CLAS3051

Presocratics and the Rise of Rational Medicine

Review What are three important characteristics of

Egyptian and Mesopotamian thinking about

medicine?

From what reasoning do they arise?

Is it right to call these 'pre-rational'?

Do the early Greeks, for example in Homer, share

these ways of thinking about disease?

How do the early Greeks differ?

How did these ideas persist in the Greek world?

Who Said It?

“all science is either Physics or stamp-collecting”

Physics in Homer and Early Poetry

LII.1-4

What natural phaenomena are they trying to

explain?

What is the prime agent of these?

Schools of Physics

“The natural scientists fall into two schools of

thought. Some make the underlying stuff single,

and identify it with either one of the three [water,

air or fire] .... Others, however, claim that the one

contains oppositions which are then separated

out.” Aristotle Physics 187a12 ff.

Thales: water

Anaximenes: air

Fragmentary Nature of Evidence

We get all this material 'second-hand'

Thales of Miletus (fl. 585 BC)

Prediction of solar eclipse (May 29, 585 BC)

Political advisor

Left no written works

Calculating measurements

Importance of water (> Egyptian and Babylonian

Myths?)

14th c. depiction of original pyramid

Anaximander

Pupil of Thales, wrote first book 'on the Nature of

things' or Peri Physeos

Origin in the apeiron, “limitless”

Separation into opposites: wet/dry, hot cold, etc.

LII.8-12

Anaximenes (floruit 546-525 BC)

Writes book on cosmology based in infinite

principle, aer: world breath dominates world

order as breath dominates us

Change and formation through condensation and

movement of air

Miletus in Ionian Asia Minor

The Sun and Moon as Wheels

What is described here?

What thought processes lead to this description?

What thought processes are rejected?

The Sacred Disease

Where does this text come from?

First line give Ionic accent of work: Hierehs

Nousou

What sort of person wrote it?

What experiences does he/she draw from

What kind of thinking

If these people claim to know how to draw down

the moon .... then, whether they claim to be able

to do it by magi or by some other method, they

seem to be impious rogues. Either they do not

believe in the existence of the gods or they

believe that the gods are powerless... I should not

call any of these things a divine visitation but a

human one, because the divine power has been

overcome and forced into subjection by the

human will [Hippocrates] Sacred Disease 4.

Physical Causation

The air which flows into the stomach cools it but

makes no other contribution. But that which goes

to the lungs and blood-vessels thence enters the

body cavities and the brain and has a further

purpose. It induces intelligence and is necessary

for the movement of the limbs. Therefore when

the blood vessels are shut off from this supply of

air ... the patient loses his voice and his wits 10

Remedy

“In this disease, as in all others, it should be your

aim not to make the disease worse, but to wear it

down by applying the remedies most hostile to

the disease and those things to which it is

unaccustomed” 21

Sacred Disease, Continued

What is central point of paper?

To whom does the author oppose himself

What causation is given for epilepsy?

To what Milesian philosopher is it most allied?

Further Study on Philosophy

Gaarder, J. Sophie's

World

Lloyd, Early Greek

Science

Waterfield, R. The

First Philosophers

(Oxford World's

Classics)

Study in Phil. dept.