Mens sana in corpore sano

Mens sana in corpore sano is a Latin phrase. It means " a healthy mind in a healthy body".

Origin

The phrase is a shortened quote from the satires of the Roman poet Juvenal.

Juvenal's real intention aimed to castigate those of his Roman citizens, who turned with prayers and intercessions foolish to the gods. Prayer, he says, one should at most by physical and mental health. Mens sana in corpore sano is therefore to be understood only in relation to the meaning and content of petitions and prayers. So he has not assert as a satirist that only in a healthy body put a healthy mind, but only - as he had often experienced the opposite - that it would be desirable if this were so. Juvenal ( 60-127 AD) has therefore also the sporting idols of his time parodied, in his opinion, most often withdrew their intellectual abilities beyond the physical.

Reception

The phrase is often misunderstood and ostensibly straight in the sense explained above or deliberately misinterpreted.

The physical exercise, which played a central role in Nazism, for ideological reasons, was held under the motto shortened interpreted Juvenal.

Today, various mental gurus like Tony Buzan propagate over again that intense athletic training very significantly tremendous gains in intellectual performance. However, this is to the extent not.

In reverse, ie the shortened interpreted phrase that in sick and weak bodies inherent in not a healthy mind. Such an analogy leads straight into the discrimination people with physical disabilities. Against this background, the stakeholders of disabled people ( disabled people's organizations ) reject the " mens sana in corpore sano " vehemently. As an example of how a brilliant scientist can be a physically broken man, they lead to, among others, Stephen Hawking.

An explanation of why, contrary to popular belief and contrary to the shortened interpretation of the phrase, there is a far weaker relationship between physical and mental performance, may be the fact to be sought that the metabolic processes of a healthy person are such that deficits until very late in the affect the brain supply, so the brain has with respect to the metabolism of a privileged position among the institutions. This is understandable since impairment of the brain (in addition to other vital organs such as the heart and lungs ) when compared to those of other institutions would have the most devastating effect on the survival of the individual.

However, studies also showed that exercise the risk of getting Alzheimer's in old age in order to reduce up to 50 percent.

On the other hand, it is also the case that physical defects can indeed draw mental impairment by itself, whether in the extreme case of manifest diseases, such as hepatic encephalopathy, or simply through lack of fitness -related adverse effects on well -being, for example, chronic overload and pain, which can cause up to the inability to work at least from the perspective of many patients concentration. Apparently, there is also here, depending on the predisposition and individual history, a certain dispersion: the one person feels by physical deficiencies severely impaired in his mental capacity, the other less.

Others

The initial letters of the words of the slightly modified phrase " anima sana in corpore sano " (anima = soul) form the acronym of the sporting goods manufacturer ASICS.