The German verb aufheben has opposite meanings. A receipt is aufgehoben when it is kept. A law is aufgehoben when it is cancelled. In his Science of Logic, first published in 1812, Hegel made this double meaning one of his central ideas: Aufheben hat in der Sprache den gedoppelten Sinn, daß es so viel als aufbewahren, erhalten bedeutet, und zugleich so viel als aufhören lassen, ein Ende machen. (In the language, aufheben has a double meaning. It means to preserve and to keep, and at the same time to let stop and to put an end to.) In Hegel’s thought, what is overcome is not thrown away. It is kept in what comes after it.
The Temple of Technology
The Deutsches Museum in Munich was founded in 1903 by the engineer Oskar von Miller. Its full name is Deutsches Museum von Meisterwerken der Naturwissenschaft und Technik, the German Museum of Masterpieces of Science and Technology. Its main building opened on 7 May 1925. At its center is the Ehrensaal, the Hall of Honor, which the museum calls Tempel der Technik und Naturwissenschaft, the temple of technology and science. It was meant to Ehrfurcht wecken vor den herausragenden Schöpfern der „Meisterwerke“, to awaken awe before the outstanding creators of the masterpieces. It followed the 19th-century idea that Männer machen Geschichte, men make history. The nuclear physicist Lise Meitner is the only woman honored there so far. The museum now writes that it views such a strongly person-centered portrayal of technology and history critically.
The Master Student
At German art academies, a student who completes the regular course with above-average results can stay on as a Meisterschüler, a master student, usually for one or two more years. At the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, students work from their third semester in the class of one professor, and the professor can put a student forward for the title of master student. Joseph Beuys entered the class of the sculptor Ewald Mataré in the winter semester of 1947/48. In 1951 Mataré named him his master student. In 1961 Beuys was appointed to the academy’s chair of monumental sculpture.
The Christmas Oratorio
Johann Sebastian Bach’s Christmas Oratorio was first performed in Leipzig at six services between Christmas Day 1734 and Epiphany 1735. Many of its choruses and arias came from secular works he had written earlier. The opening chorus, for example, comes from a cantata performed on 8 December 1733 for the birthday of the Electress of Saxony. Reusing music in this way, the Parodieverfahren, was not unusual in Bach’s time. It was not a simple copy. Bach moved the pieces into other keys, changed the instruments and gave the new words a new musical meaning in several places.
Parliament’s Office for Consequences
Since 1990 the Office of Technology Assessment at the German Bundestag, the TAB, has advised parliament on scientific and technical change. The German word for its work is Technikfolgenabschätzung, the assessment of the consequences of technology. A committee of the Bundestag decides what the office studies. One of its reports examined what would happen in a large, long-lasting power blackout. It was presented to the Bundestag on 27 April 2011. The report found that all critical infrastructure would be affected and that a collapse of society as a whole could hardly be prevented. The consequences, it said, would equal a national catastrophe.
Instead, We Kept Silent
The sleeping pill Contergan was sold in Germany from 1 October 1957 to 27 November 1961. Under the drug law of the time, a manufacturer only had to register a new medicine. In 1961 the Hamburg doctor Widukind Lenz and others linked Contergan to severe malformations in newborn children. Other sources speak of about 4,000 affected children in Germany. After the scandal, Germany rewrote its drug law. The new law came into force at the start of 1978. Since then a medicine may be approved only after proof of its quality, its efficacy and its safety. The manufacturer, Grünenthal, apologized only in August 2012, at the unveiling of a memorial in its home town of Stolberg. Its managing director Harald Stock asked forgiveness that for 50 years the company had not found its way to the victims von Mensch zu Mensch, from person to person. Stattdessen haben wir geschwiegen. (Instead, we kept silent.) Victims’ associations criticized that the apology spoke only about the company’s lack of communication.
A Purer Form of a Known Substance
According to his laboratory journal, the Bayer chemist Felix Hoffmann produced acetylsalicylic acid on 10 August 1897, for the first time largely free of by-products. The substance itself was already known. Earlier chemists, among them Karl Kraut, had described ways to make it. After pharmaceutical testing it was registered under the brand name Aspirin. The trademark dates from 1 February 1899. Later, Hoffmann’s colleague Arthur Eichengrün claimed the real credit. German Wikipedia notes that the company documents do not support his account. Only Hoffmann is named as the inventor in the American patent.
Weighing Technology
The TechnikRadar is a survey by acatech, the German Academy of Science and Engineering. The first edition, made with the Körber Foundation, appeared in 2018. In it, 35.1 percent of respondents agreed that technology creates more problems in the long run than it solves. 40.0 percent gave an ambivalent answer, and 24.6 percent disagreed. The report concluded: Trotz dieser Sorge lehnen die Deutschen Technik grundsätzlich nicht ab. (Despite this concern, Germans do not reject technology in principle.) They take a differentiated view and see that the risks are balanced by opportunities. The 2025 edition, based on a different survey, found that Germans judge each technology by its use. 70 percent called renewable energy useful and 12 percent risky. For genetically modified crops the figures were 23 percent useful and 57 percent risky.
The Wheel That Never Came Back
At the end of 1991 the board of the Deutsche Bundesbahn decided to test rubber-sprung wheels under seven dining cars of the ICE high-speed train. Passengers had complained about rattling dishes and wandernde Gläser, wandering glasses. In October 1992 the board was asked to introduce the new wheels across the whole ICE fleet. On 3 June 1998, near Eschede on the line from Hanover to Hamburg, the tire of one of these wheels broke at about 200 kilometers per hour. Metal fatigue set off a chain of events, and 101 people died. Three days later the railway took all ICE 1 trains out of service and ran them again only after ultrasound checks of every wheel. The Federal Railway Authority ordered all of about 2,880 rubber-sprung wheel sets replaced. Two railway officials and an engineer of the tire manufacturer were charged with not testing the wheels enough. German Wikipedia notes that Deutsche Bahn has not reintroduced the rubber-sprung wheels, trotz ihrer technischen Vorteile, despite their technical advantages.
From Research to Standard
For new technology, the German standards institute DIN offers a faster route than a full standard, the DIN SPEC. A regular DIN standard needs the consensus of all interested parties. A DIN SPEC needs only the agreement of the group that writes it, and it can be produced within a few months. Companies, research institutes and start-ups can start one, and a DIN SPEC can later become a full standard. DIN describes the purpose: So wird mit einer DIN SPEC der Markt für neue Produkte vorbereitet. (In this way a DIN SPEC prepares the market for new products.) The federal economics ministry runs a funding program called WIPANO. One of its aims is to turn the newest research results into norms and standards.