{"id":8148,"date":"2019-05-22T16:04:33","date_gmt":"2019-05-22T16:04:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/homunculus\/"},"modified":"2019-05-22T16:04:33","modified_gmt":"2019-05-22T16:04:33","slug":"homunculus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/homunculus\/","title":{"rendered":"Homunculus"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A metaphor for a miniature man in the brain governing decision making. &nbsp;Originating in the embryological concept of preformationism, schemas, representations and other such non-holonomic constraints are contemporary examples of homunculi. &nbsp;The preformationsists were buttressed in their conviction that that a future adult organism was to be found in miniature form in either spermia (the spermists\/animalcultists) or the ova (the ovists) through the invention of the light microscope by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ucmp.berkeley.edu\/history\/leeuwenhoek.html\" target=\"_self\" data-editable-link=\"http:\/\/www.ucmp.berkeley.edu\/history\/leeuwenhoek.html&amp;target=_self\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Anton van Leeuwenhoek<\/a> (1632-1723). &nbsp;A magnification of 250x was sufficient for some to see an actual miniature adult folded up in the spermia (see example below).<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"..\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Preformationism-1.jpg\" \/><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"\" style=\"text-align: center; \">A drawing by <a href=\"http:\/\/gluedideas.com\/content-collection\/english-cyclopedia\/Nicolas-Hartsoeker.html\" target=\"_self\" data-editable-link=\"http:\/\/gluedideas.com\/content-collection\/english-cyclopedia\/Nicolas-Hartsoeker.html&amp;target=_self\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Nicolas Hartsoeker<\/a> ((1656-1725) of a homunculus he believed he could see in human sperm by means of a light microscope. &nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>See <a href=\"constraint\">Constraint<\/a>, <a href=\"epigenesis\">Epigenesis<\/a>, <a href=\"homunculus_problem\">Homunculus problem<\/a>, <a href=\"preformationism\">Preformationism<\/a>, <a href=\"representation_-mental-\">Representation (mental)<\/a>, Schema  <\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p><\/body><\/html><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A metaphor for a miniature man in the brain governing decision making. &nbsp;Originating in the embryological concept of preformationism, schemas, representations and other such non-holonomic constraints are contemporary examples of homunculi. &nbsp;The preformationsists were buttressed in their conviction that that a future adult organism was to be found in miniature form in either spermia (the &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/homunculus\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Homunculus&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2],"class_list":["post-8148","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-glossary","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8148","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8148"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8148\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fas\/psych\/glossary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}