{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 312/1920-03-24/p016","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"If we open the body of a freshly killed sheep and encounter the full force of the odour of putrefaction from its entrails, we most certainly feel far less pleasure in the existence of the intestinal flora. We must carefully note and consider this fact; for it is simply self-evident that the same causes which favour the growth of vegetation in external nature, must be counteracted in man, and that the intestinal flora ought not to develop in us. Here we have a remarkably extensive field of research, and I would venture to recommend, as a theme for doctoral theses for younger students, to make use of this subject matter, and especially of comparative anatomical research, on the intestinal structures of various animal groups, through mammals up to man. As I say, a remarkably rich source, for much that is most significant here has not yet been investigated. Try particularly to find out why the opened sheep exhales so foul an odour of putrefacation by reason of its intestinal flora, whereas this is far from being the case in birds, even in carrion birds, whose bodies when opened smell comparatively pleasant. There is very much in these matters that has received no scientific study and research up till now. And the same is true of the comparative anatomy of the intestines. Think for a moment of the considerable difference in all birds from both the Mammalia and mankind. (It is just here that materialists, for instance the Paris expert, Metchnikoff, have perpetrated the greatest errors). In birds there is a remarkably poor development of both bladder and large intestine. Only in those groups which form the Ratites (the Ostrich and its relatives) does the colon begin to enlarge, and certain approximations to the bladder appear. So that we are led to the important fact that birds are unable to accumulate their excretions, retain them for a while within their bodies and then evacuate them as occasion offers; but on the contrary, there is a continuous equipoise between what is taken into their bodies and what is evacuated from them.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"Man's Threefold Nature and Relationship to Remedies","date":"1920-03-24","location":null,"word_count":349,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/312/1920-03-24/p016","alignment_confidence":"low","alignment_reason":"count_diverges","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"identified_edition":"RSP1948","translator":null,"publisher":"Rudolf Steiner Press","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA312/English/RSP1948/SpiSci_index.html","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code, not stated by the source page. The translator and the edition identity ARE verified (the edition's opening text was matched against this corpus; see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator and edition with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable, or check source_url before naming it."},"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["English"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":null,"is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/312/1920-03-24/p016"},{"lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/312/1920-03-24/p016"}],"witness_completeness":{"ratio":0.97,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":6240,"original_word_count":6408,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"status":"unknown","warning":"No translator is recorded for this edition. An unattributed translation cannot be weighed as a witness: you cannot tell which hand made the choices in it. Cite the German for anything load-bearing.","identified_edition":"RSP1948","translator":null,"publisher":"Rudolf Steiner Press","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA312/English/RSP1948/SpiSci_index.html","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code, not stated by the source page. The translator and the edition identity ARE verified (the edition's opening text was matched against this corpus; see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator and edition with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable, or check source_url before naming it."},"entity_parity":{"status":"not_checkable","note":"No verified paragraph alignment covers this passage, so its names cannot be compared with the German."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}