Добірка наукової літератури з теми "Goetheanum (Dornach, Switzerland)"

When the New Age philosopher Dr Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925) arrived at the Dornach hill, a short tram ride from Basel, Switzerland, it offered virtually a tabula rasa for his creative genius. Over the next little more than a decade (beginning 1913), Steiner populated this landscape with a multitude of new buildings in his unique organic architecture style. Having settled on Dornach as the site for his Anthroposophy headquarters with its centrepiece structure, the Goetheanum (the name came later), a colony of adherents, devotees, seekers, disciples, artists and artisans were drawn to Dornach. The integrity of the precinct has been maintained for a century and a visitor treading the hill will be in the footsteps of Rudolf Steiner and seeing his Anthropop colony much as he witnessed it in his own time. The buildings of the precinct range from the grand (the Goetheanum), the bold (Haus Duldeck), the curvaceous (the Glass House), the quaint (Haus Vreede), the ugly (Haus de Jaager), the utilitarian (the Schrenerei), the basic (the Atelier), the fanciful (Transformatorenhaus), the phallic (Heizhaus), and the monastic (Eurythmiehaus). Many tastes (and budgets) were catered for as Rudolf Steiner explored and invented his organic architectural style. Nearly a century after his death there are now more than 180 Anthropop buildings within the greater Goetheanum precinct, including the nearby villages of Dornach and Arlesheim. The present paper presents 21 views of the greater Goetheanum precinct. The building start dates are specified. Many of the buildings were designed by Rudolf Steiner (those are asterisked).

Austrian designer Rudolf Steiner intended his first Goetheanum building in Dornach, Switzerland (1913-1922), among other purposes, to be a dramatic illustration of the principles of a new style of architecture, simultaneously organic and functional. Its unusual forms in carved wood and reinforced concrete, its watercolor murals, and its engraved colored-glass windows were also to be a visual introduction to the metaphysical ideas of Steiner's anthroposophy. The central dynamic of the building was the intersection of its two domes of different sizes, intended by Steiner to express the union of spirit and matter through his treatment of the functions of stage and auditorium. The contrast between the two domed spaces was supported in great detail throughout the interior. Steiner applied formative principles of the natural world to building designs, attempting to achieve an organism-like relation between part and whole, a harmonious adaptation of building to site, and an organic formal quality sympathetic to the human observer. In particular, he employed the principle of metamorphosis in the abstract forms of the building's ornamentation and ground plan, relating this principle to Goethe's studies of biological morphology. He created forms and spaces that not only fulfilled but also directly imaged their functions, including their relationship to their human users. He set forth his new architectural approach within the context of an extensively enunciated architectural theory, whose primary thrust was the encouragement of a clear adaptation of the designs of buildings to a holistically conceived human nature. He pioneered new techniques and styles, which, along with his lectures and writings, have influenced a number of significant artists and architects of the twentieth century.

The Theosophical Society, founded in New York in 1875, was, at the turn of the Twentieth Century, a global phenomenon with 100,000 members. New Age philosopher Dr Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925) was appointed as the first Secretary General of the German Section of the Theosophical Society on 19 October 1902. The Theosophical Society offered Rudolf Steiner a platform, a ready-made audience, infrastructure, and the insider experience of the world’s leading New Age spiritual society. The success of the Theosophical Society demonstrated that there was a public appetite to hear about reincarnation, karma, maya, kamaloca, and other Eastern and alternative spiritual ideas. The Theosophical Society provided Rudolf Steiner a capable, multilingual, and determined personal assistant, Marie von Sivers (1867-1948). For Rudolf Steiner the Theosophical Society offered the perfect training ground for what would be, a decade later, his life’s work, the Anthroposophical Society. Rudolf Steiner grew the membership of the German Section of the Theosophical Society from 377 in 1905 to 3,702 in 1913. He earned cash from ticketing of his lectures and his Mystery plays, and from book sales of his personal publishing house, ‘Philosophisch-Theosophischer Verlag’. Another enterprise, the ‘Johannes-Bau-Verein’ (Johannes Building Association) was founded in 1911, independent of the Theosophical Society, to build a theatre in Munich to present Rudolf Steiner's plays. The building application was rejected by the Munich municipal authorities in 1912. The resistance to a build in Munich, provided impetus for the move to build in Dornach, Switzerland. The Anthroposophical Society was founded 28 December 1912 in Cologne, Germany. Most of the members of the German Section of the Theosophical Society members followed Rudolf Steiner into the Anthroposophical Society. The Theosophical Society expelled Rudolf Steiner from the Theosophical Society on 7 March 1913. The foundation stone for the Goetheanum (then still called the ‘Johannesbau’) was laid 20 September 1913. The Theosophical Society had served as the ideal prototype and springboard for founding and growing the Anthroposophical Society.

Fifty Nordic pioneers of biodynamic (BD) agriculture, and hence of organic agriculture, are identified. These individuals, from Norway (n = 23), Sweden (n = 12), Denmark (n = 10), and Finland (n = 5), joined the Experimental Circle of Anthroposophical Farmers and Gardeners in the years 1924–1946. These pioneers comprised both men (n = 35) and women (n = 14), with one member of undetermined gender. The Experimental Circle was headquartered at the Goetheanum, Dornach, Switzerland. One of these pioneers (Anna Wager-Gunnarson) attended the foundational course of biodynamic and organic agriculture, presented by Dr Rudolf Steiner (1861–1925), in eight lectures at Koberwitz (now Kobierzyce, Poland) in June 1924. The core element of the course was that agriculture was properly a biological rather than a chemical pursuit. The ‘Agriculture Course’ was subsequently issued (in German from 1926) as a subscriber-only published book to members (of the Anthroposophical Society) who joined the Experimental Circle. Each Circle member signed a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) and committed to testing the ideas of the course. A milestone was the 1938 book by Ehrenfried Pfeiffer, ‘Bio-Dynamic Farming and Gardening,’ which arguably released Experimental Circle members from their NDA. Nordic members joined progressively over the two decades following the Koberwitz course, with new memberships peaking in 1932 (n = 7), and continuing through the years of World War II (WWII). Biodynamic agriculture is still practiced in the Nordic countries of these pioneers, with Denmark presently accounting for 2,998 hectares, Sweden 873 ha, Norway 548 ha, and Finland 384 ha. The Nordic countries have developed strong organic sectors, with Sweden accounting for 610,543 ha of certified organic agriculture (which is 20.2% of its agricultural land), Finland 315,112 ha (14.4%), Denmark 299,998 (11.4%), and Norway 45,181 ha (4.6%). Iceland has no identified BD pioneers, presently no BD hectares, and 6,440 ha of organic agriculture (0.4% of total agriculture land). The identification of the 50 Nordic pioneers of the present paper provides recognition as early-adopters and invites further research on their life, legacy, and role in founding BD and organic agriculture in the region.

Background: The present study makes part of the project ‘Systematic Review of Crystallization Processes Applied for Medical Purposes (SyRCrysMed)’. SyRCrysMed is planned to lead to a publication of three review articles: (i) on crystallization of blood and its derivatives (serum, plasma) for diagnostic purposes, (ii) on crystallization of other biological fluids for diagnostic purposes, and (iii) on crystallization applied to homeopathy (both, basic and clinical research). Medical crystallization is a wide, however fragmented and little known field of science. It embraces different crystallization methodologies and applications. The commune scope of most of the crystallization-based methods is to access a more complex (or different) kind of information on the diagnosed/analyzed subject than it is possible by the use of conventional methods. The underlying thought to this analysis possibility provided by crystallization is that crystallization is an extremely sensitive process and is able to visualize not only the material dimension of the sample (e.g. composition), but also immaterial forces (e.g. force-like effects, sample’s vitality). This sensitivity of crystallization encouraged some researchers (both in the past and nowadays) to apply this process also in homeopathic research. Here we present a first summary of the crystallization-based methodologies with focus on these applied in homeopathy. Materials and methods: 177 articles, books, and book chapters on medical crystallization have been collected from scientific databases, university libraries, and the library at the Goetheanum in Dornach/Switzerland. The collected literature was divided into experimental studies and other literature. All methodologies described in the experimental studies were summarized in accordance to following criteria: type of the biological fluid, dilution degree of the fluid in the crystallizing solution, presence and type of reagent in the crystallizing solution, amount of the crystallizing solution per pattern, type of diagnosed disorder, and sensitivity and specificity of the method. Results: The different diagnostic methodologies concerned mainly the crystallization of blood, plasma, serum and saliva, however also tears, urine, cerebrospinal fluid, vaginal mucosa, and sweat were used. The concentration of the sample in the crystallizing solution ranged from 100% to trace amounts. In case of diluted samples additions of salts, amino acids, neurotransmitters were used. The volume of the crystallization solution per pattern ranged from 3 μl to 6ml. The evaporation took place on a glass surface in forms of droplets, smears, or on round dishes (10cm diameter). The methodologies were applied for the diagnoses of cancer (different types and stages, including pre-symptomatic diagnosis), other diseases (e.g. diabetes, hepatitis B&C, multiple sclerosis, tuberculosis, cystic fibrosis, Sjogren’s syndrome, gastro-intestinal disorders, colon polyps, senile dementia), and physiological stages (fertility days and pregnancy in women, differences before and after physical activity). Finally, the mean sensitivity of the methods amounted to 82.1% (from 40.6% to 100%) and the mean specificity to 84.9% (from 62.3% to 96.7%). In overall the experimental methodologies can be divided into following groups: - Evaporation of droplets of an undiluted biological fluid, - Evaporation of droplets of a diluted biological fluid with addition of salts, - Evaporation of droplets of a diluted biological fluid with addition of salts and amino acids, - Evaporation of droplets containing salts, amino acids and neurotransmitters, - Evaporation of droplets of a watery solution of ashes of a biological fluid (spagyric crystallization), - Evaporation of films/smears of an undiluted biological fluid (ferning tests), - Evaporation of larger amounts of crystallizing solution of a strongly diluted biological fluid with addition of copper chloride placed on dishes (Pfeiffer’s crystallization), Within the analyzed literature there were 10 works on crystallization applied for homeopathy. They concerned three different crystallization approaches, all characterized by a low concentration of the analyzed sample in the crystallization solution (from 1% to trace amounts), or even its absence. These methodologies, besides blood, concerned also plant models and crystallization of the homeopathic preparations by themselves (without a biological sample). In these approaches the crystallization took place with or without the addition of a reagent (salt). Summary & Conclusions: Our preliminary results indicate that crystallization based methods might constitute in future valid, non-invasive, and cost-saving tools enabling, inter alia, pre-symptomatic cancer diagnosis. The studies on crystallization based methods applied to homeopathic research point at a great potential of these methodologies for both basic research and possibly also clinical applications and screening tests. Disclosure Information: The Authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.