Paronymy versus heteronymy as neuronymic principles : presidential address at the eleventh annual meeting of the American Neurological Association, June 18, 1885 / by Burt G. Wilder.

  • Wilder, Burt G. (Burt Green), 1841-1925.
Date:
[1885]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Paronymy versus heteronymy as neuronymic principles : presidential address at the eleventh annual meeting of the American Neurological Association, June 18, 1885 / by Burt G. Wilder. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    1 So far as I am aware, neither the beginning nor the con- tinuance of my own efforts has depended upon the precept or the example of others. Partly in private study, but yet more in laboratory and lecture-room instruction, there was gradually forced upon me the conviction that the current nomenclature is, to a large extent, an obstacle rather than an aid to the advancement and dissemination of knowledge concerning a complex organ ; that, in short, excepting under unusually favorable conditions, the average student rises from a neurological discourse with the belief that, unless his organ of thought is gravely disordered, most of the terms employed are too long, and some mean the reverse of what they seem to express. With regard to the encephalic cavities in particular, I reiterate what I have said before, that every student would save time and exasperation of mind if the incongruous and misleading, quasi-descriptive terms, first, second, third, fourth, and fifth ventricle, could be replaced by totally meaningless, but easily remembered Chinese monosyllables, like pran, pren, prin, pron, and prtm. Erelong I became absolutely incapable of using the current names without hesitation and a desire to apolo- gize for them, which seriously diminished the clearness of my thoughts and the readiness of my speech. This was notably the case in dealing with published figures and with the diagrams which students were required to make from their own preparations; according to the plan usually fol- lowed, there neither was nor could be uniformity in the names, much less in the abbreviations set against the parts. Impelled, then, toward some change for the better, not by a desire to carry out an ideal scheme of reform, but by a wish to economize time and lighten the labors of earnest students, I have probably given to the nomenclature of the brain more attention than has been devoted to it by any other English-speaking anatomist, I say English-speaking to forestall comparison with two French writers whose efforts to modify nomenclature in accordance with precon- ceived plans have met the fate which sooner or later befalls innovations based upon theory rather than upon practical