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History of Biology > Philosophy, Biology and Medicine of the Ancient World > Flashcards

Philosophy, Biology and Medicine of the Ancient World Flashcards

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1
Q

What was the Ancient Greek philosophers best achievemet?

A

invented purely scientific curiosity

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2
Q

What did purely scientific curiosity of Ancient Greece look like?

A

distribution of greek culture throughout the Mediterranean

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3
Q

Science to the Greeks was defined by two concepts in an attempt to understand the world?

A

1) the natural vs the supernatural

2) rational explanation open to scrutiny (observation and reason)

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4
Q

The Greek philosophers did not invoke what to explain the world? and for what reasons?

A

supernatural agencies

  • Greek religion did not have a complete explanation of the world
  • Greek gods had human characteristics and faults with little interest in people
  • Priests did not dominate Greek civilization
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5
Q

Who was Thales? (650-580 BC)

A
  • from Miletus

- little was known from him but he was the first natural philosopher

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6
Q

What were Thales 3 main teaching points?

A
  1. Earth is a disk surrounded by water
  2. Water is the fundamental beginning of all things
  3. Forces that cause change in matter is transformation
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7
Q

Thales could lay claim to the scientific approach because…?

A

his naturalism and unity of matter

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8
Q

Empedocles was like Thales how?

A

his naturalism

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9
Q

Empedocles was known for his what model and biology?

A
  • 4 element model of nature: fire, earth, water, air

- animals evolved from limbs and torsos combining

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10
Q

Democritus (460-360 BC) as an atomist and religious skeptic?

A
  • believed the world consisted of divisible particles to small pieces that cannot be divided
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11
Q

Describe Democritus’ atomism and biology?

A
  • believed the soul contained fire atoms

- the brain is the organ of though, the heart of courage, and the liver of sensuality (DIFFERENT FROM THE OTHER GREEKS)

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12
Q

Democritus was best known for being a religious skeptic and aethist?

A
  • believed there were no divine beings; -
  • natural law govern the world not divine will
  • disagreed with the 4 elements from empedocles
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13
Q

Hippocrates (460-361) during the same time as democritus looked at medicine?

A

Early greek medicine focussed on religion and magical cures

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14
Q

These healers were known as Asclepiads, why?

A
  • religious medical/healing centres in temples working as institutions for school and surgery
  • nepotistic guilds
  • the staff of Asclepios and its symbolism arose
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15
Q

Quickly summarize the life of Hippocrates

A
  • born in Clos to an Ascelpiad father
  • travelled Asia Minor
  • practiced in Clos and Thessaly
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16
Q

Where did all his written work come from?

A

Written by his students and summarized into a Hippocratic Corpus

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17
Q

What was different about his approach to medicine?

A
  • rejected the supernatural and religion in medicine
  • suspicious of broad theory
  • held very high ethical standards
18
Q

He developed the Hippocratic Method

A
  • observe all using your senses
  • gather observations without prejudice
  • study patient rather than disease
  • evaluate honestly
  • assist nature to heal
19
Q

Hippocratic physiology and the four elements and four humours and illness

A

blood, yellow bile, black bile, etc

- and pathology describe an imbalance of these humours as illness

20
Q

Side note - Rudolf Virchow challenged Hippocrates how?

A

Humoral Physiology vs cellular physiology

21
Q

2 interesting points thought of by Hippocrates

A

1) Pneuma - life giving principle of air

2) the brain functioned as a radiator

22
Q

Hippocrates also looked at logical treatments

A
  • diagnosis was a holistic view: the whole body was sick

- therapies: moving a patient to a cleaner area, laxatives or opiums

23
Q

Aristotle and which other Greeks showed a shift from what to what?

A

Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle shifted away from purely natural curiosity toward more human-centered and theological interests

24
Q

Quickly summarized Aristotle’s life

A
  • born Macedonia
  • taught as an Asclepiad
  • study for 18 years at Plato’s Academy
  • studied Marine Biology on the Island of Lesbos (classifying up to 580 animals)
  • fled Lesbos to Macedonia and tutored Alexander the Great
  • returned to Athens for his own school: the Lyceum
25
Q

What influence did Plato have on Aristotle?

A
  • implemented his lack of interest in the natural world – focusing on abstract ideas and theology
  • His theory of universals: there exists changeless, eternal, ideal forms with objects in our world reflecting imperfections of these forms
26
Q

What was this Theory by Plato called and what did it later develop into?

A

Essentialism: some essence of these ideal attributes extend to certain high people in the world – people in this world are unideal variations
Population thinking: variations are the only ideal form

27
Q

Further Plato’s belief of teleological thinking affected the development of biology

A
  • everything has its intended purpose, everything was created by God with a rational in mind
  • “Nature does nothing without a purpose”
  • the laws which govern nature are not nature itself, but are imposed by divine intelligence
28
Q

How did Aristotle modify Plato’s idealism?

A
  • forms are ideas, and they are in the world, not outside it
29
Q

Describe Aristotle’s Scale of Nature and his systematics

A
  • never attempted to formally classify things but he understood that natural groups existed
30
Q

Describe Aristotle’s digression of natural groups of organisms

A

Natural groups members have correlated attributes - some leading to natural or unnatural groupings

  • attributes may be essential to the organism possessing it
  • attributes may be due to functional dependence
  • attributes may be related to common ancestor or relatedness
31
Q

Final thoughts on Aristotle and the influence by Plato

A
  • heavily affected by essentialism and did not examine any evolutionary change (not till Darwin)
  • his natural history could perfectly fit Christian Theology and the Scholastics*
32
Q

The Library and Museum of Alexandria

A
  • at the time of Ptolemy

- was a university; containing research labs, dissection rooms, observatory, zoos

33
Q

Describe the advancement of Anatomy at the Library Museum of Alexandria

A

Herophilus and Erasistratus & disections and their anatomy and physiology

34
Q

What was different to the Roman approach to natural history compared to the Greeks

A
  • they turned toward Encyclopedism and focused on civic duty and practical subjects
  • rather than scientific thought and research
35
Q

Two major example from the Romans

A
  • Pliny the Elder - lived as a states man in service of Rome as well as a scholastic writting a 37 volume encyclopedia
  • Celsus wrote De Medicina the first medical book
36
Q

Who was Galen?

A
  • A greek and most influential medical writer at the time
  • worked as a surgeon to a gladiatorial school in Pergamon
  • was greatest physician and worked with Roman Emporers
37
Q

What was unique about his philosophy? (3)

A
  • believed in one God, but opposed atheistic materialism
  • had a highly teleological view on the Human Body (nature does nothing without a purpose)
  • revered Hippocratus
38
Q

How did Galen study anatomy?

A
  • he learned from the Museum and Library of Alexandria
  • dissections of animals and dogs and extrapolating them on humans
  • inspecting traumatic injuries
  • examining bones from destroyed tombs
39
Q

Some of Galens better insight in anatomy

A
  • Kidney’s make urine
  • arteries contain blood
  • brain is the center of thought and reason
  • cutting the spinal in different places leads to various results
40
Q

Some of Galen’s beliefs that are questionable

A
  • blood doesn’t circulate
  • venous blood distributes food and enters the arterial system through pores in the ventricles
  • arterial blood distributes pneuma throughout the body
41
Q

Some of Galen’s Treatments

A
  • influence of diet to balance the humours (Hippocrates) or bloodletting
  • surgery
  • favoured complex drug mixtures (polypharmacy)
42
Q

The scientific legacy of the ancient world

A

1) Spiritual of natural, rational thought and inquiry (the Greek civilization allowed for that)
2) Natural history (Anatomy)
3) Pragmatic and ethical approach to medicine
4) Dogmatic adherence to ancient authorities (how did religion influence science and biology?)
5) the first job of modern science was to assimilate ancient science and travel beyond and overthrow the most influential ancients

ALL OF THESE POINTS ARE PERFECT FOR THE ESSAY QUESTION

History of Biology (2 decks)

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