Heinrich Klüver

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Heinrich Klüver (born May 25, 1897 in Holstein , †  February 8, 1979 in Oak Lawn , Illinois ) was a German-American neuroscientist who is especially significant for the description of Klüver-Bucy syndrome .

Life

Heinrich Klüver was the son of Wilhelm and Dorothes Klüver, née Wübbers. After military service for the German Reich in World War I , Heinrich Klüver studied psychology at the universities of Hamburg and Berlin . From 1920 he worked with the founder of the Gestalt theory , Max Wertheimer ; In Gestalt theory, the perception of reality through the senses and its interpretation by the brain are of decisive importance. During this time, Klüver studied visual perception in children.

In 1923, Klüver moved to Palo Alto , California , to study at Stanford University . In 1924 he received the Ph.D. for his work on the eidetic phenomenon. in psychology. From 1924 to 1926 he stayed at the University of Minnesota , where he met the psychologist Karl Spencer Lashley , with whom he was to become a lifelong friend. Klüver then spent two years as a Fellow of the Social Science Research Council at Columbia University in New York, researching, among other things, the effect of mescaline on the sense of sight.

On February 4, 1927, he married Cessa Feyerabend. From 1928 Klüver worked in Chicago with Karl Spencer Lashley and belonged to the “Neurology Club” alongside Percival Bailey , Ralph Gerard and Paul Bucy . From 1933 to 1963 Klüver held a professorship in biological psychology at the University of Chicago . During his professorship he declined any administrative tasks and lectures in favor of his research and practical experiments.

In 1934 Klüver received American citizenship, in 1954 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences , in 1957 to the National Academy of Sciences and in 1965 to the American Philosophical Society .

With his death he left behind his second wife Harriet Schwenk Klüver.

power

Heinrich Klüver's scientific career was dominated by research into the visual system, both the processing of light stimuli and the creation of images in the brain.

Research with mescaline

During his years at the University of Minnesota, Klüver studied mescaline extracted from the peyote cactus . While reading the research literature, he had noticed that mescaline affects the sense of sight; Heinrich Klüber took mescaline himself for research purposes. The light patterns that appeared under the influence of the drug and with closed eyes showed certain “geometricization tendencies” because he saw, among other things, oriental carpets, wallpaper patterns, architectural forms, buttresses, rosettes, foliage and latticework. Klüver concluded four basic " shape constants ", which he categorized as follows: 1) grids, 2) spirals, 3) cobwebs, 4) tunnels.

The abnormally increased activation of the visual system by the mescaline provided images that were neither formed from signals from the eyes nor contained any personal information content (no memories), but rather reflected the architecture of the brain itself. Klüver compared the jagged and wavy light patterns with optical phenomena that also appear in migraines (aura), fever, hypoglycemia , delirium, deprivation and when half asleep. Much later, David Hubel and Torsten Wiesel found neurons in the brain that responded to lines, edges and corners. Heinrich Klüver published his research results in 1926 in an essay entitled Mescal Visions and Eidetic Vision .

Klüver-Bucy syndrome

In 1936, Klüver succeeded in demonstrating in an animal model that removing both occipital lobes leads to cortical blindness , while removing the temporal lobes disappears the ability to interpret what has been seen. This phenomenon is called Klüver-Bucy syndrome after him and Paul Bucy. Klüver also developed a staining method to show the myelin sheaths . Further research areas concerned behavior control in primates.

Bibliography (selection)

  • Mescal Visions and Eidetic Vision , Am. J. Psychol. 37, 1926, pp. 502-15.
  • Mescal: The 'Divine' Plant and Its Psychological Effects , London 1928.
  • Behavior Mechanisms in Monkeys , University of Chicago Press, Chicago 1933.
  • Mescal and Mechanisms of Hallucinations , University of Chicago, Chicago 1966.

literature

  • Karl H. Pribram , Frederick KD Accepted: Heinrich Klüver 1897-1979. A Biographical Memoir , National Academies Press, Washington DC 1998.
  • Karl Clausberg: Warburg, Mescaline and the Stars - Image Spaces of Distance Awareness , in: Elize Bisanz, Marlene Heidel (ed.): Image Ghosts: Artistic Archives from the GDR and their role today , pp. 103-143. ISBN 9783837624618
  • Oliver Sacks : Dragons, doppelgangers and demons. About people with hallucinations , Reinbek 2015, p. 117, p. 124, p. 152. ISBN 9783499629723

Web links

Single receipts

  1. ↑ Frederick KD Nahm u. Karl H. Pribram : Heinrich Klüver 1897-1979. A Biographical Memoir National Academies Press, Washington 1998; P. 4.
  2. ↑ Karl Clausberg: Warburg, Mescaline and the Stars - Image Spaces of Distance Awareness in: Elize Bisanz, Marlene Heidel (Ed.): Image Ghosts: Artistic Archives from the GDR and their role today , p. 112.
  3. ↑ Frederick KD Nahm u. Karl H. Pribram : Heinrich Klüver 1897-1979. A Biographical Memoir , National Academies Press, Washington 1998, p. 5.
  4. ↑ Oliver Sacks : Dragons, doppelgangers and demons. About people with hallucinations , Reinbek 2015, p. 117. ISBN 9783499629723
  5. ↑ Oliver Sacks: Dragons, Doppelgangers and Demons , p. 124.
personal data
SURNAME Klüver, Heinrich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German-American psychologist and neuroscientist
DATE OF BIRTH May 25, 1897
PLACE OF BIRTH Holstein
DATE OF DEATH February 8, 1979
Place of death Oak Lawn (Illinois)