Kapronczay Károly szerk.: Orvostörténeti Közlemények 194-195. (Budapest, 2006)

TANULMÁNYOK — ARTICLES - ELEK, Gábor - MÜLLER, Miklós: Ervin Bauer as pathologist

Bauer's general views are still with us today, even if they do not come from his publications but appeared independently from his work. Let us quote another great theoretical biologist, whose life and work did not have the tragic fate of Bauer's and his work, von Bertalanffy (1933): „Such notions as adaptation, purpose, regulation, activity, autonomy, compesation, pathology, etc really give to the organisms a special place in contrast to the inorganic world...Organisms ... force this point of view upon us". " (1966, 9). „Such concepts as disease, norm, disturbance, etc are only significant in reference to the maintenance of an organism, pathology also belongs to the sphere of organismic branches of biology, but il is logically a complex discipline, since simple description and physiology have an important place in it. " (1966, 33-34). A cknowledgements We thank the granddaughter of Ervin Bauer, Dr. Svetlana Bauer (St.-Petersburg) for permission to reproduce the portrait of Bauer and for her unfailing help in our exploration of Bauer's life. We also thank Prof. Béla Szende for his interest and comments, Dr. Larisa Shumeiko for information on Bauer's studies in Göttingen, Mr. László Molnár, Mrs. Elek Kovács and Mrs. Béla Házkötő for their help in locating documents in the Semmelweis University Archives, and Ms. Hédi Erdős, Ms. Kata Csankovszky and Mrs.Angela Larkin for unfailing help in procuring material through interlibrary loans. The courtesy of the Manuscript Divisons of the National Széchényi Library and the Hungarian Academy of Sciences in making their holdings available for this research is also greatfully acknowledged. GÁBOR ELEK, MD, DSc Semmelweis University Kútvölgyi Hospital Medical Center Department of Pathology H-1125 Budapest Kútvölgyi út 4 HUNGARY MIKLÓS MÜLLER, MD, Prof.Em. Rockefeller University, New York New York, NY 10021 USA