History and phylosophy of science

HISTORY AND PHYLOSOPHY OF SCIENCE

History of science

The Virtual Library - History of Science, Technology and Medicine
History of science society
Museum of History of Science (MHS) at Oxford
American Museum of Natural History (AMNH)
Wellcome Trust

Online Gallery

Nobel prize : an award usually given annually for outstanding achievement in chemistry, physics, medicine or physiology, literature, and in the interest of world peace. It was established under the terms of the will of the Swedish chemist and engineer Alfred Bernhard Nobel (1833–1896), and was first presented in 1901. An award for achievement in economics has since been added.

eponimy

Who named it ?

history of physics

Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman, Indian physicist, 1888–1970; winner of the Nobel prize for physics in 1930

history of biology

Antoine Béchamp : Bechamp.org
Charles Robert Darwin (English biologist, 1809–1882), proponent of the theory of darwinism

Web resources

Charles Darwin

Origin of the Species

Voyage of the Beagle

Decent of Man

preformation theory : the outmoded theory that the individuals of successive generations are contained, completely formed, within the reproductive cell of one of the parents.

preformation : the theory of early physiologists that the fully formed animal or plant exists in a minute form in the germ cell. Opposed to the theory of epigenesis

animalculist : a believer in the theory that the undeveloped embryo exists preformed in the spermatozoon
ovist : one who believes that the undeveloped embryo exists preformed in the ovum

spontaneous generation : abiogenesis; the discredited concept of the development of living organisms from nonliving matter
incasement theory : the formerly advocated theory that all animals and plants develop from preexisting germs, and that they encase the germs of all future generations, one within another.
Jean Baptiste Pierre Antoine Monet de Lamarck [French naturalist, 1744–1829] is best remembered for a discredited theory of heredity, the inheritance of acquired traits. He proposed that environment changes caused changes in behavior which in turn led to the increase or decrease of particular structures. He had a basically good idea but a bad example (see epigenetic variability ). Lamarck had a colorful and distinguished career: in turns soldier, bank clerk, Professor of "insects and worms" he died a poor man and was buried in a rented grave.

Lamarck's theory : the theory that acquired characteristics may be transmitted

Altmann's theory : a theory that protoplasm is made up of granular particles (bioblasts) grouped in masses and enclosed in indifferent matter.
apposition theory : the theory that tissues grow by the deposit of cells from without
dmoz Open Directory Project : History of biology

history of medicine (see also history of immunology , historical highlights in bionics and in tissue grafting )

caduceus [L., from Doric Gr. karykeion, herald's staff] : the winged staff of Hermes or Mercury (mercurial caduceus), the messenger of the gods, with two snakes winding around it. Used as a medical symbol and as the emblem of the Medical Corps, U.S. Army^ref. The official symbol of the medical profession is the staff of Aesculapius

Aesculapius / Asclepios / Asklepios : the mythical god or deified hero of healing.

staff of Aesculapius : a rod or staff with a snake entwined around it, commonly appearing in the ancient representations of Aesculapius, the god of medicine. It is the symbol of medicine (aesculapian staff)^ref and is the official emblem of the American Medical Association (AMA). The view of most medical historians is that the Asklepian is correct, but doctors - American doctors in particular - have made the same error for so long that the wrong answer (caduceus) has become the standard

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Dracunculus medinesis

Hygeia : the goddess of health
Panacea

asclepion : one of the early Greek temples of healing, the most celebrated of which were at Cos, Epidaurus, Cnidus, and Pergamos
Hippocrates of Cos [c. 460–c. 375 B.C.] the Father of Medicine, a student and teacher, not founder, of the medical school on Cos. According to Plato and Aristotle, Hippocrates was a great physician. None of the works in the Hippocratic corpus can be surely ascribed to Hippocrates. His anatomy was vague: he knew only bones in detail, not being sure of the organs, muscles, nerves, tendons, or blood vessels. Hippocrates' physiology was based on humoralism; his diagnosis was directed toward general pathology; his prognosis, to foretell the stages, duration, and end of disease. Hippocrates closely observed fevers, skin, the tongue, eyes, sweat, urine, and feces. Malarial and pulmonary diseases, common in the ancient Mediterranean, provided Hippocrates with ample evidence of humors—hemorrhagic blood, black and yellow bile from fits of vomiting in remittent malaria, and phlegm in mucus and expectoration. Hippocrates' therapy was to restore the humoral equilibrium: rid the body of excess humors and replace the deficient humors. He relied on the healing power of nature and recommended diet and moderate exercise, but rejected drugs.

humoralism / humoral theory / humorism : the ancient theory that health and illness result from a balance or imbalance of bodily liquids (“humors”). The theory is especially associated with Hippocratic writers, but it long antedates Hippocrates. Humoralism is a variant of Empedocles' theory of the four “roots” (earth, air, fire, water), later the 4 “elements,” then the 4 qualities (hot, cold, moist, dry), then the 4 temperaments. The 4 humors and the 4 qualities are (1) phlegm (water, or a watery substance), which is cold and moist; (2) blood, which is hot and moist; (3) black bile or gall, secreted from the kidneys and spleen, cold and dry; and (4) yellow bile or choler, secreted from the liver, hot and dry. Humoralism was decisively displaced only in 1858 by Rudolf Virchow's Cellularpathologie
neo-hippocratism / neo-hippocratic medicine : a school of medicine which tends toward a humanistic view of disease focused on the individual patient and scientific observation by the physician, representing a return to the hippocratic theory and practice, with emphasis on observational and bedside medicine.

Hippocrate's Oath

Dogmatist : a school of medicine formed by Diocles of Carystus. The school put Aristotelian language, system, and speculation into Hippocratic medicine to discover the hidden causes of the constitution of man and of disease: such knowledge, they thought, was necessary for the practice of medicine

Diocles of Carystus [4th century B.C.] : Greek physician and anatomist, a contemporary and student of Aristotle. Diocles was a founder of the Dogmatist school; he studied embryology, gynecology, and obstetrics, and he also performed animal dissections (e.g., on the womb of a mule).
Praxagoras of Cos [c. 340 B.C.] : a Greek physician who succeeded Diocles as leader of the Dogmatists. He was apparently the first Greek physician to recognize the difference between arteries (carriers of air) and veins (carriers of blood), and to comment on the pulse.

Empiric : the second of the post-hippocratic schools of medicine, which arose in the second century B.C., under the leadership of Philinos of Cos and Serapion of Alexandria (c. 280 B.C.) . As opposed to the Dogmatists, the Empirics declared that the search for the ultimate causes of phenomena was vain, but they were active in endeavoring to discover the immediate causes. They paid particular attention to the totality of symptoms. In their search for a line of treatment to benefit a particular set of symptoms they employed the “tripod of the Empirics”: (1) their own chance observations—their own experience; (2) learning obtained from contemporaries and predecessors—the experience of others; and (3) in cases of new diseases, the formation of conclusions from other diseases which they resembled—analogy. The Empirics paid great attention to clinical observation, and were guided in their methods of treatment almost entirely by experience.

empiricism : the method of the Empiric school of medicine; opposed to rational medicine
Serapion of Alexandria :

Alcmaeon of Crotona [c. 500 B.C.] a physician, student of Pythagoras. He described bodily states as an interplay of opposites: health is an isonomy of hot and cold, wet and dry, etc.; disease, a monarchy of one of these qualities; thus he was one of the precursors of humoralism. Alcmaeon considered the brain to be the seat of sensation and thought, performed the first known human dissections, distinguished veins from arteries, discovered “passages” from the eye to the brain, and was the first observer of the development of a chick embryo
Empedocles (c. 493 to c. 433 B.C.) a Greek philosopher born in Acragas, Sicily. He accepted and combined pneumatism with his own theories of the four “roots” (earth, air, fire, and water) and of the 2 opposite, complementary forces (love and strife), which unite and reunite or separate and disintegrate the four roots in diverse proportions to form or destroy matter; thus health is a balance, disease an imbalance, of the roots by the forces
Democritus [c. 460–c. 370 B.C.] : a Greek philosopher who was the first to state that everything in nature, including the body and the soul, is made up of atoms of different sizes and shapes, the movements of which are the cause of life and mental activity. Democritus' only influential Greek follower was Epicurus (341–270 B.C.). Their mechanistic, atomistic theory was influential at Alexandria, and the Epicurean school of philosophy corresponds roughly to the Empiric school of medicine
Aristotle [384–322 B.C.] : Greek philosopher, student of Plato. As a physical scientist, Aristotle stressed direct observation and induction; in biology his teleology is still accepted by vitalists. His studies included comparative anatomy and physiology, embryology, and ethology. Unfortunately, Aristotle adopted Empedocles' theory of the heart's being the center of intelligence, and also the theory of the 4 elements and the four qualities
Asclepiades of Bithynia [124–c. 40 B.C.] : a Greek physician born in Prusa in Bithynia (southwest coast of the Black Sea) who studied at Alexandria and taught and practiced at Rome after 91 B.C. An Epicurean, he opposed humoralism and introduced into medicine Democritus' atomic theory, according to which inharmonious or irregular movement of atoms causes disease, which one cures by restoring harmony. Asclepiades' methods included diet, friction, bathing, exercise, emetics, and blood-letting. His influence continued (through the Methodical School, founded by his students) until Galen began to practice in A.D. 164. Asclepiades established humane treatment for the mentally ill and made Greek medicine honorable in Rome through his own good character
Apollonia : a Christian martyr and the patron saint of dentistry; her teeth were knocked out, and then she was burned alive in 249. Her feast day is February 9.
Galen (c. 129 to c. 200) : a Greek physician and teacher, born in Pergamum (Asia Minor), author of 500 books on philosophy, philology, and medicine (83 medical books survive). He was court physician to Marcus Aurelius, a surgeon to gladiators, and a practicing anatomist (he performed vivisections and post mortems on the Barbary ape [Macaca sylvana], but not on humans). An eclectic Dogmatist, he revered Hippocrates and Plato and respected Aristotle, but also freely advanced his own findings and opinions. Galen was the great compiler and systemizer of Greco-Roman medicine, physiology, and anatomy. He accepted Aristotelian teleology and the theories of humoralism, the four qualities, and pneumatism, and he promulgated that of the 4 temperaments. Galen's piety, half-Stoic, half-Christian, appealed strongly to late antiquity and the Middle Ages. By experiment he showed that arteries carried blood, believed the brain to be the seat of intelligence, and understood the diagnostic value of the pulse. His work was superseded by Vesalius in anatomy and by Harvey in physiology.

galenic medicine : an absolute system of practice based upon the teachings of Galen.

Aëtius (Aetios) of Antiochenus or of Amida [500–575] : a Byzantine Greek writer and physician to the Emperor Justinian; his Tetrabiblion gives details of the works of Rufus (of Ephesus), Leonides, Soranus, and Philumenus, and accounts of diseases of the eye, ear, nose, and throat, and also of technical procedures (e.g., tonsillectomy, urethrotomy, and the treatment of hemorrhoids)
Rhazes [Ar. Abu Bakr Mohammad Ibn Zakariya Razi, c. 845 to c. 930] a Persian physician distinguished for his clinical practice and scholarship. He published the first known monograph distinguishing smallpox and measles (Liber de variolis et morbillis); and his students made a posthumous compilation of his writings on medicine and surgery (Liber continens, The Comprehensive Book), which was a standard textbook in western Europe for more than 600 years.
Ali Abbas [L. Haly Abbas, from Ar. Ali ibn-al-Abb[amacr]s, al Maj[umacr]si, 930–994] a Persian physician whose Al-Maliki (Liber Regius, “Royal Book”) was the leading medical text for 100 years, when it was superseded by Avicenna's Canon
Avicenna [L., from Ar. Ab[umacr] Ali al-Husayn ibn Abdallah ibn Sin[amacr] / Ibn Sin[amacr], 979–1037] the greatest physician and philosopher of the Eastern Arab world, born in Persia. His Canon is one of the most famous medical books ever written and was the standard text in Europe through the 17th century. He completely expounded the entire corpus of speculative and practical medicine according to Hippocrates, Aristotle, and Galen and systematically compiled all of Greco-Arabic medicine
Maimonides [Moses ben Maimon, 1135–1204] : rabbi, physician, and the greatest of the Jewish philosophers, born in Cordoba, Spain. He was the physician to Saladin in Egypt, during which time he wrote many medical works in Arabic, among them a commentary on the aphorisms of Hippocrates and treatises on asthma, diet, poisons, and hygiene. A prayer attributed to him is considered to rank beside the oath of Hippocrates as an ethical guide to the medical profession.
iatrochemistry : a school of medicine active from 1525 to 1660; it theorized that life, health, and disease were the result of chemical balances, and that disease was to be treated chemically. Its most famous members were

J.B. van Helmont :
François de la Boë / Sylvius Jacobus [Fr. Jacques Dubois, 1478–1555) : French physician. Confusion exists as to whether some terms ascribed to Franciscus Sylvius should be ascribed instead to this man, particularly the aqueductus mesencephali and related terms.
Paracelsus (pseudonym of Philipus Aureolus Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim, Swiss physician and alchemist [1493–1541]) : the “Luther of Medicine”, he defied the authority of Galen and Avicenna and condemned all medical teaching not based on experience. His alchemical researches led to the introduction of such substances as lead, sulfur, iron, and arsenic into pharmaceutical chemistry. Although he was far ahead of his time in many of his observations (e.g., on metabolic and on occupational diseases), much of his thinking was made obscure by his mysticism.

spagyric or hermetic medicine : semialchemistic system of practice established by Paracelsus

Fracastorius [It. Girolamo Fracastoro] : an Italian physician, born in Verona (1483–1553), a poet and geologist, who published in 1530 a medical poem, Syphilis sive morbus gallicus, in which the name syphilis was first given to the disease.
Vesalius Andreas (1514–1564). A Flemish physician and professor of anatomy of Padua, where in 1543 he produced his De humani corporis fabrica libri septem (Seven Books on the Structure of the Human Body) and founded the modern science of anatomy. Following Galen's exhortations to dissect and observe, Vesalius dissected and observed and overthrew Galen's anatomy (which was founded on nonhuman dissection). Vesalius standardized anatomical nomenclature and made important contributions in osteology and myology; in cardiology he rejected Galen's doctrine of the pervious septum. The riot of criticism for the old orthodoxy and against Vesalius drove him from Padua to Spain, where he became physician to Emperor Charles V.

Gabriele Fallopio (1523–1562), Italian anatomist, pupil of Vesalius

Fabricius ab AquapendenteHieronymus (1537–1619). Italian anatomist and surgeon, who was the pupil and successor (at Padua) of Gabriele Falloppio. He was the teacher of William Harvey, and the first demonstrator of the valves of the veins.

Harvey William (1578–1657). English physician, student of Fabricius; he practiced in London and was physician to James I and Charles I. In his Exercitatio anatomica de motu cordis et sanguinis (1628), Harvey proved, among other things, that (1) contraction of the heart muscle coincides with the pulse as the ventricles pump blood into the aorta and pulmonary artery; (2) the pulse is produced by the arteries' filling with blood; (3) the septum is impervious; (4) venous and arterial blood are the same; and (5) the blood in the right ventricle goes through the arteries to the lungs and thence through the pulmonary veins to the left ventricle and thence through the arteries to the body whence it returns along the smaller veins to the venae cavae and then into the right ventricle—a complete circulation of the blood. Harvey's work was not fully substantiated until 1827.

Sanctorius [It. Santorio Santorio, 1561–1636] : an Italian physician, professor of medicine at Padua, who devised several instruments of precision (e.g., a clinical thermometer and a pulse clock), and made quantitative experiments on basal metabolism or “insensible perspiration.”
Paré Ambroise (1510–1590) chief surgeon to three French kings and the greatest surgeon of the 16th century. Paré reformed the treatment of gunshot wounds by abolishing cauterization with boiling oil. He also practiced ligation of arteries after amputation and reintroduced podalic version into obstetrics. His famous aphorism, Je le pansay, et Dieu le guarit (“I dressed him and God healed him”), first appeared in 1585, in the fourth edition of his collected works, which he wrote in French to make more accessible.
iatrophysical : an Italian school of medicine active in the 17th century; the school opposed iatrochemistry and, inspired by the earlier experiments of Harvey and Sanctorius, combined medicine, physics, and mechanics. René Descartes [French mathematician and philosopher, 1596–1650] was an early exponent of iatrophysics, and his posthumous De homine (1662) was the first modern textbook on physiology
Thomas Sydenham [English physician, sometimes called “the English Hippocrates,” 1624–1689]
Sir Percivall Pott [English surgeon, 1714–1788]
Lazaro Spallanzani [Italian anatomist, 1729–1799]
Giuseppe Flajani [Italian surgeon, 1741–1808]
Joseph Desault [French surgeon, 1744–1795]
Giovanni Battista Morgagni [Italian anatomist and pathologist, 1682–1771]; professor at Padua, and the founder of pathological anatomy, whose clinicopathological reports were published in 1761 under the title De sedibus et causis morborum (“The Seats and Causes of Disease”)
1687 : development of an endoscope for minimally invasive surgery
Marie François Xavier Bichat [French anatomist and physiologist, 1771–1802] : founder of scientific histology and pathological anatomy
Baron Guillaume Dupuytren [French surgeon, 1777–1835]
René Théophile Hyacinthe Laënnec [French physician and inventor of the stethoscope, 1781–1826]
Claude Bernard [French physiologist, 1813–1878]
Sir William Osler [Canadian-born physician, 1849–1919] : successively professor of medicine in McGill University, the University of Pennsylvania, Johns Hopkins University, and the University of Oxford
Louis Pasteur (1822–1895) : French chemist, author of the germ theory of disease, and founder of microbiology, virology, and immunology. Pasteur is famous for disproving spontaneous generation and for his work in stereochemistry, lactic and alcoholic fermentation, microbiology and diseases of wine and beer, diseases of silkworms, anaerobiosis, virulent diseases (anthrax, chicken cholera), and preventive inoculation with attenuated microbes (especially against rabies). Pasteur's work enabled Joseph Lister to develop antiseptic surgery.
1842-1847 : anesthetic properties of a number of compounds first discovered and demonstrated
1847 : introduction of silver amalgam for dental fillings
1858 : publication of the first edition of Gray's Anatomy
Sir Francis Galton (English anthropologist and biologist, 1822–1911) boasted a hefty fortune, wide-ranging curiosity, and the compulsion to measure or count almost everything, from the visual acuity of Londoners to the number of attractive women he passed on the street. The combination helped the English gentleman-scientist make a mark in fields as diverse as statistics, meteorology, and genetics. A virtual library from software engineer Gavan Tredoux of Rochester, New York, who's writing a book on the Victorian polymath, houses all of Galton's major texts and about 300 of his papers, letters, and other writings. Galton's legacy includes the modern weather chart, which he created by marking locations on a map with the same barometric pressure. He gave fingerprinting a scientific foundation by showing that each person's prints are unique, and he devised the statistical techniques of correlation and regression. You can browse the paper in which he shot down his cousin Charles Darwin's hypothesis for inheritance. Galton, who coined the term "eugenics," was an early apostle of efforts to breed better humans. Readers can page through his 1869 work Hereditary Genius, in which he marshaled the pedigrees of English luminaries, including Darwin, to argue that ability was innate.
1863 : introduction of antiseptical surgical techniques Baron Joseph Lister (1827–1912). English surgeon who, following Pasteur's theory that bacteria cause infection, introduced to surgery the principle of antisepsis. In 1865 Lister, using carbolic acid as his antiseptic agent together with heat-sterilized instruments, greatly reduced postoperative mortality
Koch Robert (German physician and bacteriologist, 1843–1910); winner of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1905 for his work and discoveries concerning tuberculosis
Ramón y Cajal Santiago (Spanish physician and histologist, 1852–1934); co-winner, with Camillo Golgi, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1906 for describing the terminal branches of neurons, developing a method of staining nerve tissues, and discovering the structure of the nervous system.
Alfons Maria Jakob; Hans Gerhard Creutzfeldt (German psychiatrist, 1885–1964)
1911 : paraffin injection to treat vocal fold paralysis
Gullstrand Allvar (Swedish ophthalmologist, 1862–1930); winner of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1911 for elucidating the formation of optical images in the eye and incorporating it in the general laws governing optical image formation.
Heymans Corneille (Belgian physiologist, 1892–1968); winner of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1938 for his discovery of the role played by the sinus and aortic mechanisms in the regulation of respiration.
1914 : citrate identified as a blood anticoagulant, allowing for blood storage
phrenology : the theory, popular in the 18th and 19th centuries, that mental faculties could be determined by the location of bumps and other topographical features on the skull.
Palade George Emil (Romanian-born American cytologist, born 1912); co-winner, with Albert Claude and Christian René de Duve, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology for 1974 for his work on mitochondria, ribosomes, and microsomes in the structural and functional organization of the cell
Domagk, Gerhard Johannes Paul (German physician and biochemist, 1895–1964); winner of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1939 for his discovery of the effectiveness of Prontosil, the predecessor of sulfa drugs , in treating streptococcal infections.
Fleming, Sir Alexander (Scottish bacteriologist, 1881–1955); co-winner, with Ernst Boris Chain and Sir Howard Walter Florey, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology for 1945 for the discovery of penicillin
Houssay Bernardo Alberto (Argentine physiologist, 1887–1971); co-winner, with Carl Ferdinand Cori and Gerty Theresa Cori, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1947 for his demonstrations that a hormone secreted by the pituitary gland prevents metabolism of sugar and that injections of pituitary extract induce diabetes symptoms.
Weller, Thomas Huckle (American physician and parasitologist, born 1915); co-winner, with John Franklin Enders and Frederick Chapman Robbins, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1954 for the discovery that viruses (specifically, poliomyelitis viruses) can be grown in tissue culture and thereby isolated and studied, making possible the production of vaccines.
Beadle George Wells [American biochemist, 1903–1989] : co-winner, with Edward Lawrie Tatum and Joshua Lederberg, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1958 for work on the bread mold Neurospora crassa, showing that genes control a cell's production of enzymes and therefore the chemistry of the cell.
Crick Francis Harry Compton [British biologist, born 1916] : co-winner, with Maurice Wilkins and James Dewey Watson, of the Nobel prize in medicine and physiology for 1962, for discoveries concerning the molecular structure of nucleic acids and its significance for information transfer in living material.
Eccles, Sir John Carew (Australian physiologist, 1903–1997); co-winner, with Alan Lloyd Hodgkin and Andrew Fielding Huxley (British physiologist, born 1917), of the Nobel prize in medicine or physiology for 1963, for discoveries concerning the ionic mechanisms involved in excitation and inhibition in the peripheral and central portions of the nerve cell membrane
Huggins Charles Brenton (Canadian-born American surgeon, born 1901); co-winner, with Francis Peyton Rous, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1966 for his discoveries in hormonal treatment of cancer of the prostate.
Rous Francis Peyton [American pathologist, 1879–1970]; co-winner, with Charles Brenton Huggins, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1966 for his discovery of tumor-inducing viruses in 1910.
Nirenberg Marshall Warren (American biochemist, born 1927); co-winner, with Robert William Holley and Har Gobind Khorana, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1968 for their interpretation of the genetic code and its function in protein synthesis.
Lorenz Konrad Zacharias (Austrian zoologist born 1903); co-winner, with Karl von Frisch and Nikolaas Tinbergen, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology for 1973, for his pioneer work in ethology, particularly on imprinting and aggression.
Dulbecco Renato [Italian-born American biologist, born 1914]; co-winner, with David Baltimore and Howard Temin, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology for 1975, for discoveries concerning the interaction between tumor viruses and the genetic material of host cells and the role of reverse transcriptase.
Guillemin Roger Charles Louis (French-born American physician, born 1924); co-winner, with Andrew Victor Schally and Rosalyn Sussman Yalow, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1977 for showing that the hypothalamus secretes hormones that control the pituitary gland and for developing methods for isolating peptide hormones.
Hounsfield Sir Godfrey Newbold (British research scientist, born 1919); co-winner, with Allan MacLeod Cormack (South African–born American physicist, born 1924), of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1979 for their development of computerized axial tomography
Hubel David Hunter (Canadian-born American neurobiologist, born 1926); co-winner, with Tolsten Nils Wiesel and Roger Wolcott Sperry, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology for 1981 for their research on information processing in the visual system.
Brown Michael Stuart (American physician, born 1941); co-winner, with Joseph Leonard Goldstein, of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1985 for their discoveries about the regulation of cholesterol metabolism and the treatment of diseases caused by abnormally high levels of cholesterol in the blood.
Levi-Montalcini Rita [Italian neurobiologist, born 1909]. Co-winner with Stanley Cohen of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology in 1986 for discoveries regarding the mechanisms by which growth factors regulate cell and organ growth.
1982 : genetically engineered insulin becomes commercially available (the first genetically engineered drug)

Web resources

History of Medicine at NLM, NIH
Historical Anatomy on the Web by NLM, NIH
Dream Anatomy Gallery by NLM, NIH
Original texts in biomedical sciences by Dr. D.R.Forsdyke, Canada
History of Pharmacy
HISTLINE at NLM
Museum of health and medical science (MHMS)
20^th century history
20^th century American Neuroscience History Archives
University of Michigan's Health History Home Page

Bibliography

Historical Works: Medicine in the Americas

History of Medicine Division

[free at NCBI Bookshelf !]

miasma [Gr. “defilement, pollution”] : a supposed noxious emanation from the soil or earth, alleged to be the cause of diseases endemic in certain areas, such as malaria, before the true cause became known

tellurism [L. tellus earth] : the alleged production of disease by emanations from the earth or soil (telluric effluvium, or miasma)

theories that Napoleon was betrayed, poisoned, or a victim of inappropriate medical treatment have been undermined by new research based on the emperor’s trouser collection. The research has shown that his weight loss in his final year is consistent with a severe progressive illness. It lends credence to the idea that Napoleon died of stomach cancer, which was the cause of death specified in the original autopsy. Napoleon died in exile on the island of St Helena and almost since the day of his death in 1821 there have been conspiracy theories about the cause. There have also been suggestions that chronic exposure to arsenic and medication errors were involved, while the theories that he had been poisoned was given a considerable boost in 1961, when a raised arsenic concentration was found in his hair. This finding elicited numerous theories of conspiracy, treachery, and poisoning. Most recent reports even suggested inappropriate medical treatment may have contributed to the exiled emperor’s death. Suggestions that Napoleon had indeed died of stomach cancer were confounded by reports of apparent obesity at the time of his demise. But the weight changes over the course of his life, noticeable from contemporary iconography, have never before been systematically analysed. To test the hypothesis that Napoleon’s weight at death could be compatible with a diagnosis of terminal gastric cancer, the researchers, from the University Hospital of Basel and the University of Zurich, did a series of studies to determine Napoleon’s weight at death and to see what changes in his weight occurred in the last two decades of his life. For the necessary measurements, the researchers used a collection of 12 different pairs of trousers worn by Napoleon between 1800 and 1821, the year of his death in exile. Modelling trouser sizes with control data suggested that his weight did increase over part of the period, as contemporary reports had suggested. It went up from a low of 67 kg to reach 90 kg by 1820. But measurements of the trousers worn at the time of death suggested a subsequent weight loss of 11 kg during the last year of his life, reducing his weight to 79 kg. The weight found from the trouser tests were then confirmed by the results of a second approach to weight measurement, using the subcutaneous fat measurement that was done at Napoleon’s autopsy. The measurement—1.5 inches (3.8 cm)—was then compared with a control group of 270 men dying from various causes. Napoleon’s terminal weight loss of > 10 kg is suggestive of a severe progressive chronic illness and is highly consistent with a diagnosis of gastric cancer^ref1,
ref2.

Phylosophy of science

religion and science

Buddhism : many religious leaders find themselves at odds with science, but the head of Tibetan Buddhism is a notable exception. One of the first things people discover when they meet His Holiness the Dalai Lama is that the head of Tibetan Buddhism likes a good laugh. People in good spirits are better able to control their blood sugar levels and meditation can transform emotions, and daily experiences can alter the expression of genes. Since 1987 that the Dalai Lama has convened 12 times leading psychologists and neurobiologists to hear the latest scientific thinking in fields related to the human mind. These meetings are organized by the Mind & Life Institute in Louisville, Colorado, which was established in the 1980s to promote communication between science and Buddhism. But much of the credit for this open communication goes to the Dalai Lama himself. In accordance with Tibetan tradition, the current Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso, was recognized as the 14th reincarnation of the Bodhisattva of Compassion in 1937, when he was only 2 years old. Gyatso has long had an interest in science. When he accepted the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, he commented: "Both science and the teachings of the Buddha tell us of the fundamental unity of all things." He once said that if he had not been a monk, he would have been an engineer. Enthusiasm for science seems to extend beyond the spiritual leader. Tibetans, surprisingly enough, were the most strongly represented ethnic group working on the Human Genome Project: although they account for only 0.1% of the world's population, Tibetans made up about 10% of the project's workforce^ref. For many Buddhist monks, this interest in science is focused on an intense curiosity about the workings of the brain. Monks typically spend hours in meditation each day, a practice they say enhances their powers of concentration. Highly trained monks report being able to focus on a single object for hours without distraction and to recall complex scenes in exquisite detail. A question that deeply interests the Dalai Lama, and indeed some neuroscientists, is whether these phenomena have a biological basis. As a key component of Buddhist belief is that meditation literally transforms the mind, Buddhists are keenly interested in scientific advances that could help explain this observation. For the monks, the sessions may help them deal with modern questions not addressed in traditional Buddhist teachings, such as the issue of the morality of stem-cell research^ref. Certain neural processes in the brain are more coordinated in people with extensive training in meditation, an observation that may be linked to the heightened awareness reported by meditating monks^ref. Gage says that what particularly impressed him was the Dalai Lama's empirical approach. "At one point I asked: 'What if neuroscience comes up with information that directly contradicts Buddhist philosophy?'," says Gage. "The answer was: 'Then we would have to change the philosophy to match the science'." So far that hasn't been necessary. And if the reported benefits of laughter are correct, there is no need for the Dalai Lama to rein in his sense of humour either. During a discussion of how our childhoods shape who we are, he observed that he liked to play with toy guns as a child and even picked on his brother. "I was the mean one," he said, thereby stabilizing blood sugar levels throughout the room.
embryonic stem-cell (ESCs) research : when Pope John Paul II addressed the Pontifical Academy of Sciences in 1992, he tackled yet again Galileo's famous battles with the Church 4 centuries ago. In his talk, entitled "Faith can never conflict with reason", the Pope was doing his best to mend fences. Although science and religion form "2 realms of knowledge", he said, "the 2 realms are not altogether foreign to each other, they have points of contact". Despite the Pope's optimistic words, the tension between faith and science never fully subsides. And as these realms regularly come into contact, over everything from Darwin to Dolly the cloned sheep, they sometimes collide with explosive force. Today, with scientists manipulating the machinery of life as never before, the debate is in full swing. Nanotechnology, artificial intelligence, cloning, creationism and genetic modification all test the strained relationship between faith and advancing technology. If ever there was a technology that could get mankind accused of playing God, it is genetic engineering. As humanity mixes species with species and creates clones of creatures, religions have had to grapple with questions that could not have been foreseen when most religious texts were written. The Bible can be used to argue both for and against genetic manipulation. In the Old Testament, lines such as "Thou shalt not sow thy field with mingled seed" (Leviticus 19: 19), and "Thou shalt not sow thy vineyard with divers seeds" (Deuteronomy 22: 9), have been used by some Christians as evidence that meddling with creation is unacceptable — although the same lines could be used to argue against traditional agricultural practices. Others note that, according to Genesis, man was made in the image and likeness of God and given dominion over all living things, which would make genetic modification mankind's right. The Catholic, Jewish and Islamic faiths generally see no need to ban genetically modified foods or vaccines for moral reasons. On a purely practical level, Jews and Muslims share the worry of whether their food contains any hidden genes from pigs or other forbidden dietary products. In the Hindu tradition, food is believed to affect your physical and mental constitution and your karmic balance. Each Hindu must assess whether the motivation behind genetic engineering is a positive desire to help feed the world or a negative one driven by commercial exploitation in order to determine its impact on body and mind. Other religions also share this worry about how genetic engineering is used. But on the purest level of assessing the ethics of the technology itself, there is little to go on to decide whether mixing corn with bacteria is ok, but mixing mankind with mice is not. There's no list of boxes to tick off to tell you when you have gone too far and changed the animal or plant into something fundamentally different : there is no commandment from God saying: 'Thou shalt not genetically engineer.' It's a judgement call. Today's frontline controversy — stem-cell research — has prompted a wide range of reactions from religious leaders, much of it negative. But the fundamental, religion-based belief in the sanctity of human life, even at the stage of an embryo, clashes in this field with another fundamental human desire: to alleviate suffering and cure disease. The debate does not leave room for simple answers, for individuals or society as a whole. Francis Collins, head of the US National Human Genome Research Institute in Bethesda, Maryland, and a devout Christian, has described himself as being "intensely conflicted" over stem-cell research. "It is a classic example of a collision between 2 very important principles," he says. The opposition to stem-cell research cannot be dismissed as merely 'anti-science'. Most religious traditions sincerely value medicine and science, and make a serious effort to reconcile scientific thinking with doctrine. Marialuisa Lavitrano had been uncertain about what to expect. A pathologist at the University of Milan-Bicocca, Lavitrano had been invited to organize a series of scientific meetings at the Vatican about xenotransplantation and the genetic modification of animals. That was three years ago, and she is still surprised by the response she got. "The cardinals wanted to know everything about the science," she says. "It was a fascinating debate and, frankly, I was not prepared for so much open-mindedness." After the meetings, the Vatican legitimized the transplant of animal organs into humans and the use of animals in medical research^ref (E. Sgreccia et al. Nature 414, 687; 2001). The Vatican often seeks informed advice on questions emerging from progress in science and medicine. And many researchers who have been involved say that they are surprised by the high quality of scientific discourse with the cardinals. Despite the Church's reputation for nurturing anti-scientific tendencies — as recently as the 1960s, Catholic priests in training were asked to renounce 'modern errors' such as darwinism and the expansion of the Universe — the Vatican has long abandoned literal interpretations of scripture. The Vatican takes regular scientific advice from the 400-year-old Pontifical Academy of Sciences in the Vatican City. The academy is made up of 80 eminent scientists from around the globe chosen by the academy itself. Each November they hold a scientific meeting, usually on a topic of their choosing, or sometimes on a matter requested by the central administration of the Church; these have covered everything from birth control to cloning, genetic engineering and the origin of life. The annual meetings conclude with an audience with the Pope. He and his officials then take this scientific advice into account when they draw up guidance notes and issue decrees on the Church's doctrine. Pope John Paul II has shown a notable interest in science ever since he took over as head of the Catholic Church in 1978. Perched on top of the private residence of the Pope at Castelgandolfo is an astronomical observatory that, partnered with a telescope in Arizona, is funded by the Vatican to the tune of US$1 million a year. The possibility of extraterrestrial life and intelligence, and the implications of cosmology for Christian ideas about the beginning and end of time, will be upcoming challenges for science-minded theologians. This process of discussion and reconciliation may even be initiating a fundamental change. Some Catholics are beginning to hope that recent insights into developmental biology could move the Church from its 135-year-old position that human life begins at conception — the main obstacle to it accepting the study of stem cells extracted from human embryos. Much of the theological debate about stem-cell research centres on the question of when life begins. Some traditions, including most sects of Judaism and Islam, aren't troubled by this because they don't consider the early embryo fully human. Most Jewish Talmudic scholars, for example, argue that 'ensoulment' takes place 40 days or more into pregnancy, once the human form is roughly established. Before that, the embryo is described as 'water'. Israel accepts embryonic stem-cell research, and the Israeli Academy of Sciences and the Jewish Rabbinical Assembly, headquartered in the United States, have both come out in favour. Likewise, researchers at the Royan Institute in Tehran have developed stem-cell lines with the full blessing of Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. According to Hinduism, life begins at conception. But this does not make for easy decisions on the ethics of stem-cell research. Destruction of an embryo could still be justified if it is considered to be an "extraordinary, unavoidable circumstance" and an act "done for greater good". Based on these criteria, many traditional Hindu priests are unwilling to condone the work, but it has not provoked much opposition in India, for instance, where embryonic stem-cell research is allowed. The strongest objections come from Christian sects that regard the sacrifice of an embryo — even an undifferentiated clump of cells in a 3-day-old blastocyst — as totally unacceptable. Embryos cannot be killed, they say, any more than Death Row prisoners can be used in lethal experiments, even if the goal is to relieve suffering in others. Evangelical Christianity relies on a specific interpretation of scripture for its advice on this matter. Psalm 139: 13, for example, says: "For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb." In Jeremiah 1: 5 God tells the prophet, "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you," implying that Jeremiah had 'personhood' in God's eyes even before he was an embryo. This roughly matches current Vatican thinking. The Catholic Church holds that human life is sacred from the moment of fertilization. But some Catholic theologians point out that the Church's view on the moral status of the embryo has changed over time, and may change again. In fact, scientific breakthroughs — the discovery of the mammalian ovum in 1827 and the first microscopic views of developing embryos — helped to shape the Vatican's thinking. The findings informed Pope Pius IX's decision in 1869 to abandon the Church's moral distinction between early- and late-term abortions and to call instead for full protection of life from the moment of conception. Today, the Vatican does not strictly claim that the early embryo is a person — only that it deserves respect as a potential human being, says Carlos Bedate of the Autonomous University of Madrid. Bedate has an unusual background as a Jesuit priest with a doctorate in molecular biology, and has served on a Spanish advisory committee for bioethics. He thinks the ambiguity in Catholic thought could open a window for the Church's acceptance of embryonic stem-cell research. Recent advances in developmental biology have shown that an embryo's viability depends on the cellular environment as well as its own DNA. We cannot consider that in the early embryo there is the entire information needed to complete the process of development,. A few Catholic theologians have spoken out in favour of human embryonic stem-cell research, including Jean Porter of the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, Margaret Farley of Yale University, and Christian Kummer, who trained as a zoologist and is now director of an institute for scientific issues related to philosophy and theology at the Jesuit Faculty of Philosophy in Munich. Kummer says that they are free to voice these views without fear of censure from the Church. Academic freedom is more pronounced than one would expect from knowing the Vatican's official positions. Bedate thinks that the Vatican may eventually be open to reconsidering the issue on the basis of new scientific understanding. But any formal change in the Church's position is likely to come very slowly, as Galileo's case once showed. Arguments about the moment of ensoulment are crucial, but they are not the only factor in religion-based objections to stem-cell research. As evangelical Christian Nigel Cameron, a bioethicist at the Institute on Biotechnology and the Human Future in Chicago, Illinois, told a US Senate committee in 2001: "It is by no means necessary to take the view that the early embryo is a full human person in order to be convinced that deleterious experimentation is improper." The Church of England, for example, does not contend that early embryos are fully human. Yet they are "deserving of respect" nonetheless. In its guidelines on ethical investment, the Church concludes that "companies, a major part of whose business is engaged in the cloning of embryos (even for therapeutic use), should be avoided." Another point of controversy is the source of the embryo. Some stem-cell researchers use embryos discarded from in vitro fertilization (IVF) clinics, whereas others clone new embryos to harvest their cells. The very practice of IVF has faced strict opposition from the Catholic Church on the grounds that it breaks the God-given connection between sex and procreation — a rule often voiced during discussions on the ethics of contraception. Most other religious groups, including evangelicals, see IVF as a good solution for infertile couples who want children. But that acceptance is now coming under greater scrutiny because IVF clinics frequently discard 'excess' embryos that are not needed for implantation. Although the issue hasn't received the same attention as abortion, some Christian leaders have begun to speak out. In predominantly Catholic Italy, attempts to find a compromise on the issue have led only to new problems. The country passed a law this year legalizing IVF despite Vatican opposition. But no embryos can be destroyed — all have to be transferred to the mother's uterus. This can increase the risk to mothers and even lead to miscarriages in the case of multiple pregnancies. Other denominations, including the Unitarian Universalists, one of the most liberal of religious groups, take more umbrage with using custom-made embryos than the 'leftovers' from IVF. Although the Unitarian Universalist Association has no official consensus opinion on stem cells, its president, William Sinkford, offered his personal opinion in 2001 that there should be no ban on embryonic stem-cell research. But he added: "I would contend that no human embryos should be created specifically for stem-cell experimentation, thus turning human life and human reproduction into a commodity — surely a clear affront to our first principle affirming the inherent dignity of human beings." Perhaps this dignity seems all the more affronted since the resulting experiments have not, so far, yielded life-saving results. Damien Keown, a specialist in Buddhist ethics at Goldsmiths College in London, sums it up: "Scientific curiosity seems to be the main factor motivating cloning experiments at present, and overall Buddhists are likely to be sceptical about the need for this curiosity to be satisfied at the price of destroying human life." When Seoul National University's Woo Suk Hwang cloned human embryonic stem-cell lines earlier this year he cited his own Buddhist beliefs, saying that the experiments were a kind of "recycling of life" in line with reincarnation. Some Buddhist groups in South Korea, where Buddhists account for about a third of the population, supported him. But most Buddhist scholars say the killing of an embryo at any stage violates a central tenet that living things should not be harmed. Cloning for reproductive purposes, on the other hand, does not require destroying the embryo and so does not in itself violate Buddhist precepts. The problem is not when life is started, but when it is stopped, as in therapeutic cloning. Dr Hwang is on shaky ground in claiming that Buddhism supports cloning, without careful qualification. Protestants, who make up another third of South Korea's population, reacted strongly to the news of Hwang's experiments. 16 Protestant groups, representing 6,000 people — half of them doctors in the Christian Medical Fellowship — met in September 2004 to plan a campaign devoted to making the use of human embryos in research illegal. But the extent to which religious opinion influences politics and laws varies dramatically from society to society. In Spain, where 99% of the population is Catholic, a law was recently passed to allow the use of IVF embryos in stem-cell research. But in Italy, which vehemently opposes the use of European Union funding for stem-cell research, the population is much more reactionary on religious issues than the Church itself. This zeal, rather than formal Catholic doctrine, is at the core of the recent creationist movement in Italy^ref and of other perceived 'anti-science' tendencies throughout Europe. Another place where religion has proved to be the driving force for politics is the United States. In November 2004's election, President George W. Bush owed his victory in part to votes from his fellow evangelical Christians. Evangelicals are not uniformly conservative in their political views — some oppose capital punishment, for example. But most evangelical leaders are strongly against embryonic stem-cell research. The Southern Baptist Convention, which represents the second largest US denomination after Catholics, says it relies on a "crass utilitarian ethic which would sacrifice the lives of the few for the benefits of the many". Such statements have surely influenced the United States' rigid policy on stem-cell research, in which federal funding is limited for use on a few dozen pre-established cell lines, and cannot be used to establish new ones. Does this reflect public attitudes? Polls reveal mixed opinions — although a lot hinges on the wording of the question. In July 2004, Catholics for Free Choice published a poll of 2,239 Catholics nationwide, and found that 72% supported allowing scientists to use stem cells obtained from very early human embryos to find cures for serious diseases such as Alzheimer's, diabetes and Parkinson's. But polls on embryonic stem-cell research often fail to mention that the research requires destroying human embryos. In August the Catholic bishops released the results of their own poll. When given a choice between funding both adult and embryonic stem-cell research or only work that didn't require destroying an embryo, Americans preferred the latter by 61% to 23%. Efforts to establish ethical rules on stem cells that transcend national and spiritual boundaries have proved remarkably unsuccessful. After years of delayed decisions, on 19 November the United Nations came to what was widely called a "compromise" position on cloning technologies — it adopted a non-binding declaration that asks member states to adopt legislation that respects "human dignity". In the end, this statement is likely to be interpreted in as many different ways as some lines from the Bible. So scientists and theologians will continue to talk — and to disagree. At least one thing has changed in this debate since Galileo's day, for better or for worse: now, science is the orthodox worldview, in the industrialized world at least, and religion stands outside, raising objections. At bioethics conferences biologists rarely show any knowledge of theology. But religious people are expected to have spent huge amounts of time learning all the science. One thing is certain. Everyone agrees that fundamental ethical questions underlying stem-cell research, many of which transcend religion, need to be addressed. The power of these new technologies is so great that we can no longer deal with them in a vacuum. This affects everyone across the board. And stem cells are just the beginning. The stuff that's coming down the pipe will make this look like child's play. Organic mixed with inorganic, one species mixed with another. Everything from the molecular level on up will be fluid.

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