Goethe’s Zur Farbenlehre, Theory of Colors, appeared on 16 May 1810. One part of it is a polemic against Newton’s theory of color. Between 1810 and 1832 many natural scientists and mathematicians commented on the work. Almost half of them opposed Goethe. Among the statements from natural science, a third supported him. Hermann von Helmholtz admired Goethe’s scientific work, but he called its main thesis simply wrong. Goethe himself valued his research on color more than all his literary work. He told Johann Peter Eckermann: Auf alles, was ich als Poet geleistet habe, bilde ich mir gar nichts ein. (I think nothing of all that I have achieved as a poet.) What made him proud, he said, was that he was the only one in his century who knew the truth in the difficult science of color.
Combat Value Enhancement
On 25 October 1979 the first series-built Leopard 2 tank was handed over to the German army. Since then the tank has gone through several Kampfwertsteigerungen, combat value enhancements. Each version carries its own designation, such as A5 or A7V. From 2019, 104 tanks were upgraded to the A7V standard. The next version is called A8, and its delivery was planned for 2025 to 2026.
Kant’s Touchstone
In December 1784 Immanuel Kant published his essay Was ist Aufklärung?, What Is Enlightenment? In it he asks whether a church assembly could bind itself and all later generations to fixed doctrines. He says it has no such right, and he gives a test for every law: Der Probierstein alles dessen, was über ein Volk als Gesetz beschlossen werden kann, liegt in der Frage: ob ein Volk sich selbst wohl ein solches Gesetz auferlegen könnte? (The touchstone of everything that can be decided as law for a people lies in the question: could a people impose such a law on itself?)
Sworn Doctor of Holy Scripture
In October 1512 Martin Luther received his doctorate in theology at the University of Wittenberg. The Elector paid the costs of the ceremony. Luther’s doctoral oath bound him to Holy Scripture. In his later conflict with the papal church, Luther appealed to this obligation. From then on he lectured regularly on a book of the Bible, until November 1545.
Sixty Years of the 911
The first Porsche 911 was presented on 12 September 1963 at the motor show in Frankfurt. It still has its engine at the rear, a six-cylinder boxer. Its generations carry their own names: original model, G model, 964, 993, 996, 997, 991 and 992. German Wikipedia sums up its history in one sentence: the 911 was kontinuierlich weiterentwickelt, continuously developed. The 996, from model year 1998, was the first 911 with a water-cooled engine. It also shared many parts, such as headlights and fenders, with the Boxster. This brought the new 996 a lot of criticism, above all because it could be mistaken for a Boxster. People called its headlights Spiegeleier, fried eggs. They were replaced in 2002.
He Does Not Play Dice
On 4 December 1926 Albert Einstein wrote to Max Born about the new quantum mechanics. He began with respect: Die Quantenmechanik ist sehr achtunggebietend. (Quantum mechanics commands great respect.) Aber eine innere Stimme sagt mir, daß das noch nicht der wahre Jakob ist. (But an inner voice tells me that this is not yet the real thing.) The theory delivered a lot, he wrote, but it hardly brought us closer to the secret of the Old One. Jedenfalls bin ich überzeugt, daß der nicht würfelt. (In any case I am convinced that He does not play dice.) Until his death in 1955 Einstein tried in vain to find a deterministic theory behind it. Experiments later disproved his conclusions. But the observations behind his objections proved correct and fundamental. German Wikipedia says he was the first to put his finger in an open wound.
Permission to Experiment
The German Passenger Transport Act contains an Experimentierklausel, an experimentation clause. Zur praktischen Erprobung neuer Verkehrsarten oder Verkehrsmittel, for the practical testing of new types or means of transport, the licensing authority may allow exceptions to the law on application, for at most five years. Volkswagen’s ride-pooling service MOIA started in Hamburg on 15 April 2019 under this clause. Its permit ran until the end of 2022. In March 2021 the law was reformed, and in September 2022 MOIA received a regular permit for the first time. On 19 May 2025 the federal cabinet adopted a draft law on Reallabore, real-world laboratories. They allow innovations to be tested for a limited time and under official supervision. The law aims to make such tests easier to set up. The Bundestag passed it on 25 June 2026.
The Commoner Who Reformed the Prussian Army
Gerhard Scharnhorst was born in 1755 near Hanover. His father, an army quartermaster, came from a family of smallholders. He became a teacher at the war school in Hanover and wrote military handbooks, among them a Handbuch für Offiziere in den angewandten Teilen der Kriegswissenschaften, a handbook for officers in the applied parts of the science of war. His reform proposals went unheeded in Hanover. In 1801 he entered Prussian service as a lieutenant colonel of artillery. He was ennobled in 1802. On 25 July 1807 he became chairman of the Military Reorganization Commission, which rebuilt the Prussian army. Officers of the Prussian Guards later mocked his origins.
Modernized, Not Replaced
Most years on 1 August, when the new training year begins, a set of revised training regulations comes into force. In 2016 the Federal Institute for Vocational Education and Training counted the revisions since 2003. Of 243 revised regulations, 206 modernized existing occupations and 37 created new ones. On 1 August 2025 seven modernized occupations started, among them florist, photographer, gold- and silversmith and chimney sweep.
The Professor Who Drank the Cholera
The Munich hygienist Max von Pettenkofer did not accept that Robert Koch’s cholera bacterium alone caused the disease. In his view, the soil and the groundwater mattered most. On 7 October 1892 he drank a culture of the bacteria himself, to show that the bacteria alone were not enough to cause the disease. He suffered only mild diarrhea. Some of his students repeated the experiment and fell ill only mildly or not at all. Koch’s bacteriology prevailed all the same. Because Pettenkofer would not accept it, he became more and more isolated in science.