The Empiric school of
medicine
Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient, managing the diagnosis, prognosis, prevention, treatment, palliation of their injury or disease, and promoting their health. Medicine encompasses a variety of health care pr ...
(''Empirics'', ''Empiricists'', or ''Empirici'', el, Ἐμπειρικοί) was a school of medicine founded in
Alexandria
Alexandria ( or ; ar, ٱلْإِسْكَنْدَرِيَّةُ ; grc-gre, Αλεξάνδρεια, Alexándria) is the second largest city in Egypt, and the largest city on the Mediterranean coast. Founded in by Alexander the Great, Alexandri ...
the middle of the third century BC. The school was a major influence on
ancient Greek
Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic pe ...
and
Roman
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
* Rome, the capital city of Italy
* Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
*Roman people, the people of ancient Rome
*''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lett ...
medicine. The school's name is derived from the word (ἐμπειρία "experience") because they professed to derive their knowledge from ''experiences'' only, and in doing so set themselves in opposition to the
Dogmatic school
The Dogmatic school of medicine (''Dogmatics'', or ''Dogmatici'', el, Δογματικοί) was a school of medicine in ancient Greece and Rome. They were the oldest of the medical sects of antiquity. They derived their name from '' dogma'', a ...
. The sect survived at least into the 4th century AD. The doctrines of this school are described by
Aulus Cornelius Celsus
Aulus Cornelius Celsus ( 25 BC 50 AD) was a Roman encyclopaedist, known for his extant medical work, ''De Medicina'', which is believed to be the only surviving section of a much larger encyclopedia. The ''De Medicina'' is a primary source on ...
in the introduction to his ''
De Medicina
''De Medicina'' is a 1st-century medical treatise by Aulus Cornelius Celsus, a Roman encyclopedist and possibly (but not likely) a practicing physician. It is the only surviving section of a much larger encyclopedia; only small parts still survi ...
''.
Famous Empirics
Serapion of Alexandria
Serapion of Alexandria ( grc-gre, Σεραπίων ὁ Ἀλεξανδρεύς) was a physician who lived in the 3rd century BC. He belonged to the Empiric school, and so much extended and improved the system of Philinus of Cos, that the creation ...
, and
Philinus of Cos
Philinus of Cos ( el, Φιλῖνος ὁ Κῷος; 3rd century BC) was a Greek physician. He was the reputed founder of the Empiric school. He was a pupil of Herophilus, a contemporary of Bacchius, and a predecessor of Serapion. He wrote a w ...
, are regarded as the founders of this school in the 3rd century BC. Other physicians who belonged to this sect were:
Apollonius of Citium Apollonios of Kition (or Apollonius of Citium; el, Ἀπολλώνιος ὁ Κιτιεύς), was a physician (fl. c. 60 BC) belonging to the Empiric school of thought. He studied medicine in Alexandria under the surgeon Zopyrus, but he lived in K ...
,
Glaucias,
Heraclides,
Bacchius,
Zeuxis,
Menodotus,
Theodas,
Herodotus of Tarsus,
Aeschrion,
Sextus Empiricus
Sextus Empiricus ( grc-gre, Σέξτος Ἐμπειρικός, ; ) was a Greek Pyrrhonist philosopher and Empiric school physician. His philosophical works are the most complete surviving account of ancient Greek and Roman Pyrrhonism, and ...
, and
Marcellus Empiricus Marcellus Empiricus, also known as Marcellus Burdigalensis (“Marcellus of Bordeaux”), was a Latin medical writer from Gaul at the turn of the 4th and 5th centuries. His only extant work is the ''De medicamentis'', a compendium of pharmacologica ...
.
Philosophy
The Empirics were the first Western proto-
empiricists
In philosophy, empiricism is an epistemological theory that holds that knowledge or justification comes only or primarily from sensory experience. It is one of several views within epistemology, along with rationalism and skepticism. Empir ...
. The school had substantial overlap with the Greek philosophical school of
Pyrrhonism
Pyrrhonism is a school of philosophical skepticism founded by Pyrrho in the fourth century BCE. It is best known through the surviving works of Sextus Empiricus, writing in the late second century or early third century CE.
History
Pyrrho of ...
.
Galen
Aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus ( el, Κλαύδιος Γαληνός; September 129 – c. AD 216), often Anglicized as Galen () or Galen of Pergamon, was a Greek physician, surgeon and philosopher in the Roman Empire. Considered to be o ...
noted that the Empirics approached medicine exactly as the Pyrrhonists approached the whole of life.
[Galen, "An Outline of Empiricism" sections 43 and 82.] Many of the well-known Empirics were also Pyrrhonist teachers, including: Sextus Empiricus, Herodotus of Tarsus, Heraclides, Theodas, Saturninus, and Menodotus.
Doctrines
The Empiric school said that it was necessary to understand the ''evident causes'' of disease, but considered the inquiry after the ''hidden causes'' and ''natural actions'' to be fruitless, because
Nature
Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are ...
is incomprehensible. That these things cannot be understood appears from the controversies among
philosopher
A philosopher is a person who practices or investigates philosophy. The term ''philosopher'' comes from the grc, φιλόσοφος, , translit=philosophos, meaning 'lover of wisdom'. The coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek th ...
s and
physician
A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...
s, and in the way in which the methods of practice differed from place to place, one method being used in
Rome
, established_title = Founded
, established_date = 753 BC
, founder = King Romulus ( legendary)
, image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg
, map_caption ...
, another in
Egypt
Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning the North Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via a land bridg ...
, and another in
Gaul
Gaul ( la, Gallia) was a region of Western Europe first described by the Romans. It was inhabited by Celtic and Aquitani tribes, encompassing present-day France, Belgium, Luxembourg, most of Switzerland, parts of Northern Italy (only during ...
. Often too, the causes are evident; as in a
wound
A wound is a rapid onset of injury that involves lacerated or punctured skin (an ''open'' wound), or a contusion (a ''closed'' wound) from blunt force trauma or compression. In pathology, a ''wound'' is an acute injury that damages the epider ...
, and if the evident cause does not suggest a method of curing, then much less so other obscure methods. This being the case, it is much better to seek relief from things certain and tried; that is, from remedies as learned from experience.
They said that medicine, in its infancy, was deduced from
experiment
An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs whe ...
s; for the sick, in a time when there were no physicians, had either taken
food
Food is any substance consumed by an organism for nutritional support. Food is usually of plant, animal, or fungal origin, and contains essential nutrients, such as carbohydrates, fats, proteins, vitamins, or minerals. The substance is in ...
in the first days of their illness, or had abstained, and that the illness was more quickly alleviated in one group than the other. This and other instances occurring daily were observed by people diligent enough to realize which method was best to cure particular conditions, and hence the art of medicine arose. Medicine was not invented in consequence of
reason
Reason is the capacity of consciously applying logic by drawing conclusions from new or existing information, with the aim of seeking the truth. It is closely associated with such characteristically human activities as philosophy, science, lang ...
ing, but that
theory
A theory is a rational type of abstract thinking about a phenomenon, or the results of such thinking. The process of contemplative and rational thinking is often associated with such processes as observational study or research. Theories may ...
was sought after the discovery of medicine.
They asked, too, whether reason prescribed the same as experience, or something different: if the same, then it is not necessary; if different, then mischievous. Initially there was a necessity to examine
remedies with the greatest accuracy, but now they are sufficiently ascertained; there are no new diseases, and hence no need for any novel methods of healing. If a patient had an unknown type of
illness
A disease is a particular abnormal condition that negatively affects the structure or function of all or part of an organism, and that is not immediately due to any external injury. Diseases are often known to be medical conditions that a ...
, the physician would not recourse to obscure knowledge, but would see what type of illness was most nearly allied, and to make a trial of the medicines used to treat the allied condition.
What matters is not what causes, but what cures the condition. It does not matter why a concoction works, only that it does work. Nor is it necessary to know how we
breathe, but what relieves difficult breathing. Likewise we should not seek the cause of motion in the
arteries
An artery (plural arteries) () is a blood vessel in humans and most animals that takes blood away from the heart to one or more parts of the body (tissues, lungs, brain etc.). Most arteries carry oxygenated blood; the two exceptions are the pu ...
, but what each kind of motion indicates. These things are known by experience and
epilogistic reasoning. There is no value in
dissect
Dissection (from Latin ' "to cut to pieces"; also called anatomization) is the dismembering of the body of a deceased animal or plant to study its anatomical structure. Autopsy is used in pathology and forensic medicine to determine the cause ...
ing dead bodies, since the state of the organs are very different in dead bodies compared to living ones.
They supported their opinions in favour of experience with the famous "''Tripod of Medicine''":
*Observation: The observations which the
patient
A patient is any recipient of health care services that are performed by healthcare professionals. The patient is most often ill or injured and in need of treatment by a physician, nurse, optometrist, dentist, veterinarian, or other heal ...
had made in the course of the illness concerning the course of the disease and results of any treatments.
*History: A written collection of observations made by others.
*Analogy: When treating a new illness, selecting a plan of treatment by comparing it with a known disease which most resembled it.
See also
*
*
*
Alexandrian school
References
* William Smith, (1857), ''
Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities'', pages 401-3
External links
*Aulus Cornelius Celsus
''On Medicine'', Prooemium{{Ancient Roman medicine
Ancient Greek medicine
Ancient Roman medicine
Pyrrhonism