Lorenz Oken, a German biologist and philosopher, was born at Bohlsbach, Baden. He was graduated from the faculty of medicine at Freiburg in 1804 and obtained his first professorship in medicine at Jena in 1807. Oken left Jena in 1819 because as editor of the liberal periodical Isis he had incurred the disfavor of the authorities. He traveled in Germany and France, lectured at the University of Basel in 1821 and 1822, and after a brief appointment at the University of Munich he became professor of physiology in Zürich, where he remained until his death.

After a few years in Jena, Oken was asked to transfer from medicine to philosophy. Yet ten years later, in his second term at Basel, he was listed as professor of medicine only, with no reference to philosophy. These changes reflect Oken's development and the superseding of romantic nature philosophy by a more...