. , 2005). Flex-time is a growing idea in the business industry and meet a popular option in the body of works work order of battles. The idea that the employees should not be tied on to their desks the whole week emerged in the 1990s. To twenty-four hours, flexibility is an integral part of business. This is expected already as the new generation enters the workforce (Bitti, 2008).The inception of new technology, especially the use of computers, changed the landscape of work arrangements. It allows employees to be more p resent or cite to their work anytime and anywhere if their work is accessible in the internet. That is why more companies are embracing flexi-time work schedules for their work arrangements (Bitti, 2008). Compressed work week is becoming an option for the company to attract more employees and increase their productivity. Compressed work week means that you will work for the same number of hours as they would work for regular week but in fewer days (MacKillop, Geddie & Miedema, 2003).Compressed work week may be in the form of flexible work arrangement in order to maintain balance between work and family. Alternative work schedules provide options for the employees that have other responsibilities either at home or at school as most of the people that seek for alternative work schedules are mothers who are engaged in household activities and students who seek job opportunities while studying. The alternative work schedule has its own advantages and disadvantages. Flexible work arra ngement is a type of alternative work schedule that renders benefits to the employees.One of the advantages it renders is allowing employees not to transform on the rush hour that is less stressful on the part of the employees (Katepoo, 2008). Alternative work schedule also improve the morale of the employees and considerably disgrace the stress experienced of the employees. Alternative work schedule can lower the absences of the employees and can contribute greatly in productivity. In addition, the overtime pay for the employees is reduced, thusly lowering the costs for the employers (Beierlein & Van Horn, 1995).Moreover, there is an enhancement in the aspect of recruitment as well as for the people who may be unobtainable for the traditional work schedule. The business hours are also extended due to flex-time and insipid work week options. The equipment and facilities are also economically used in alternative work schedules (Beierlein & Van Horn, 1995). One of the advantages of the flexi-time is that it allows the employees to juggle different things while receiving a regular payment. They are able to attend to other things without sacrificing their work (Bitti, 2008).Alternative work schedule also has its own share of disadvantages. This includes mentally and physically stressful or draining for the employees working in the compressed work week arrangement. This may also become the onset of chronic fatigue due to work and family conflict time pressures in some types of alternative work schedule. The compressed work schedule may render difficulty especially for mothers who are attending household responsibilities (Katepoo, 2008). Furthermore, supervisors and subordinates may not work on the same schedule fashioning it hard for the management to effectively manage the company.Problems may also arise in the areas of timekeeping and how benefits are distributed (Beierlein & Van Horn, 1995). There is also the possibility of lower workforce on peak days tha t require the managements to establish efficient cross and back-up training and good communication system to ensure high productivity. In compressed work week arrangement, people with young family members spend longer hours in the office in some days and experience difficulty in their day care obligations (MacKillop, Geddie & Miedema, 2003).The alternative work schedule is a growing trend in the business industry and slowly gaining popularity in some companies. It renders advantages not single for the employees but also for the employer and the company. However, the alternative work schedule has its own set of disadvantages for both parties.References Beierlein, J. G. & Van Horn, J. E. (1995, June). Alternative Work Schedule. National Network for Child Care. Retrieved November 12, 2008, from http//www. nncc. org/EO/emp. alt. work. sched. html.Bitti, T. (2008, July 14). What are the pros and cons of flex time?. Financial Post. Retrieved November 12, 2008, from http//www. financialpo st. com/small_business/businesssolutions/story. html? id=645783.Katepoo, P. (2008). Compressed Workweek Pros & Cons as a Flexible Work Arrangement. WorkOptions. com. Retrieved November 12, 2008, from http//www. workoptions. com/compros. htm.MacKillop, M. , Geddie, J. & Miedema, A. (2003). Legal Terms for Human Resources Professionals. Canada CCH Canadian Ltd. Rogovsky, N. , Ozoux, P. , Esser, D. , Marpe, T. & Broughton, A. (2005). Restructuring for incarnate Success A Socially Sensitive Approach. Geneva International Labour Organization.

Essay of Ancient China

past china In antediluvian Chinese cosmology, the universe was created non by divinities sole(prenominal) when self-generated from the interplay of natures basic duality the active agent, light, dry, warm, positive, masculine yang and the passive, dark, cold, moist, proscribe yin. both(prenominal) things, animate and inanimate, and only circumstances were a combination of these fundamentals. The ultimate principle of the universe was the tao, the way, and it resolute the comely proportions of yin and yang in eitherthing. Anything that altered the natural congress of yin to yang was considered bad, and adept living consisted of carefully observeing the tao.If unrivaled observed the tao by moderation, equanimity, and morality, as taught in the Tao-te Ching, by Lao-tzu ( 6th ampere-second B. C. ), one would be impervious to un healthiness and resistant to the ravages of aging disregard of the tao led to unhealthiness, which was non so very much a punishment for r epulsiveness as the inevitable result of playing obstinate to natural laws. However, illness overly could be ca employ by forces beyond ones control Wind is the cause of a hundred diseases, and atmospheric conditions could upset the harmonious inward balance of the yang and yin.One had to be alert to this possibility and set upon its effects as tumesce as condition intragroup imbalances of the vital forces. Longevity and health were the rewards. Chinese medicament, in league with Taoism, was foc utilize on the saloon of illness for, as the storyary Huang Ti, father of Chinese medicinal drug, observed, the superior medico helps to begin with the premature(a) on develop of disease. Although Taoist hygiene c on the wholeed for temperance and simplicity in almost things, sexual mores were governed by the yin-yang aspect of Chinese philosophy.Ejaculation in intercourse led to diminution of a mans yang, which, of course, upset the inner balance of his nature. On the opposite hand, one was strengthened by absorption of the yin released by the orgasm of ones female sidetracknerunless she was over thirty, the foretell where female essence lost its efficacy. The tao was important in Confucianism a comparable, as the path of virtuous conduct, and for centuries the precepts of Confucius (Kung Fu-tzu, 550-479 B. C. ) set the most prevalent standards of behavior. In early Chinese philosophy, on that point was a tendency to accept and combine aspects of all(prenominal) religions and to make way for new ideas.Nevertheless, the antique Chinese were profoundly conservative once an institution, custom, philosophy, mode of dress, or flat a furniture style was firm established, and it remained relatively unchanged over centuries. As Confucius express Gather in the like places where our fathers in the lead us develop ga in that locationd per fashion the same ceremonies which they before us charter performed play the same harmony which they befo re us attain played wage respect to those whom they honored love those who were dear to them. Although superannuated Chinas verbotengrowth was relatively isolated, there was early firearm away with India and Tibet.Buddhism came to China from India, and health check exam concepts and blueprints were an important part of its t for each oneings. The active and breathing exercises in Chinese aesculapian checkup examination modeology as s wellhead came from India and were close related to the principles of Yoga and to aspects of Ayurvedic medicine. There were also contacts with s fall outh-east Asia, Persia, and the Arabic world. In the second ascorbic acid B. C. , the Chinese ambassador Chang Chien spent more than a decade in Mesopotamia, Syria, and Egypt, deliverance back info on drugs, viticulture, and oppositewise out allows.Over the centuries, fellowship of humoral medicine and of numerous new medicaments filtered into China. The introduction of the wis dom of the Mediterranean world was greatly facilitated in the fifth degree Celsius by the expulsion and wide dispersion from Constantinople of the heterodox Nestorian Christians. The mother of Kublai Khan (1216-94), founder of the Mongol dynasty, was a Nestorian and asked the Pope to send European doctors to China. Early Medical Writings Classical Chinese medicine was establish primarily on plant ascri bottomland to three legendary emperors. The most old-fashioned was Fu Hsi (c. 2900 B. C. , who was practice session tongue to to possess originated the pa kua, a symbol quiet of yang lines and yin lines combined in eight (pa) enlighten trigrams (kua) which could hold still for all yin-yang conditions. This system is followed even today in the I Ching (Book of Changes), though as a biz or superstition in the West. Shen Nung, the Red emperor only ifterfly (Hung Ti), compiled the initially health check herbal, the Pen-tsao (c. 2800 B. C. ), in which he describe the effe cts of 365 drugs, all of them personally tested. One legend explains that a magic drug made his type AB skin transparent, so he could observe the do of the many plants he evaluated.A nonher story tells that he vamoose open his abdomen and stitched in a window. Shen Nung is also verbalize to have drawn up the first charts on acupuncture, a medical examination unconscious process presumably even older than the legendary emperors. The fame of Yu Hsiung (c. 2600 B. C. ), the xanthous Emperor (Huang Ti), rests on his great medical compendium, the Nei Ching (Canon of Medicine). convey orally for many centuries, this seminal work was discolorthornhap committed to writing by the third hundred B. C. Its present form dates from the eighth degree centigrade A. D. when the hold up extensive revision was done by Wang Ping. The study portion of the Nei Ching, the Sun-Wen (Simple Questions), records the discourse of the scandalmongering Emperor with chi Po, his prime minister, on vir tually all phases of health and illness, including prevention and manipulation. The section called Ling-Hsu (Spiritual Nucleus), deals totally with acupuncture. Yu Hsiung also was said to be responsible for another great compendium, The Discourses of the Yellow Emperor and the Plain Girl, which thoroughly manageed the subject of sex from the Taoist point of view.Among other celebrated stemmas for ancient medical lore, one force constitute the Shih Ching (Book of Odes), which perhaps predates Homers epics, and the Lun-yu, discourses of Confucius probably written down presently after his death, which affected patterns of behavior for many generations. During the yen Chou dynasty (c. 1050-255 B. C. ), a lengthy compilation of medical works, Institutions of Chou, was completed and became the criterion for subsequent dynasties on the duties and transcription of medical students. In the Han dynasty (206 B. C. -A. D. 20), there was a noted clinical author named Tsang Kung, who pioneered in the description of many diseases, including crabmeat of the stomach, aneurysm, and rheumatism. Chang Chung-ching, the Chinese Hippocrates, in the third snow A. D. , wrote the true treatise Typhoid and Other Fevers. Ko Hung, a far-famed alchemist and a careful observer, wrote treatises describing beriberi (a vitamin B deficiency), hepatitis, and plague, and gave one of the earlier announces on smallpox As the New yr approached there was a seasonal affection in which pustules appeared on the face and spread rapidly all over the organic structure.They looked like burns covered with white starch and reformed as soon as they were broken. The majority died if not treated. After recovery imperial black scars remained. Sun Szu-miao (A. D. 581-682) wrote Chien Chin Yao Fang (A Thousand prospering Remedies), which summarized in thirty volumes much of the known medical looking, and he headed a committee which produced a fifty-volume assembly on pathology. An extensive codification of forensic medicine, Hsi kwai Lu, was done in the Sung dynasty and became the prime source for knowledge of medical jurisprudence.Anatomy and Physiology Ideas of signifier in ancient China were reached by reasoning and. by surmise rather than dissection or forthwith observation. Since the doctrines of Confucius forbade violation of the body, it was not until the eighteenth century, coarse after Vesalius, that the Chinese began systematic, direct anatomical studies. Even as late as the nineteenth century, in the Viceroys Hospital Medical School, anatomy was taught by diagrams and artificial models rather than dissection.Physiological functions were constructed into a humoral system much like Greek concepts of the sestetth century B. C. and Galenic views of the second century A. D. , except that there were 5 instead of four essential humors. (The digit v had mystical value for the Chinese and was used for most classifications five instalments, five tastes, fi ve qualities, five kinds of drugs, five treatments, five solid organs, five seasons, five emotions, five colors, etc. ) The medical compendium Nei Ching say that each emotion had its seat in a particular organ.Happiness dwelt in the heart, thought in the spleen, affliction in the lungs, and the liver housed anger as well as the someone. Ideas in the Nei Ching concerning movement of the race (All the parenthood is under control of the heart. The blood authorized flows continuously in a circle and neer stops. ) have been thought to approach an understanding of its circulation antedating Harvey by thousands of years however, nearly body vessels were believed to convey air, and there is little evidence that commentators perceived the blood-carrying vessels as a contained system. DiagnosisThe Chinese methods of diagnosis included questioning, feeling the pulse, spy the voice and body, and in some circumstances moving the affected parts. In almost all multiplication and cultur es medical students have used a similar approach, for all therapists have sought to know as much as practicable somewhat a enduring in order to understand his or her illness and advise treatment. However, in some respects ancient mendeleviums saw each unhurried more solely as a reflection of his surroundings (indeed, the entire universe) than does the doctor of today. The Chinese doctor wanted to learn ow the patient had violated the tao, and to do this he took into composition the patients rank changes in his or her social status, household, stinting position, sense of well-being, or appetite the weather and the dreams of the patient and his or her family. Perhaps the most important diagnostic technique of the ancient Chinese was examination of the pulse. The medico felt the right wrist and then the left. He compared the beats with his own, noting precise time as well as day and season since each arcminute affected the nature of the pulsations.Each pulse had three trenc hant sections, each associated with a specific organ, and each division had a separate quality, of which there were dozens of varieties. Moreover, each division or zone of the pulse had a superficial and deep projection. Thus literally hundreds of possible characteristics were gettable. In one treatise, Muo-Ching, ten volumes were necessary to cover all the intricacies of the pulse. A patient had only to last his or her arm through drawn bed curtains for the physician to determine the symptoms, diagnosis, prognosis, and proper treatment by intensive palpation of the pulse.Whenever possible the examiner also felt the skin of the ill person. However, it was considered bad form for a man to intimately examine a woman, so special ceramic, ivory, and wooden dolls were pointed to by the handicap to indicate where discomfort was felt. Treatment According to the Nei Ching, there were five methods of treatment cure the spirit, nourish the body, give musics, treat the whole body, and use acupuncture and moxibustion. The physician had to put the patient back on the right path, the tao.Assuming that specific mental states caused changes in specific organs, the healer linked genuine objectionable behavioral and intact factors with illness and attempted to have the patient animate these. For instance, dissolute and licentious ideas led to diseases of the lungs, save acting out such thoughts brought on heart trouble. A doctor had to determine the cause of disharmony in the body and act accordingly. Exercises were developed to keep the body go and to restore well-being. Hua To, the great surgeon, worked out an ingenious system of physical therapy by advising caricature of the natural movements of animals.Massagekneading, tapping, pinching, and chafingwas also a regular method of treatment, as were the application of plasters and evacuation of the intestinal nerve tract by cathartics. In nourishing a patients body, the physician resorted to complex combinations of nutriments according to their potential amounts of yang and yin. Foods also had to fit the seasons, and each of the five tastes had benefits for a particular element of the body sour for the bones, pungent for the tendons, salty for the blood, bitterly for respiration, and sweet for muscle.Medications The Chinese pharmacopoeia was always rich, from the time of the Pen-tsao, the first medical herbal, to the afterward dynasties when twain thousand items and 16 thousand prescriptions made up the armamentarium. Drugs were considered more in all probability to be good if they tasted bad. As one would expect, they were categorize ad into five categories herbs, trees, insects, stones, and grains. The therapeutic minerals and metals included compounds of mercury (calomel was occupied for venereal diseases), arsenic, and magnetic stones.Animal-derived remedies, in admission to firedrake teeth (powdered fossilized bones), included virtually anything obtainable from living creatures whole parts, segments of organs, urine, dung. Two plant substances oddly associated with China may be singled out. One is ephedra (ma huang), the horsetail plant described by the Red Emperor, which was used for thousands of years as a stimulant, as a remedy for respiratory -diseases, to induce fevers and perspiration, and to depress coughs.Ephedra entered the Greek pharmacopoeia and eventually was disseminated throughout most of the world. It only became a factor in Western medicine in the late nineteenth century after Nipponese investigators isolated and purified the active principle, ephedrine, and established its pharmacologic action. A second medicinal herb, always highly usual among the Chinese, is ginseng (man-shaped root). To the Chinese, preparations containing ginseng were almost rattling(a) in delaying old age, restoring sexual powers, stimulating the debilitated, and sedating the overwrought.In addition it improved diabetes and stabilized blood pressure. In new year s this root has been under scrutiny by Western pharmacologists attempting to evaluate its true benefits. Multitudes in Asia, and even some Westerners, are so convinced of its speciality that high-grade wild roots have brought mythic prices (even reaching thousands of dollars apiece). Although many items in the Chinese materia medica have either faded into bscurity or been labeled fanciful, others later have been found to possess sound pharmacologic bases seaweed, which contains iodine, was used in treating enlargement of the thyroid the willow plant, containing salicylic acid, was a remedy for rheumatism the Siberian wort has antispasmodics for menstrual discomfort and mulberry flowers contain rutin, a treatment for elevated blood pressure. Whether opium was used as a drug before quite late in Chinese history is still in dispute. stylostixis and Moxibustion These modalities have been an integral part of Chinese medical therapy for thousands of years.The Yellow Emperor is said t o have invented them, only when they may well have existed prospicient before his time. The aim of these treatments was to drain off excess yang or yin and hence establish a proper balance, but external energy also could be introduced into the body. In acupuncture the skin is pierced by long needles to varying prescribed depths. Needles are inserted into any of 365 points on the twelve meridians that traverse the body and transmit an active flavor force called chi. Each of these points is related to a particular organ.For instance, puncture of a certain secern on the ear lobe might be the proper way to treat an abdominal ailment. Virtually every illness, weakness, and symptom is thought to be amenable to subject area by acupuncture. Acupuncture spread to Korea and Japan by the end of the tenth century A. D. , to Europe about the seventeenth century, and recent years have seen a wider interest in this Chinese medical practice in the West. Individual paramedical healers and even some medical practitioners have been swamped with requests for acupuncture, e particularly for problems patently little benefited by conventional practices.The eventual acceptability of this practice in standard Western medicine frame to be seen. Moxibustion is as old as acupuncture, and the same meridians and points govern placement of the moxa. However, in this treatment a powdered plant substance, normally mugwort, is fashioned into a small mound on the patients skin and burned, usually raising a blister. Dentistry The treatment of tooth disorders was hold mainly to applying or ingesting drugspomegranate, aconite, ginseng, garlic, rhubarb, and arsenic, as well as animal products such as dung and urine.The Nei Ching classified nine types of toothaches, which included some obviously referable to infections and tooth decay. Like the Mesopotamians and Egyptians, the ancient Chinese believed that worms were much responsible for dental problems. Toothpicks and tooth whiteners wer e used, and loose teeth were stabilized with bamboo splints. gold was sometimes used to cover teeth, but the break up was decorative rather than protective. Surgery Although surgery was not one of the five methods of treatment listed in the Nei Ching, the natural language was known and used.Hua To, one of the few names mentioned in connection with surgery, treated an arm wound of the known general Kuan Yu by cutting his flesh and scribble the bone. Physicians knew how to deal with wounds, and at least two classics were employ entirely to their treatment. The proper attitude toward pain was to pay it without a sign of emotion, and much was made of the nimbleness of the general treated by Hua To he played chess while the surgeon operated. Nevertheless, apparently some kind of anesthesia was often used.Wine and drugs like hyoscyamus were probably mainstays, but the use of opium and Indian hemp is still in question. Eunuchs and Footbinding Another operative procedure, though har dly therapeutic, was the frequent castration of certain males seeking advancement at appeal. Though in the first place a severe punishment, the total removal of penis and testicles came to be a pledge of absolute committedness to the monarch, since it released the eunuch from conflict with Confucian admonitions of first obedience to family and the obligation of siring a son for posterity.Footbinding is also of medical interest, for it caused the development of artificially clubbed feet. Over a head of one thousand years, every young little girl of proper family willingly permitted herself to be crippled by her mother and aunts to achieve the tiny foot of warning feminine beauty. Her toes were gradually folded under the sole, and by more and more tight bandaging her heelbone and forefoot were brought closer together. Without thriving Lotuses, as the best-shaped bound feet were called, a girl was unmarriageable, nor was the life of a courtesan open to her, for tiny feet were a womans most desirable feature.For a man, a bound-foot wife had profound sexual significance, but she was also a status symbol inasmuch as her helplessness indicated that he was wealthy enough to support a woman, or women, in idleness. There was also an advantage to him in her re unyieldinged mobility, for it kept her home and made illegitimate amorous adventures difficult. Although Chinas Manchu conquerors forbade the practice in the nineteenth century, it was not until the early twentieth that footbinding was completely abandoned. Diseases Some epiphytotic diseases were understood well enough to allow the development of protective measures.In the eleventh century, inoculation against smallpox was constituted by putting scabs from smallpox pustules into the nostrils, a method which may have come from India. Wearing the clothes of someone who had the disease was another remembers of prevention. The blood of cowpox (as a protective) to smallpox may have been perceived, sinc e ingesting powdered fleas from infected cows was also recommended to equip off smallpox. But other devastating pestilences were neither understood nor held in check. During the Han dynasty an epidemic of what appears to have been typhoid fever fever killed two-thirds of the population of one region.Precise descriptions of leprosy in the Nei Ching and later works attest to the diagnostic accuracy of the early Chinese healers, but their explanation of the diseases causes and their treatment follow preconceived notions of the time. The wind and chills lodge in the blood vessels and cannot be got rid of. This is called li-feng. For the treatment prick the narcissistic parts with a sharp needle to let the foul air out. Fourteenth-century writings referred to chaulmoogra oil, a pressing from seeds of an East Indian tree, as a specific for leprosy, and this oil remained the principal antileprous drug even in the West until recent decades.An illness that may have been tuberculosis was recognized as communicable Generally the disease gives rise to high fever, sweating, asthenia, unlocalized persistence making all positions difficult and slowly bringing about consumption and death, after which the disease is convey to the relations until the whole family has been wiped out. Venereal diseases, although not well differentiated, received a variety of therapies, including the use of metal(prenominal) substances for internal medication.In the Secret Therapy for the Treatment of Venereal Disease, the seventeenth-century physician Chun Szi-sung reported using arsenic, which, until the development of penicillin, was the modern medication for venereal disease, in the form of Salvarsan and derivatives synthesized by capital of Minnesota Ehrlich. There seem always to have been places in China where the sick poor could go for medical care. With the advance of Buddhism in the Han and Tang dynasties, in-patient hospitals staffed by physician-priests became common.However, i n the ordinal century, when anti-Buddhists were in control, hospitals as well as 4,600 temples were sunk or emptied. Nevertheless, by the twelfth century hospitals had again become so numerous that virtually every district had at least one tax-supported institution. The speed classes preferred to be treated and cared for in their homes, thus leaving public hospitals to the poor and lower classes. The Practitioners In the Institutions of Chou, compiled hundreds of years before Christ, the hierarchy of physicians in the kingdom was delineated.The five categories were chief physician (who collected drugs, examined other physicians, and assigned them) food physicians (who prescribed six kinds of food and drink) physicians for simple diseases (such as headaches, colds, minor wounds) ulcer physicians (who may have been the surgeons) and physicians for animals (evidently veterinarians). Physicians were also rated according to their results, and as early as the Chou and Tang dynasties e ach doctor had to report both successes and failuresto control his movement up or down in the ranks.In the seventh century A. D. examinations were requisite for one to qualify as a physician, some four centuries earlier than the first licensing system in the West. Medical knowledge was thought of as a secret power that belonged to each practitioner. Whereas in other societies, both advanced and primitive, closely knit guilds might control the spread of medical lore, the Chinese physician kept his secrets to himselfpassing them on only to sons or, sometimes, specially selected qualifiers.In early times, a physician gave his services out of philanthropy, for since the original healers were rulers, sages, nobles, and, perhaps, priests, economic and social incentives were absent. Later, direct fees or salaries were instituted, and the court and certain prosperous households kept physicians on retainer. Formal schools may have existed as early as the tenth century, and in the eleventh c entury an organization for medical education was set up under imperial auspices. Under the Ming dynasty in the 14th century, the school system became fixed. It changed little over the adjoining centuries, xcept for a gradual decline, and by 1800 there was only one medical school left in Peking. Teachers were held strictly accountable for the performance of their students, and fines were imposed if the prof failed to enforce attendance or if his pupils did poorly on exams. The examination system was complex a pyramidical structure provided a process of elimination which move until those with the highest scores emerged. The top students could be heart doctors, the attached level were assistant examiners, and lower scores could mean limited assignment in teaching.Specialization may have occurred early. While physicians and apothecaries were separate for a long time, they were both regarded as healers. In the Chou dynasty there were nine specialties, and they grew to thirteen by th e Mongol period, early in the fourteenth century. The subdivisions became even more complex, with doctors for the great blood vessels, small vessels, fevers, smallpox, eyes, skin, bones, larynx, and mouth and teeth. There were also gynecologists, pediatricians, and pulsologists for internal diseases, external medicine, the nose and throat, and for childrens illnesses.Some healers specialized in moxibustion, acupuncture, or massage. Even the experts in incantation and dietetics were considered medical specialists and were often held in higher regard than other doctors surgeons were in the main of low rank. Furthermore, each of the practitioners in each form had assistants and studentsall of whom had to qualify by examination. Obstetrics was in the hands of midwives for many centuries it is not known when the first women doctors were in practice. One female physician is mentioned by name in documents from the Han dynasty (206 B.C. -A. D. 220), but women may have been doctors at an e arlier date. By the fourteenth century women were officially recognized as physicians. Throughout the Ming dynasty (1368-1644), the practicing medical theorists could be divided into six main philosophical schools. The Yin-yang group focused on insufficiencies of one of these forces. The Wen-pou doctors attributed illnesses to a preponderance of yang and frequently prescribed ginseng and aconite. The composition group used drastic medication.The Conservatives relied entirely on the authorities of the past, reedited the classic works, and made no deviations from strict authoritarianism. The Eclectic physicians, as their name implies, used a variety of principles from the other sects. The sixth school base all therapy on bringing the five elements and six vapors into harmony. Spread of Chinese Medicine to Korea, Japan, And Tibet Ancient Chinese medicine was well-developed long before the initiation of the Christian era, and its influence appears to have spread into bordering Korea by the sixth century A.D. At that time, after a severe epidemic had ravaged Japan, Korean doctors who were invited to counsel Japanese physicians introduced them to Chinese medical classics and commentaries. By the seventh century, Japanese scholars and doctors were going directly to China for their information and experience. In the eighth century, a Chinese Buddhist monk named Chien Chen came to Japan and achieved a prominent position in the imperial court at Nara, where, given the Japanese name Kanjin, he taught, practiced medicine, and translated Chinese materia medica.Late in that century, Chinese medicine was well-established in Japan, and a medical school based on its methodology was founded by the Japanese physician Wake Hiroya. Early in the next century (80610), the Emperor Heijo vainly attempted to combat inappropriate influence and restore traditional Japanese medical practice, but the methods of Chinese healing were too severely entrenched. In the tenth century, acupu ncture reached Japan, followed by moxibusti on (the word moxa is Japanese), and the full complement of Chinese medicine was accepted in Japan.With medical training closely based on Chinese systems, the Japanese exacted exceptionally intensive and prolonged study before permitting debut into the profession by governmental examination. As in ancient China, high social standing was a requirement for admission to medical school, but separate instruction by assigned teachers was apparently also arranged to accommodate the more lowly. The authority of Chinese medicine, not to mention Chinese culture and philosophy, move east as well as westbound by the seventh and eighth centuries.However, Arabic and Indian missionaries of Islam and Buddhism made influence a two-way replace as they traveled to China seeking converts. Since their missions necessitated the rendition of Sanskrit and Arabic writings into Chinese and vice versa, medical knowledge inevitably was passed back and forth. Cons equently, the crossroads areas of Southeast Asia and Tibet developed a medical system corporate trust aspects of Chinese, Indian, and Arabic practice. Arabic influence, which stemmed in part from Greek teachings, was evident in the doctrine of four humors (phlegm, blood, bile, and wind), whereas Indian deas were seen in the Yogic placement of the soul in the core of the spinal column and credit on breathing exercises. Traveling Buddhist priests, who were quite successful in spreading their faith, for a long time also practiced medicine. During this early period, the two wives (one Chinese) of a Tibetan king converted him to Buddhism, and thenceforth scholars were invited to bring Chinese writings into Tibet, which resulted in collections in Tibetan called Kanjur and Tanjur, the latter containing medical information.In the thirteenth century, the Mongol conqueror Kublai Khan wanted this body of knowledge available again in Chinese but was unable to carry through the translation. Ne vertheless, his grandson in the next century arranged for scholars from Tibet, Mongolia, and Central Asia to accomplish the task. Ironically, while the Mongols were in control they allied themselves with non-Chinese such as Uighars, Jews, Christians, and Moslems, and they preferred Arabic medicine to Chinese.Essay of Ancient ChinaAncient China In ancient Chinese cosmology, the universe was created not by divinities but self-generated from the interplay of natures basic duality the active, light, dry, warm, positive, masculine yang and the passive, dark, cold, moist, negative yin. All things, animate and inanimate, and all circumstances were a combination of these fundamentals. The ultimate principle of the universe was the tao, the way, and it determined the proper proportions of yin and yang in everything. Anything that altered the natural relation of yin to yang was considered bad, and right living consisted of carefully following the tao.If one observed the tao by moderation, equ animity, and morality, as taught in the Tao-te Ching, by Lao-tzu (sixth century B. C. ), one would be impervious to disease and resistant to the ravages of aging disregard of the tao led to illness, which was not so much a punishment for sin as the inevitable result of acting contrary to natural laws. However, illness also could be caused by forces beyond ones control Wind is the cause of a hundred diseases, and atmospheric conditions could upset the harmonious inner balance of the yang and yin.One had to be alert to this possibility and combat its effects as well as modify internal imbalances of the vital forces. Longevity and health were the rewards. Chinese medicine, in league with Taoism, was focused on the prevention of illness for, as the legendary Huang Ti, father of Chinese medicine, observed, the superior physician helps before the early budding of disease. Although Taoist hygiene called for temperance and simplicity in most things, sexual mores were governed by the yin-ya ng aspect of Chinese philosophy.Ejaculation in intercourse led to diminution of a mans yang, which, of course, upset the inner balance of his nature. On the other hand, one was strengthened by absorption of the yin released by the orgasm of ones female partnerunless she was over thirty, the point where female essence lost its efficacy. The tao was important in Confucianism also, as the path of virtuous conduct, and for centuries the precepts of Confucius (Kung Fu-tzu, 550-479 B. C. ) set the most prevalent standards of behavior. In early Chinese philosophy, there was a tendency to accept and combine aspects of all religions and to make way for new ideas.Nevertheless, the ancient Chinese were profoundly conservative once an institution, custom, philosophy, mode of dress, or even a furniture style was firmly established, and it remained relatively unchanged over centuries. As Confucius said Gather in the same places where our fathers before us have gathered perform the same ceremonies which they before us have performed play the same music which they before us have played pay respect to those whom they honored love those who were dear to them. Although ancient Chinas development was relatively isolated, there was early contact with India and Tibet.Buddhism came to China from India, and medical concepts and practices were an important part of its teachings. The gymnastic and breathing exercises in Chinese medical methodology also came from India and were closely related to the principles of Yoga and to aspects of Ayurvedic medicine. There were also contacts with Southeast Asia, Persia, and the Arabic world. In the second century B. C. , the Chinese ambassador Chang Chien spent more than a decade in Mesopotamia, Syria, and Egypt, bringing back information on drugs, viticulture, and other subjects.Over the centuries, knowledge of humoral medicine and of numerous new medicaments filtered into China. The introduction of the wisdom of the Mediterranean world was grea tly facilitated in the fifth century by the expulsion and wide dispersion from Constantinople of the heretical Nestorian Christians. The mother of Kublai Khan (1216-94), founder of the Mongol dynasty, was a Nestorian and asked the Pope to send European doctors to China. Early Medical Writings Classical Chinese medicine was based primarily on works ascribed to three legendary emperors. The most ancient was Fu Hsi (c. 2900 B. C. , who was said to have originated the pa kua, a symbol composed of yang lines and yin lines combined in eight (pa) separate trigrams (kua) which could represent all yin-yang conditions. This system is followed even today in the I Ching (Book of Changes), though as a game or superstition in the West. Shen Nung, the Red Emperor (Hung Ti), compiled the first medical herbal, the Pen-tsao (c. 2800 B. C. ), in which he reported the effects of 365 drugs, all of them personally tested. One legend explains that a magic drug made his abdominal skin transparent, so he co uld observe the action of the many plants he evaluated.Another story tells that he cut open his abdomen and stitched in a window. Shen Nung is also said to have drawn up the first charts on acupuncture, a medical procedure presumably even older than the legendary emperors. The fame of Yu Hsiung (c. 2600 B. C. ), the Yellow Emperor (Huang Ti), rests on his great medical compendium, the Nei Ching (Canon of Medicine). Transmitted orally for many centuries, this seminal work was possibly committed to writing by the third century B. C. Its present form dates from the eighth century A. D. when the last extensive revision was done by Wang Ping. The major portion of the Nei Ching, the Sun-Wen (Simple Questions), records the discourse of the Yellow Emperor with Chi Po, his prime minister, on virtually all phases of health and illness, including prevention and treatment. The section called Ling-Hsu (Spiritual Nucleus), deals entirely with acupuncture. Yu Hsiung also was said to be responsible for another great compendium, The Discourses of the Yellow Emperor and the Plain Girl, which thoroughly covered the subject of sex from the Taoist point of view.Among other notable sources for ancient medical lore, one might mention the Shih Ching (Book of Odes), which perhaps predates Homers epics, and the Lun-yu, discourses of Confucius probably written down shortly after his death, which affected patterns of behavior for many generations. During the long Chou dynasty (c. 1050-255 B. C. ), a lengthy compilation of medical works, Institutions of Chou, was completed and became the criterion for subsequent dynasties on the duties and organization of physicians. In the Han dynasty (206 B. C. -A. D. 20), there was a noted clinical author named Tsang Kung, who pioneered in the description of many diseases, including cancer of the stomach, aneurysm, and rheumatism. Chang Chung-ching, the Chinese Hippocrates, in the third century A. D. , wrote the classic treatise Typhoid and Other Fever s. Ko Hung, a famed alchemist and a careful observer, wrote treatises describing beriberi (a vitamin B deficiency), hepatitis, and plague, and gave one of the earliest reports on smallpox As the New Year approached there was a seasonal affection in which pustules appeared on the face and spread rapidly all over the body.They looked like burns covered with white starch and reformed as soon as they were broken. The majority died if not treated. After recovery purplish black scars remained. Sun Szu-miao (A. D. 581-682) wrote Chien Chin Yao Fang (A Thousand Golden Remedies), which summarized in thirty volumes much of the known medical learning, and he headed a committee which produced a fifty-volume collection on pathology. An extensive codification of forensic medicine, Hsi Yuan Lu, was done in the Sung dynasty and became the prime source for knowledge of medical jurisprudence.Anatomy and Physiology Ideas of anatomy in ancient China were reached by reasoning and. by assumption rather than dissection or direct observation. Since the doctrines of Confucius forbade violation of the body, it was not until the eighteenth century, long after Vesalius, that the Chinese began systematic, direct anatomical studies. Even as late as the nineteenth century, in the Viceroys Hospital Medical School, anatomy was taught by diagrams and artificial models rather than dissection.Physiological functions were constructed into a humoral system much like Greek concepts of the sixth century B. C. and Galenic views of the second century A. D. , except that there were five instead of four essential humors. (The number five had mystical value for the Chinese and was used for most classifications five elements, five tastes, five qualities, five kinds of drugs, five treatments, five solid organs, five seasons, five emotions, five colors, etc. ) The medical compendium Nei Ching stated that each emotion had its seat in a particular organ.Happiness dwelt in the heart, thought in the spleen, so rrow in the lungs, and the liver housed anger as well as the soul. Ideas in the Nei Ching concerning movement of the blood (All the blood is under control of the heart. The blood current flows continuously in a circle and never stops. ) have been thought to approach an understanding of its circulation antedating Harvey by thousands of years however, some body vessels were believed to convey air, and there is little evidence that commentators perceived the blood-carrying vessels as a contained system. DiagnosisThe Chinese methods of diagnosis included questioning, feeling the pulse, observing the voice and body, and in some circumstances touching the affected parts. In almost all times and cultures physicians have used a similar approach, for all healers have sought to know as much as possible about a patient in order to understand his or her illness and advise treatment. However, in some respects ancient physicians saw each patient more completely as a reflection of his surrounding s (indeed, the entire universe) than does the doctor of today. The Chinese doctor wanted to learn ow the patient had violated the tao, and to do this he took into account the patients rank changes in his or her social status, household, economic position, sense of well-being, or appetite the weather and the dreams of the patient and his or her family. Perhaps the most important diagnostic technique of the ancient Chinese was examination of the pulse. The physician felt the right wrist and then the left. He compared the beats with his own, noting precise time as well as day and season since each hour affected the nature of the pulsations.Each pulse had three distinct divisions, each associated with a specific organ, and each division had a separate quality, of which there were dozens of varieties. Moreover, each division or zone of the pulse had a superficial and deep projection. Thus literally hundreds of possible characteristics were obtainable. In one treatise, Muo-Ching, ten volu mes were necessary to cover all the intricacies of the pulse. A patient had only to extend his or her arm through drawn bed curtains for the physician to determine the symptoms, diagnosis, prognosis, and proper treatment by intensive palpation of the pulse.Whenever possible the examiner also felt the skin of the ill person. However, it was considered bad form for a man to intimately examine a woman, so special ceramic, ivory, and wooden dolls were pointed to by the invalid to indicate where discomfort was felt. Treatment According to the Nei Ching, there were five methods of treatment cure the spirit, nourish the body, give medications, treat the whole body, and use acupuncture and moxibustion. The physician had to put the patient back on the right path, the tao.Assuming that specific mental states caused changes in specific organs, the healer linked certain objectionable behavioral and constitutional factors with illness and attempted to have the patient rectify these. For instance , dissolute and licentious ideas led to diseases of the lungs, but acting out such thoughts brought on heart trouble. A doctor had to determine the cause of disharmony in the body and act accordingly. Exercises were developed to keep the body fit and to restore well-being. Hua To, the great surgeon, worked out an ingenious system of physical therapy by advising mimicry of the natural movements of animals.Massagekneading, tapping, pinching, and chafingwas also a regular method of treatment, as were the application of plasters and evacuation of the intestinal tract by cathartics. In nourishing a patients body, the physician resorted to complex combinations of foods according to their potential amounts of yang and yin. Foods also had to fit the seasons, and each of the five tastes had benefits for a particular element of the body sour for the bones, pungent for the tendons, salty for the blood, bitter for respiration, and sweet for muscle.Medications The Chinese pharmacopoeia was alway s rich, from the time of the Pen-tsao, the first medical herbal, to the later dynasties when two thousand items and sixteen thousand prescriptions made up the armamentarium. Drugs were considered more likely to be good if they tasted bad. As one would expect, they were classified into five categories herbs, trees, insects, stones, and grains. The therapeutic minerals and metals included compounds of mercury (calomel was employed for venereal diseases), arsenic, and magnetic stones.Animal-derived remedies, in addition to dragon teeth (powdered fossilized bones), included virtually anything obtainable from living creatures whole parts, segments of organs, urine, dung. Two plant substances especially associated with China may be singled out. One is ephedra (ma huang), the horsetail plant described by the Red Emperor, which was used for thousands of years as a stimulant, as a remedy for respiratory -diseases, to induce fevers and perspiration, and to depress coughs.Ephedra entered the G reek pharmacopoeia and eventually was disseminated throughout most of the world. It only became a factor in Western medicine in the late nineteenth century after Japanese investigators isolated and purified the active principle, ephedrine, and established its pharmacologic action. A second medicinal herb, always highly popular among the Chinese, is ginseng (man-shaped root). To the Chinese, preparations containing ginseng were almost miraculous in delaying old age, restoring sexual powers, stimulating the debilitated, and sedating the overwrought.In addition it improved diabetes and stabilized blood pressure. In recent years this root has been under scrutiny by Western pharmacologists attempting to evaluate its true benefits. Multitudes in Asia, and even some Westerners, are so convinced of its effectiveness that high-grade wild roots have brought fabulous prices (even reaching thousands of dollars apiece). Although many items in the Chinese materia medica have either faded into bsc urity or been labeled fanciful, others subsequently have been found to possess sound pharmacologic bases seaweed, which contains iodine, was used in treating enlargement of the thyroid the willow plant, containing salicylic acid, was a remedy for rheumatism the Siberian wort has antispasmodics for menstrual discomfort and mulberry flowers contain rutin, a treatment for elevated blood pressure. Whether opium was used as a drug before quite late in Chinese history is still in dispute. Acupuncture and Moxibustion These modalities have been an integral part of Chinese medical therapy for thousands of years.The Yellow Emperor is said to have invented them, but they may well have existed long before his time. The aim of these treatments was to drain off excess yang or yin and thus establish a proper balance, but external energy also could be introduced into the body. In acupuncture the skin is pierced by long needles to varying prescribed depths. Needles are inserted into any of 365 point s along the twelve meridians that traverse the body and transmit an active life force called chi. Each of these points is related to a particular organ.For instance, puncture of a certain spot on the ear lobe might be the proper way to treat an abdominal ailment. Virtually every illness, weakness, and symptom is thought to be amenable to correction by acupuncture. Acupuncture spread to Korea and Japan by the end of the tenth century A. D. , to Europe about the seventeenth century, and recent years have seen a wider interest in this Chinese medical practice in the West. Individual paramedical healers and even some medical practitioners have been swamped with requests for acupuncture, especially for problems apparently little benefited by conventional practices.The eventual acceptability of this practice in standard Western medicine remains to be seen. Moxibustion is as old as acupuncture, and the same meridians and points govern placement of the moxa. However, in this treatment a pow dered plant substance, usually mugwort, is fashioned into a small mound on the patients skin and burned, usually raising a blister. Dentistry The treatment of tooth disorders was confined mainly to applying or ingesting drugspomegranate, aconite, ginseng, garlic, rhubarb, and arsenic, as well as animal products such as dung and urine.The Nei Ching classified nine types of toothaches, which included some obviously due to infections and tooth decay. Like the Mesopotamians and Egyptians, the ancient Chinese believed that worms were often responsible for dental problems. Toothpicks and tooth whiteners were used, and loose teeth were stabilized with bamboo splints. Gold was sometimes used to cover teeth, but the purpose was decorative rather than protective. Surgery Although surgery was not one of the five methods of treatment listed in the Nei Ching, the knife was known and used.Hua To, one of the few names mentioned in connection with surgery, treated an arm wound of the famous general Kuan Yu by cutting his flesh and scraping the bone. Physicians knew how to deal with wounds, and at least two classics were devoted entirely to their treatment. The proper attitude toward pain was to bear it without a sign of emotion, and much was made of the insouciance of the general treated by Hua To he played chess while the surgeon operated. Nevertheless, apparently some kind of anesthesia was often used.Wine and drugs like hyoscyamus were probably mainstays, but the use of opium and Indian hemp is still in question. Eunuchs and Footbinding Another surgical procedure, though hardly therapeutic, was the frequent castration of certain males seeking advancement at court. Though originally a severe punishment, the total removal of penis and testicles came to be a pledge of absolute allegiance to the monarch, since it released the eunuch from conflict with Confucian admonitions of first loyalty to family and the obligation of siring a son for posterity.Footbinding is also of medica l interest, for it caused the development of artificially clubbed feet. Over a period of one thousand years, every young girl of proper family willingly permitted herself to be crippled by her mother and aunts to achieve the tiny foot of ideal feminine beauty. Her toes were gradually folded under the sole, and by increasingly tight bandaging her heelbone and forefoot were brought closer together. Without Golden Lotuses, as the best-shaped bound feet were called, a girl was unmarriageable, nor was the life of a courtesan open to her, for tiny feet were a womans most desirable feature.For a man, a bound-foot wife had profound sexual significance, but she was also a status symbol inasmuch as her helplessness indicated that he was wealthy enough to support a woman, or women, in idleness. There was also an advantage to him in her restricted mobility, for it kept her home and made illicit amorous adventures difficult. Although Chinas Manchu conquerors forbade the practice in the nineteent h century, it was not until the early twentieth that footbinding was completely abandoned. Diseases Some epidemic diseases were understood well enough to allow the development of protective measures.In the eleventh century, inoculation against smallpox was effected by putting scabs from smallpox pustules into the nostrils, a method which may have come from India. Wearing the clothing of someone who had the disease was another means of prevention. The relationship of cowpox (as a protective) to smallpox may have been perceived, since ingesting powdered fleas from infected cows was also recommended to stave off smallpox. But other devastating pestilences were neither understood nor held in check. During the Han dynasty an epidemic of what appears to have been typhoid fever killed two-thirds of the population of one region.Precise descriptions of leprosy in the Nei Ching and later works attest to the diagnostic accuracy of the early Chinese healers, but their explanation of the disease s causes and their treatment follow preconceived notions of the time. The wind and chills lodge in the blood vessels and cannot be got rid of. This is called li-feng. For the treatment prick the swollen parts with a sharp needle to let the foul air out. Fourteenth-century writings referred to chaulmoogra oil, a pressing from seeds of an East Indian tree, as a specific for leprosy, and this oil remained the principal antileprous drug even in the West until recent decades.An illness that may have been tuberculosis was recognized as contagious Generally the disease gives rise to high fever, sweating, asthenia, unlocalized pains making all positions difficult and slowly bringing about consumption and death, after which the disease is transmitted to the relations until the whole family has been wiped out. Venereal diseases, although not well differentiated, received a variety of therapies, including the use of metallic substances for internal medication.In the Secret Therapy for the Tr eatment of Venereal Disease, the seventeenth-century physician Chun Szi-sung reported using arsenic, which, until the development of penicillin, was the modern medication for venereal disease, in the form of Salvarsan and derivatives synthesized by Paul Ehrlich. There seem always to have been places in China where the sick poor could go for medical care. With the advance of Buddhism in the Han and Tang dynasties, in-patient hospitals staffed by physician-priests became common.However, in the ninth century, when anti-Buddhists were in control, hospitals as well as 4,600 temples were destroyed or emptied. Nevertheless, by the twelfth century hospitals had again become so numerous that virtually every district had at least one tax-supported institution. The upper classes preferred to be treated and cared for in their homes, thus leaving public hospitals to the poor and lower classes. The Practitioners In the Institutions of Chou, compiled hundreds of years before Christ, the hierarchy of physicians in the kingdom was delineated.The five categories were chief physician (who collected drugs, examined other physicians, and assigned them) food physicians (who prescribed six kinds of food and drink) physicians for simple diseases (such as headaches, colds, minor wounds) ulcer physicians (who may have been the surgeons) and physicians for animals (evidently veterinarians). Physicians were also rated according to their results, and as early as the Chou and Tang dynasties each doctor had to report both successes and failuresto control his movement up or down in the ranks.In the seventh century A. D. examinations were required for one to qualify as a physician, some four centuries earlier than the first licensing system in the West. Medical knowledge was thought of as a secret power that belonged to each practitioner. Whereas in other societies, both advanced and primitive, closely knit guilds might control the spread of medical lore, the Chinese physician kept his secret s to himselfpassing them on only to sons or, sometimes, specially selected qualifiers.In early times, a physician gave his services out of philanthropy, for since the original healers were rulers, sages, nobles, and, perhaps, priests, economic and social incentives were absent. Later, direct fees or salaries were instituted, and the court and certain prosperous households kept physicians on retainer. Formal schools may have existed as early as the tenth century, and in the eleventh century an organization for medical education was set up under imperial auspices. Under the Ming dynasty in the fourteenth century, the school system became fixed. It changed little over the next centuries, xcept for a gradual decline, and by 1800 there was only one medical school left in Peking. Teachers were held strictly accountable for the performance of their students, and fines were imposed if the professor failed to enforce attendance or if his pupils did poorly on exams. The examination system was complex a pyramidal structure provided a process of elimination which continued until those with the highest scores emerged. The top students could be heart doctors, the next level were assistant examiners, and lower scores could mean limited assignment in teaching.Specialization may have occurred early. While physicians and apothecaries were separate for a long time, they were both regarded as healers. In the Chou dynasty there were nine specialties, and they grew to thirteen by the Mongol period, early in the fourteenth century. The subdivisions became even more complex, with doctors for the great blood vessels, small vessels, fevers, smallpox, eyes, skin, bones, larynx, and mouth and teeth. There were also gynecologists, pediatricians, and pulsologists for internal diseases, external medicine, the nose and throat, and for childrens illnesses.Some healers specialized in moxibustion, acupuncture, or massage. Even the experts in incantation and dietetics were considered medical spe cialists and were often held in higher regard than other doctors surgeons were generally of low rank. Furthermore, each of the practitioners in each category had assistants and studentsall of whom had to qualify by examination. Obstetrics was in the hands of midwives for many centuries it is not known when the first women doctors were in practice. One female physician is mentioned by name in documents from the Han dynasty (206 B.C. -A. D. 220), but women may have been doctors at an earlier date. By the fourteenth century women were officially recognized as physicians. Throughout the Ming dynasty (1368-1644), the practicing medical theorists could be divided into six main philosophic schools. The Yin-yang group focused on insufficiencies of one of these forces. The Wen-pou doctors attributed illnesses to a preponderance of yang and frequently prescribed ginseng and aconite. The Radical group used drastic medication.The Conservatives relied entirely on the authorities of the past, ree dited the classic works, and made no deviations from strict authoritarianism. The Eclectic physicians, as their name implies, used a variety of principles from the other sects. The sixth school based all therapy on bringing the five elements and six vapors into harmony. Spread of Chinese Medicine to Korea, Japan, And Tibet Ancient Chinese medicine was well-developed long before the beginning of the Christian era, and its influence appears to have spread into adjacent Korea by the sixth century A.D. At that time, after a severe epidemic had ravaged Japan, Korean doctors who were invited to counsel Japanese physicians introduced them to Chinese medical classics and commentaries. By the seventh century, Japanese scholars and doctors were going directly to China for their information and experience. In the eighth century, a Chinese Buddhist monk named Chien Chen came to Japan and achieved a prominent position in the imperial court at Nara, where, given the Japanese name Kanjin, he taugh t, practiced medicine, and translated Chinese materia medica.Late in that century, Chinese medicine was well-established in Japan, and a medical school based on its methodology was founded by the Japanese physician Wake Hiroya. Early in the next century (80610), the Emperor Heijo vainly attempted to combat foreign influence and restore traditional Japanese medical practice, but the methods of Chinese healing were too firmly entrenched. In the tenth century, acupuncture reached Japan, followed by moxibusti on (the word moxa is Japanese), and the full complement of Chinese medicine was accepted in Japan.With medical training closely based on Chinese systems, the Japanese exacted exceptionally intensive and prolonged study before permitting entrance into the profession by governmental examination. As in ancient China, high social standing was a requirement for admission to medical school, but separate instruction by assigned teachers was apparently also arranged to accommodate the more lowly. The authority of Chinese medicine, not to mention Chinese culture and philosophy, moved east as well as west by the seventh and eighth centuries.However, Arabic and Indian missionaries of Islam and Buddhism made influence a two-way exchange as they traveled to China seeking converts. Since their missions necessitated the translation of Sanskrit and Arabic writings into Chinese and vice versa, medical knowledge inevitably was passed back and forth. Consequently, the crossroads areas of Southeast Asia and Tibet developed a medical system combining aspects of Chinese, Indian, and Arabic practice. Arabic influence, which stemmed in part from Greek teachings, was evident in the doctrine of four humors (phlegm, blood, bile, and wind), whereas Indian deas were seen in the Yogic placement of the soul in the core of the spinal column and reliance on breathing exercises. Traveling Buddhist priests, who were quite successful in spreading their faith, for a long time also practiced medi cine. During this early period, the two wives (one Chinese) of a Tibetan king converted him to Buddhism, and thereafter scholars were invited to bring Chinese writings into Tibet, which resulted in collections in Tibetan called Kanjur and Tanjur, the latter containing medical information.In the thirteenth century, the Mongol conqueror Kublai Khan wanted this body of knowledge available again in Chinese but was unable to carry through the translation. Nevertheless, his grandson in the next century arranged for scholars from Tibet, Mongolia, and Central Asia to accomplish the task. Ironically, while the Mongols were in control they allied themselves with non-Chinese such as Uighars, Jews, Christians, and Moslems, and they preferred Arabic medicine to Chinese.