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Joachim S. Gravenstein, MD; Santosh Kalhan, MD; Nikolas G. Balamoutsos, MD

JAMA. 1981;246(10):1091-1092.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

WORDS are like pots. In their forms, both show their background and culture and both serve as containers. Some old pots, now smooth and shiny on their outside from daily use, still hold traces of ancient residue on the inside. It is similar with some very old words in our language: they still carry the flavor of ancient concepts they conveyed in bygone centuries. Words dealing with respiration and spirits provide an example.

Common human experience links breath to life and life to spiritual values. For the Judeo-Christian world, Genesis 2:7 exemplifies this link: "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." Here the Divine breath initiates life. Later, philosophers and physicians thought about this vital force, named it, and tried to identify it. In 1795, J. C. Reil, a German . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

Author Affiliations
From the Departments of Anesthesiology, University of Florida, Gainesville (Dr Gravenstein), Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland (Dr Kalhan), and Aristotelian University, Thessaloniki, Greece (Dr Balamoutsos).

Footnotes
Reprint requests to Department of Anesthesiology, University of Florida, College of Medicine, Box J-254, Gainesville, FL 32610 (Dr Gravenstein).

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