Roelcke V
Medizinhistorisches Institut der Universität Bonn.
Sudhoffs Arch. 1996;80(1):56-67.
Johann Christian Reil is usually portrayed as a pioneer in the realm of neuroanatomy and psychiatry, and as a pragmatic physician engaged in contemporary problems of social medicine and hygiene. In this article, the connection between these two fields of interest is focused: Reil's ideas on the relation between the "modern" way of life and the occurrence of diseases of the nervous system. The first part of the paper summarizes Reil's statements on the issue, as laid out e.g. in his "Ueber die Erkenntnis und Cur der Fieber" (1802), and in the "Rhapsodieen über die Anwendung der psychischen Curmethode auf Geisteszerrüttungen" (1803). The second part gives an outline of Reil's neurophysiological model of the interaction between the organ of the soul ("Seelenorgan") and the social environment. In the third part, Reil's conceptions of culture, civilisation, and history are investigated. For Reil, madness is not an alienation from reason, but from a postulated healthy state of nature which is located in the past. Modern life causes and steadily increases a contradiction between the needs of the body and those of the soul, resulting in a concomitant tension and irritability of the nerves. Modern culture is thus criticized for its potentially harmful effects on mental health. The balance between physical and mental activities, and the constitution of a decentralized state would be means to prevent the manifestation of the ensuing diseases.
约翰·克里斯蒂安·里尔通常被描绘为神经解剖学和精神病学领域的先驱，以及一位致力于解决当代社会医学和卫生问题的务实医生。在本文中，重点关注这两个感兴趣领域之间的联系：里尔关于“现代”生活方式与神经系统疾病发生之间关系的观点。论文的第一部分总结了里尔在该问题上的论述，例如在他的《论发热的认识与治疗》（1802年）以及《关于精神治疗方法在精神错乱上的应用的狂想曲》（1803年）中所阐述的内容。第二部分概述了里尔关于灵魂器官（“Seelenorgan”）与社会环境相互作用的神经生理模型。第三部分研究了里尔的文化、文明和历史观念。对里尔来说，疯狂并非与理性的疏离，而是与一种假定的、存在于过去的自然健康状态的疏离。现代生活引发并不断加剧身体需求与灵魂需求之间的矛盾，导致随之而来的神经紧张和易怒。因此，现代文化因其对心理健康的潜在有害影响而受到批评。身心活动之间的平衡以及去中心化状态的构建将是预防随之而来疾病表现的手段。
