The Ancient World Pt 2 Flashcards
Socrates, Plato and Aristotle represented what?
A shift away from natural curiosity, toward more human centred and theological interests
How did Socrates, Plato and Aristotle all relate?
Socrates (c. 470–399 BC) - Mentor of Plato
Plato (c. 427–347 BC) - Student of Socrates
Aristotle (384–322 BC) - Student of Plato
Aristotle was the most influential philosopher and scientist in history, when was he alive? He was born during the life of who?
384-322 BC
Hippocrates and Dimocritus
Summary of Aristotles Life
Where was he born?
Who was his father?
When and why did he go to Athens?
What did he study?
Why did he leave Lesbos and what did he do when he left?
macedonia
His father was a Asclepian physician
To learn philosophy at Platos academy
Studied marine biology
Fled due to revolution, where he Tutored Alexander the Great
When did Aristotle return to Athens and what did he do?
334 BC, he established his own school, the Lyceum which was a one man University versed in many subjects including Biology, physics, and philosophy
why did Aristotle have to flee Athens? What was his fate?
he was suspected of impiety (wanted to avoid fate of Socrates)
died in exle on the island of Chalcis
What were Platos ideas that were considered harmful to biology?
His abstract ideas (such as theory of universals) and his belief in theology. He had no interest in the natural world.
The evolutionary biologist and historian Ernst Mayr accused Plato of doing what?
impeding the progress of biology for over 2000 years because aspects of Platos philosophy were anti evolutionary
What are Platos theory of the universals?
In another dimension there are eternal ideal forms, objects on Earth are the imperfect reflections of these forms
What is the essentialist thinking of Plato and later Artistotle vs population thinking in modern biology?
Essentialist: the idea forms exist in another dimension/reality, our world is full of imperfect copies of these forms
Modern: All variation is what we see in front of us, there are no perfect copies
What was platos belief of Teleological explanations?
Explanation of things based on their intended, divinely inspired purposed, rather than based on their causes or origins.
What was Aristotle mainly interested in?
Zoology, mentions 580 animals, was also a keen observer and dissector of animals, especially sea and terrestrial animals.
How did Aristotle modify platos ideal forms?
He believed that forms are ideas, they are in the wold and not outside it. Matter is potentiality, form gives matter reality.
What was Aristotle’s view of livng things?
heavily teleological, like plato’s “nature does nothing without a purpose” the purpose of something was its “final cause”
what were Aristotle’s views of the laws which govern nature?
The laws are not in nature itself, they are imposed by divine intelligence
What was Aristotles Scale of Nature/Great Chain of Being? How did he rank positions?
How he depicted relationships between organisms
Ranked things according to form dominance (humans were at the top). His heiarchy was exclusive.
what are Aristotle’s systematics? (groups)
he never tried to establish a formal classification of things, but he understood that natural groups existed
What is Digression of Natural Groups (not aristotles thinking)?
Natural groups are those with members who have correlated attributes, some attributes of organisms lead to natural groups while others lead to unnatural groups
In the digression of natural groups, why do attributes lead to natural groups?
- Attributes that lead to natural groups are essential to the form of the organism
- Attributes that lead to natuual groups are correlated because they must occur together for functional interdependence
- Attributes that lead to natural groups are inherited by the same common ancestor
Aristotle thought anatomy should be what?
comparative, not evolutionary
What were the 5 categories of phenomena that explain organic function according to Aristotle?
- information processing
- metabolism
- temperature regulation
- inheritance
- embryogenesis
what view did Aristotle accept concerning human neuroanatomy?
he accepted the erroneous view of the early hippocratics that the brain cools the blood and produces mucus
what did Aristotle thing about the heart?
heart is the organ of soul and intelligence
Aristotle’s view on the gut
it is where Food is “cooked”
Aristotle’s conception of nature?
Geocentric
Everything has purpose
Form dominance
Physics- thought everything had natural place
Conclusions on Aristotle
He was an inspiration to later biologists and he founded natural history as he had a stronger orientation to nature than Plato, but he was not rigorously natural.
what did Aristotle’s approach take from plato that is viewed negatively?
plato’s Essentialism, he did not imagine any kind of evolutionary change
What was The library and museum of alexandria and who ruled it?
Greek institution (in Egypt) and was ruled by Ptolemy
The library possessed how many scrolls?
700,000
the museum was more of what in the modern sense?
a university, it contained research labs, rooms for dissection (including humans), an observatory, a zoo, and a botanical garden, and large lecture halls
who were Herophilus and Erasistratus? What are their dates?
were both physicians and anatomists at Alexandria
Herephilus 330-260 BC
Erasistratus 310-250 BC
what were Herophilus and Erasistratus accused of?
performing vivisections on chriminals but this is not proven
what was Herophilus and Erasistratus view of Blood? Why did they believe this?
blood was synthesized from food and is distributed in the veins, because of the hepatic portal vein.
was was Herophilus and Erasistratus view on Pneuma (spirit) and muscle movement
Pneuma is replenished by respiration.
Vital pneuma is carried by the arteries to the brain where it is converted to animal spirits, and then carried by hollow nerves to the muscles
An inrush of animal spirits caused muscle movements
Herophilus and Erasistratus view on veins and arteries?
they are dead end canals through which blood and pneuma seep into the tissue
Herophilus believed the beating heart transmitted what? Was this belief common?
pulsations to the arteries; both veins and arteries carry blood, not commonly thought
what was Erasistratus view on arteries?
that they have blood only when it seeps from the tissues into the arteries, this blocked the flow of pneuma and caused disease
Roman Encyclopedism
With Romes ascent in the Mediterranean region, science turned heavily towards what? What was the consequence of this?
Encyclopedism and away from independent scientific thought and experiment
Romans did little to extend the science done by Greeks
what were the two lives of Pliny the Elder? What were his dates?
AD 23-79
He lived one life as in service of roman society and the roman state( lawyer, civial administrator, millitary officer)
the other in the service of scholarship (historian, encyclopedist).
Pliny wrote what? Where did the work come from? Why was he important?
a 37 volume encyclopedia; NATURAL HISTORY. Culled from ancient authors, he claimed to have access to over 2000 works
He included plenty of solid information and became a standard reference work for the next 1500 yrs
what did Celsus do? What are his dates?
1st century AD
he wrote a large encyclopedia of which only the portion on medicine (De medicina) survived
What invention made Celsus works known? His work (De medicinia) was one of the first what?
Invention of printing in 1478
First medical book to be printed
what did Celsus believe about the role of Physicians?
Following the hippocrates that surgeons should assist nature
Who was Galen of Peramon and what were his dates?
AD 130-200
A Greek and one of the most influential medical writers of all time, physician, surgeon
early in Galens career he was what?
a surgeon at the Gladiatorial school at Pergamon, learning practical medicine
Why was Galen so important and who were some of Galens patients?
He was a very prestigious physician in Rome, favoured by and physician to Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his son Commodus
what were other physicians view on Galen?
he was very unpopular, seen as contentious and quarrelsome, a “know it all”
what was Glanes belief in religion?
he believed in one god although he was not a christian. he was fiercely opposed to atheistic materialism
what was galens view of the human body?
highly teleological, similar to Aristotle and Plato
what did Galen and the Hippocrates have in common?
He agreed with ethical practice in medicine. Galen believed that physicians should disdain money and seek wisdom
how did Galen study anatomy?
?
He took anatomical info from Alexandrian anatomists like Herophilus and Erasistratus
He performed dissection of animals (dissections on humans was illegal at this time)
inspection of patients with severe traumatic wounds, from his days as a gladiatoral physician
examination of bones from destroyed tombs
Galen’s biological insights
in his view how was the voice controlled? What idea did this support?
by laryngeal nerves that lead to the brain
this supported the idea that the brain is the center of thought and reason
what was Galens thoughts on Arteries? How did he come to this conclusion?
that they contain Blood not air
through experimental results on animals
Galens thoughts on the kidney?
The kidney makes urine, not the bladder
what did Galen notice about the gut?
peristalsis
what did galen do to study the spine?
cut it in different places and noted the loss of function when cutting ay different vertebrates
3-4 no respiration
below 6 paralysis of thoracic muscles
lower, paralysis of lower limbs, bladder and intestine
Galens thoughts on blood circulation?
- Blood does not circulate, it moves from the site of synthesis (the liver from food) to the tissue and is distributed by venous blood to the tissues
- Venous blood enters the atrial system through pores connecting left and right venticles
- Arterial blood distributes pneuma
what were Galens therapies? How did they compare with Hippocrates?
Galen was more of an interventionist
He “balanced” the Humours with diet, bloodletting and purging
he also performed surgery
in terms of drugs what type did Galen favour?
complex drug mixtures, especially theriac, which was based on a poison antidote
What is the use of complex drug mixtures (such as the ones Galen used) called?
polypharmacy
why did Galens name endure?
- his works survived
- his theology fit later christian and islamic views
- A lot of his writings were encyclopedic
What is the scientific legacy of the ancient world?
- spirit of natural, rational thought and inquiry; beginnings of science
- Natural history
- Pragmatic, ethical medicine
- Dogmatic adherence to ancient authorities such as Aristotle and Hippocrates
- The first jobs or modern science were to assimilate ancient science and travel beyond or overthrow the most influential ancients
Place the names of these 8 science guys in their historical order from oldest to most recent: Hippocrates, Galen, Thales, Bill Nye, Democritus, Pliny the Elder, Aristotle, Empedocles.
- Thales
- Empedocles
- Democritus
- Hippocrates
- Aristotle
- Pliny the Elder
- Galen
- Bill Nye
(Oddly enough Democritus and Hippocrates were both born the same year and died the same year according the Wikipedia, so they’re hard to rank)
