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Thanks. Let's take as an example somebody we know more about, Paracelsus who died in 1541: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paracelsus https://en.wikipedia.org/wi

by acqq 10y ago

Thanks. Let's take as an example somebody we know more about, Paracelsus who died in 1541: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paracelsus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paracelsus "Paracelsus grew up during a period of Renaissance humanism" "He is also a famous revolutionary for utilizing observations of nature, rather than referring to ancient texts, something of radical defiance during his time." Is that a myth? And still: "Much of his theoretical work does not withstand modern scientific thought, but his insights laid the foundation for a more dynamic approach in the medical sciences." Had the medicine been good before him, it would be even better afterwards, but we can actually evaluate the quality of his achievements and therefore we get the idea how it was before. We can even use much more recent example, Semmelweis, died 1865: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis "Despite various publications of results where hand washing reduced mortality to below 1%, Semmelweis' observations conflicted with the established scientific and medical opinions of the time and his ideas were rejected by the medical community. Some doctors were offended at the suggestion that they should wash their hands and Semmelweis could offer no acceptable scientific explanation for his findings. Semmelweis' practice earned widespread acceptance only years after his death, when Louis Pasteur confirmed the germ theory."

foldr 10y ago
>Is that a myth? Well, yes. The second article I linked to quotes several physicians explaining the importance of observation hundreds of years before Paracelsus lived. And the fact that people were performing dissections hundreds of years before the Renaissance is a clear demonstration that they knew the value of observation. >We can even use much more recent example, Semmelweis, died 1865 This example only goes to show that there was nothing special about the medievals. New advances in science are often initially rejected by the scientific community.
- acqq 10y ago
  The second article gives some quotes, but does their mere existence change anything, if the medical science remained where it was even in 1541, or much later? Apart from learning that some people wrote something clever, is there any evidence to some meaningful results? That's what counts. I don't see them still. Until then, I don't consider the poor state of medicine between Galen and Renaissance a myth. The periods of the strong religious dogma de facto existed and they really significantly limited the advance of sciences. The opposition to science is strong even in the present times among the "fundamentally" religious. It surely wasn't better before.
  - foldr 10y ago
    There was certainly progress in anatomical knowledge. Reliably effective medicine is really a very modern development.
    - acqq 10y ago
      > There was certainly progress in anatomical knowledge Are there any preserved books with the anatomical drawings that can prove that or something equivalently indisputable? I've expected some link already. EDIT, what follows is written after your post that mentions de Liuzzi: I don't see how he actually supports your claim of a visible progress before Renaissance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondino_de_Liuzzi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondino_de_Liuzzi -- an Italian who died 1326 (14th century) and the Renaissance is considered to originate in Italy in late 13th and to include 14th century. Moreover: "He is often credited as the “restorer of anatomy” because he made seminal contributions to the field by reintroducing the practice of public dissection of human cadavers and writing the first modern anatomical text." How come he had to "restore" anatomy at all? EDIT2: And what were the reasons for the poor state of medicine between Galen and Renaissance when not the religious/dogmatic ones (as in "the Bible says how God made a man and the animals, separately")? We see these arguments even now. EDIT3: Just like you admit "beginning of Renaissance" I admit I formulated somewhere my view of poor state of medicine as "between Galen and Renaissance" which even (probably wrongly) includes some years between Galen and the Christian dominance, and I still stay behind the point of my claim: there's an immense period of time where we don't have any good example of functioning scientific approach to the medicine, and the fundamentalist understanding of Bible was the very significant cause for that. EDIT4: Your "printing press" excuse doesn't correlate with all the progress in antique and also at the start of the Renaissance (and before the printing press), the very example you gave, but my "religion" argument not only correlates with the "dark medicine ages" but also with many source texts that we can read. So I still see your arguments more as wishful thinking than anything else. You can't excuse the religion holding on to the "it's written in this fine book, and that's it." EDIT5: You can disprove my claim of "poor medicine" for many centuries influenced by the Christian dogma if you can quote some text or drawings made between cca 300-something AD and 1200-something AD of any author actually correcting Galen who died 216 AD and who made very obvious errors in his own writings. His writings were dutifully copied through almost 1000 years but, to my knowledge, not corrected during all these centuries until the Italian times you link to. The times also known as Renaissance. We can nitpick the dates, but nobody can refute that Renaissance actually existed. How can I prove that it's religion that suppressed the science? Simply because the written (and other) material available to history shows people spending immense energy to the religious questions, but not to the science. That's the main period we can observe that in that amount. During these times the Church surely didn't have to explicitly forbid something that simply nobody did. They've spent the energy on "heresies" they were confronted to -- like was Jesus ever made or was he always his own father, are the icons allowed, stuff like that. You consider that "not fundamentalist," call it what you want, it was the religion-and-dogma-caused blindness for science. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renaissance_of_the_12th_century https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renaissance_of_the_12th_centur...

by acqq 10y ago

foldr 10y ago

>Is that a myth? Well, yes. The second article I linked to quotes several physicians explaining the importance of observation hundreds of years before Paracelsus lived. And the fact that people were performing dissections hundreds of years before the Renaissance is a clear demonstration that they knew the value of observation. >We can even use much more recent example, Semmelweis, died 1865 This example only goes to show that there was nothing special about the medievals. New advances in science are often initially rejected by the scientific community.

acqq 10y ago
The second article gives some quotes, but does their mere existence change anything, if the medical science remained where it was even in 1541, or much later? Apart from learning that some people wrote something clever, is there any evidence to some meaningful results? That's what counts. I don't see them still. Until then, I don't consider the poor state of medicine between Galen and Renaissance a myth. The periods of the strong religious dogma de facto existed and they really significantly limited the advance of sciences. The opposition to science is strong even in the present times among the "fundamentally" religious. It surely wasn't better before.
- foldr 10y ago
  There was certainly progress in anatomical knowledge. Reliably effective medicine is really a very modern development.
  - acqq 10y ago
    > There was certainly progress in anatomical knowledge Are there any preserved books with the anatomical drawings that can prove that or something equivalently indisputable? I've expected some link already. EDIT, what follows is written after your post that mentions de Liuzzi: I don't see how he actually supports your claim of a visible progress before Renaissance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondino_de_Liuzzi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondino_de_Liuzzi -- an Italian who died 1326 (14th century) and the Renaissance is considered to originate in Italy in late 13th and to include 14th century. Moreover: "He is often credited as the “restorer of anatomy” because he made seminal contributions to the field by reintroducing the practice of public dissection of human cadavers and writing the first modern anatomical text." How come he had to "restore" anatomy at all? EDIT2: And what were the reasons for the poor state of medicine between Galen and Renaissance when not the religious/dogmatic ones (as in "the Bible says how God made a man and the animals, separately")? We see these arguments even now. EDIT3: Just like you admit "beginning of Renaissance" I admit I formulated somewhere my view of poor state of medicine as "between Galen and Renaissance" which even (probably wrongly) includes some years between Galen and the Christian dominance, and I still stay behind the point of my claim: there's an immense period of time where we don't have any good example of functioning scientific approach to the medicine, and the fundamentalist understanding of Bible was the very significant cause for that. EDIT4: Your "printing press" excuse doesn't correlate with all the progress in antique and also at the start of the Renaissance (and before the printing press), the very example you gave, but my "religion" argument not only correlates with the "dark medicine ages" but also with many source texts that we can read. So I still see your arguments more as wishful thinking than anything else. You can't excuse the religion holding on to the "it's written in this fine book, and that's it." EDIT5: You can disprove my claim of "poor medicine" for many centuries influenced by the Christian dogma if you can quote some text or drawings made between cca 300-something AD and 1200-something AD of any author actually correcting Galen who died 216 AD and who made very obvious errors in his own writings. His writings were dutifully copied through almost 1000 years but, to my knowledge, not corrected during all these centuries until the Italian times you link to. The times also known as Renaissance. We can nitpick the dates, but nobody can refute that Renaissance actually existed. How can I prove that it's religion that suppressed the science? Simply because the written (and other) material available to history shows people spending immense energy to the religious questions, but not to the science. That's the main period we can observe that in that amount. During these times the Church surely didn't have to explicitly forbid something that simply nobody did. They've spent the energy on "heresies" they were confronted to -- like was Jesus ever made or was he always his own father, are the icons allowed, stuff like that. You consider that "not fundamentalist," call it what you want, it was the religion-and-dogma-caused blindness for science. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renaissance_of_the_12th_century https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renaissance_of_the_12th_centur...