Ernst Platner

Life Following the death of his father in 1747, the philologist Johann August Ernesti became his foster father. He received his early education at the gymnasium in Altenburg, the Thomasschule in Leipzig and at the gymnasium in Gera. Afterwards, he studied at the University of Leipzig, where in 1770 he became an associate professor of medicine. Later at Leipzig, he was appointed a full professor of physiology (1780) and philosophy (1811). In 1783/84 and 1789/90 he served as university rector.

Platner is credited with originally coining the term Unbewußtseyn (unconscious). He is also credited for coining the phrase "pragmatic history of the human faculty of cognition" (pragmatische Geschichte des menschlichen Erkentnißvermogens ), later appropriated by Johann Gottlieb Fichte as "pragmatic history of the human spirit" (pragmatische Geschichte des menschlichen Geistes).

Selected publications Anthropologie für Aerzte und Weltweise (Anthropology for Physicians and the Worldwise), 1772 Neue Anthropologie für Aerzte und Weltweise (New Anthropology for Physicians and the Worldwise), 1790 Über den Atheismus. Ein Gespräch (About Atheism. An Interview), 1783 Philosophische Aphorismen nebst einigen Anleitungen zur philosophischen Geschichte (Philosophical Aphorisms with Some Principles for a History of Philosophy), Vol. 1: 1776, Vol. 2: 1782 (second edition: 1784, third edition: 1793) Quaestiones physiologicae (Questions of Physiology), 1794 Quaestiones medicinae forensis (Questions of Forensic Medicine), 1797–1817