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The Body as Object and Instrument of Knowledge pp 287–308Cite as

Empiricism and Its Roots in the Ancient Medical Tradition

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Part of the book series: Studies in History and Philosophy of Science ((AUST,volume 25))

Abstract

Kant introduces empiricism as a deficient position that is unsuitable for the generation of scientific knowledge. The reason for this is that, according to him, empiricism fails to connect with the world by remaining trapped within the realm of appearances. If we follow Galen’s account of the debate ensuing among Hellenistic doctors in the third century B.C., empiricism presents itself in an entirely different light. It emerges as a position that criticises medical practitioners who stray away from the here and now by indulging in theory-driven a priori forms of reasoning. In so doing empiricism remains at all times committed to the world and its agents. In this paper Galen’s account of empiricism will serve me as a means to unravel the dynamics of a discussion that aims to reassess the standards of a dogmatic scientific practice. By looking at Bacon’s and Gassendi’s perception of the ancient medical tradition I will furthermore show that the understanding of what empiricism is crucially depends on the understanding of what scepticism is.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Kant 1970, 345/A 369.

  2. 2.

    Kant 1970, 344/A 367.

  3. 3.

    “Thus the critique of reason, in the end, necessarily leads to scientific knowledge; while its dogmatic employment, on the other hand, lands us in dogmatic assertions to which other assertions, equally specious, can always be opposed – that is in scepticism” (Kant 1970, 57/B 23).

  4. 4.

    Kant 1970, 22/B xvii.

  5. 5.

    “Gesichtspunkt der ersten, sinnlich nächsten Betrachtung” (Fischer 1909, 8).

  6. 6.

    “Wollte ihr Reich [das Reich der Philosophie] nicht zugrunde gehen, musste sie sich eine neue, stete, von Seiten der Erfahrungswissenschaften anerkannte und unbestreitbare Stellung erobern” (Fischer 1909, 4).

  7. 7.

    Kant 1970, 344/A 367.

  8. 8.

    Kant 1970, 346/A 370.

  9. 9.

    Kant 1970, 429/A 474/B502.

  10. 10.

    Kant 1970, 346/A 370.

  11. 11.

    Galen 1985, 3.

  12. 12.

    Galen 1985, 26.

  13. 13.

    For this kind of criticism see Woolhouse 1985 and Loeb 1981.

  14. 14.

    Nutton 2005.

  15. 15.

    Galen 1985, 9 (my emphasis).

  16. 16.

    Ibid.

  17. 17.

    Kant 1970, 667/A 854/B 882.

  18. 18.

    Galen 1985, 3.

  19. 19.

    Ibid.

  20. 20.

    Galen 1985, 9f.

  21. 21.

    The empiricist, as much as the Pyrrhonist, only allows for commemorative or recollective signs which are used to draw inferences on previously observed causal chains. See Barnes 1983, 158f.

  22. 22.

    Lolordo cites an Epicurean example to illustrate the nature of analogism: “The void must exist, because motion could not exist unless the void existed. Thus, motion is a sign of the void. How do we come to know that motion is impossible without an absolute void? Epicurus’ answer is that we know this by analogy with evident things. In ordinary cases, a (relatively) solid body cannot move somewhere unless that place is (relatively) empty” (Lolordo 2007, 96).

  23. 23.

    Galen 1985, 9f.

  24. 24.

    Barnes remarks that the same point has been made by Cicero, namely, when he presented the sceptic Carneades as someone who turned useless forms of logic, the so-called sorites, against the Stoic Chrysippus who, according to Carneades, explained nothing. See Barnes 1982, 45.

  25. 25.

    Barnes 1983, 167.

  26. 26.

    Experience comprises sources other than one’s own experience: history, reports and testimony of other practitioners can be consulted in order to identify the needed remedy. See Galen 1985, 27.

  27. 27.

    Galen 1985, 13.

  28. 28.

    Galen 1985, 14.

  29. 29.

    Frede points out that the methodists took an equally mediating stance in the debate between empiricists and rationalist as Galen, an aspect that Galen would purposefully conceal. See Frede 1982.

  30. 30.

    Galen 1985, 14.

  31. 31.

    Barnes notes that Stoics and Aristotelians agreed with their Epicurean rivals that “phusiologia is ‘to give a precise account of the causes of the most important things’ (Ad. Hdt.78)” (Barnes 1983, 150).

  32. 32.

    Galen 1985, 11.

  33. 33.

    Frede’s introduction in Galen 1985, xxiv.

  34. 34.

    See Dear 2006.

  35. 35.

    Galen De simpl. med. I, 40, Kühn, XI 456.

  36. 36.

    Galen De fac. Nat. I, 13, 501 III, 132; II, 8, 500 III, 186.

  37. 37.

    Galen 1985, 44–45.

  38. 38.

    Galen, De methodo medendi V, 1, X, 306; XIV, 5, Kühn X, 962, in Galen 1821–33/1965. See Tieleman 2009, 53.

  39. 39.

    This characterisation applies to Galen’s own position rather than Galenism as it had developed as an intellectual system by 600 A.D. Nutton describes the different between the two positions as follows: “His [Galen’s] empiricism, his observational genius and his willingness to think on his feet found little place in Galenism, for its central texts were those that emphasized his conclusions rather than the means by which he had researched them. Anatomical dissection for the purpose of investigation, so much stressed by Galen, seems to have vanished almost entirely, although both the Byzantines and the Arabs were extremely proficient in surgery” (Nutton 2008, 363).

  40. 40.

    Galen 1985, 42.

  41. 41.

    There is no evidence that Galen knew Sextus’ writings. See Annas’ and Barnes’ introduction of Sextus Empiricus 2007, xii.

  42. 42.

    Barnes 1983, 153.

  43. 43.

    Frede 1987, 186.

  44. 44.

    Galen 1985, 45.

  45. 45.

    For similar interpretations see Burnyeat 1984, 230f.

  46. 46.

    Barnes 1983, 159.

  47. 47.

    Ibid.

  48. 48.

    Burnyeat 1984, 232 points out that even the distinction between evident and non-evident is the distinction of the dogmatist but not that of the Pyrrhonist; Perler 2006, 21 attributes the sort of scepticism that results from a twofold metaphysical model to the Academics rather than the Pyrrhonists.

  49. 49.

    Caluori argues that it is this practical commitment to the everyday world that qualifies the Renaissance doctor Sanchez as a Pyrrhonist: “Although … Sanchez claims that our sense perception and our reason often go astray, this critique is primarily a problem for a theoretical approach that is based on sense perception and reason. The usefulness of senses and reason, however, for daily life is not being questioned” (Caluori 2007, 43).

  50. 50.

    Bacon 2000, 79.

  51. 51.

    Ibid.

  52. 52.

    It is interesting to note that Kant inserts a passage from Bacon’s Great Instauration as the motto in the B edition of the Critique.

  53. 53.

    Bacon 1950, 145.

  54. 54.

    For further discussion of these aspects of Bacon’s empiricism see Van Fraasen 2002, 32f.

  55. 55.

    Gassendi 1972, 294.

  56. 56.

    Gassendi 1972, 304.

  57. 57.

    Ibid.

  58. 58.

    Lolordo 2007, 64; also see 76.

  59. 59.

    Gassendi 1972, 329.

  60. 60.

    MacLean 2005; Popkin 2003; Schmitt 1983.

  61. 61.

    Montaigne 2003, 679.

  62. 62.

    Brush 1966, 17.

  63. 63.

    Brush 1966, 16.

  64. 64.

    Ibid.

  65. 65.

    Montaigne 2003, 680.

  66. 66.

    Gaukroger characterises the Aristotelian position as follows: “Aristotle’s account had involved a commitment to the most obvious and natural epistemology for a theory of vision, resemblance: what you saw resembled what was there in the world.” See Gaukroger’s introduction in Arnauld 1990, 3.

  67. 67.

    Montaigne 2003, 679.

  68. 68.

    This interpretation seems to be endorsed by the concluding paragraphs of the Apology where Montaigne suggests that reality itself is as changeable and unsteady as appearances: “There is nothing in Nature, either, which lasts or subsists; in her, all things are either born, being born, or dying.” Montaigne 2003, 682.

  69. 69.

    Gassendi 1972, 82–6.

  70. 70.

    Gassendi 1972, 333.

  71. 71.

    This interpretation opposes Walker’s claims that Gassendi would have benefited from Kant’s insight that knowledge of the Ding-an-sich is impossible: “It would certainly be a bonus from Gassendi’s point of view if the result were such as to exclude the possibility of our knowing about things as they are in themselves. Kant, in fact, was to put forward a line of thought which at least in his own opinion met the relevant requirements, and which I cannot help thinking Gassendi would have found rather congenial” (Walker 1983, 333). According to my reading, Gassendi was plainly not troubled by the Kantian question; for further discussion of this point see Waldow 2010.

  72. 72.

    See for instance Gassendi 1972, 328 and Gassendi’s reply to Descartes in Descartes 2005, 180.

  73. 73.

    Hartle defends a non-sceptical reading of Montaigne in Hartle 2005.

  74. 74.

    Popkin 2003.

  75. 75.

    MacLean 2006, 253.

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  1. Department of Philosophy, University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia

    Anik Waldow

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  1. Unit for History and Philosophy of Science, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, 2006, Australia

    Charles T. Wolfe  & Ofer Gal  & 

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Waldow, A. (2010). Empiricism and Its Roots in the Ancient Medical Tradition. In: Wolfe, C.T., Gal, O. (eds) The Body as Object and Instrument of Knowledge. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, vol 25. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-3686-5_14

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