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Book Review of Allen G. Debus

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Book Review of Allen G. Debus Book Reviews 131 mistakes and unrealized possibilities, is ALLEN G. DEBUS : Chemistry and always worthwhile in history; and here Medical Debate. Van Helmont to it pays off too, and allows authors to Boerhaave , Science History Publica- raise the question whether (as biog- tions, Canton MA, 2001, xvii + 277 raphers of Lavoisier have wondered) the pp. [ISBN 0-88135-285-3]. honor and glory goes to the ambitious bastards. We also meet conservatism about innovations, theoretical or in- In the field of the history of science Al- strumental, which historians have len G. Debus deserves to be ranked learned to expect at all times and places. among the innovators. In his pioneering One unsurprising feature is that whereas studies, he has presented such figures as (as Wurtz in fact ruefully realized) nine- Paracelsus and Robert Fludd as subjects teenth-century chemistry was a German worthy of study. Within a domain that science, the twentieth was the American was dominated by physics and astrono- century – important things happened my, he saw a space for chemistry. He elsewhere, but it was the research has placed the history of medicine with- schools in the American universities and in a wider scientific, religious, and phil- their links with industry, brought out osophical context and has characterized particularly by Nicolas Rasmussen, that the ‘chemical philosophy’ as a third were dominant. force between the declining Aristoteli- We look at the rise of cosmochemis- anism and the rising mechanical philos- try, at radiochemistry, polymer science, ophy. He has always highlighted the and biotechnology, with authors who close relationship between the spread of are good guides into these territories – humanistic ideals, the increase in philo- though some of the papers would have logical skill, and scientific progress in benefited from a read-through by a na- the early-modern period (from this tive speaker of English. And we end point of view, his Man and Nature in the with BERNADETTE BENSAUDE -VINCENT Renaissance is exemplary). He has never looking at materials science and raising missed the opportunity to emphasize the question whether chemists have a the connections among such cultural future in this new world. Chemistry has factors as religious humanism, biblical such a long past that it would be sur- studies, and textual authority in the prising if like some dinosaur it were to making of the scientific enterprise, most become extinct; but while sciences are of all the cross-referencing of the great not social constructions, the boundaries book of nature and the Scriptures. Last between them clearly are – and ‘chemis- but not least, he has never undermined try’ might cease to be a useful label. But the role of the educational establish- we can infer from these studies that ment and the pedagogical implications chemists are likely to continue to be of the new science. crucial figures in the research teams In this volume, Debus retraces the which, to the continuing bafflement of principal results of his studies, specifi- lay people, will carry science forward as cally focusing on the debate between an intellectual, a practical, and a social chemistry and medicine, a debate that activity. was triggered in the 16 th century by the appearance of the Paracelsian œuvre and David Knight: that was far from concluded at the end Department of Philosophy, University of of the eighteenth century. One of the Durham, 50, Old Elvet, great merits of Debus’ book is its far- Durham DH1 3HN, UK; ranging scope and the attention to long- [email protected] term developments in the history of sci- ence. It is indeed the case that teleology has become anathema in the field of his- torical studies of late. One ought to ask HYLE – International Journal for Philosophy of Chemistry, Vol. 8 (2002), No. 2. Copyright 2002 by HYLE and the authors. 132 Book Reviews whether teleology implies, as it is sup- cartes’ advocacy of dualism? Was chem- posed, a linear account of history. One istry a Trojan horse in the philosophical might ask whether teleology may be citadel of the mechanical philosophy used to indicate instead a tension to- (especially when dealing with such elu- ward a potential meaning in the unfold- sive topics as respiration, combustion, ing of human events. (The question and digestion)? Was the mechanical phi- whether this meaning is inherent in his- losophy so unmoved by the chemical tory or it is only a reasonable projection philosophy? Borelli, Malpighi, and Bel- by the historian can here be left aside lini, for instance, were sincere believers being a matter of metaphysics and phi- in the validity of the iatrophysical ap- losophy of history rather than of histo- proach in medicine, and yet they made riography.) The philosopher may be frequent use of the chemical armory – content with a view of history as the both from a theoretical and an experi- domain of chance, arbitrariness, and ir- mental point of view – to explain the rationality, but the historian, in recount- origin and maintenance of life within ing a meaningful story, looks for a se- the bodily engine. quence of events, that is, a plot. And By way of dialectical counterpoint, plots have prologues and aftermath. the establishing of the mechanical medi- This is quite apparent, for example, cine is an important component of De- when dealing with Jan Baptiste van bus’ book. Iatrophysics was a complex Helmont’s work and its fortunes and variegated phenomenon. It could through the 17 th and 18 th centuries. De- represent the introduction of quantifica- bus tells us that if we want to follow the tion and measurement into the domain Wirkungsgeschichte of Helmont’s chemi- of physiology up to the most refined cal and medical thought we need to bear use of the calculus in matters of animal well in mind the writings of Hermann economy. It could advocate reliance on Boerhaave, Georg Ernst Stahl, Joseph mathematics and on the universal laws Black, Gabriel François Venel, Antoine of motion, fluids and solids for the Lavoisier, and Xavier Bichat, and not study of the life processes. Albeit reluc- confine ourselves to the parochial set- tantly, some iatrophysicists agreed to ting of late 17 th -century English medi- reserve some space for chemical applica- cine. Big pictures, macro-histories, and tions in the medical field, but even sa- the widening of geographical horizons vants like Boerhaave and Stahl were in- produce sense. And not only that: in van terested in what we would call inorganic Helmont’s case, the diachronic pattern chemistry rather than the chemical in- is more reliable than the typical syn- terpretation of life; that is to say, they chronic, contextual device traditionally did not embark on any attempt to un- adopted by historians, namely, the battle derstand the vital functions of the body between mechanists and vitalists. and the processes of living matter in The rich historical reconstruction chemical terms. Referring to Boerhaa- provided by Debus’ book makes the ve’s and Stahl’s position, Debus rightly reader question more than once the le- notes that it was “a fundamental break gitimacy of the hackneyed polarization with the Paracelsian-Helmontian tradi- between mechanism and vitalism in ear- tion” (p. 222). Before Lavoisier’s grand ly modern medicine. Can we still label synthesis, the separation between chem- Boerhaave a mechanist when we learn istry and medicine, apart from the spe- that, especially in the last part of his life, cific section of materia medica, re- he devoted so much energy to under- mained common among medical and standing the alchemical legacy? Can we chemical practitioners. It may seem a refer to Stahl as a vitalist when his belief paradox, but the division between medi- in the inertia of matter and the mechan- cine and chemistry – medicine and ical arrangement of the body has the chemistry being understood as the re- same clarity and presumption as Des- spective domains of the ensouled body Book Reviews 133 and inert matter – could be justified as try as a product of the Egyptian wisdom the result of a far-fetched interpretation on the other. With an eye for the tech- of Helmont’s philosophy. In the Hel- nological side of the chemical practice, montian system, life and matter were Boerhaave argued that chemical theoriz- incommensurable entities, and the vital ing originated from the fabulous stories spark was a transcendent accident super- made up by miners eager to make sense imposed on prime matter by a divine of the terrifying and inexplicable sides command. Whilst the contingent nature of their job. Platonic and Hermetic ele- of the manifestations of life in the creat- ments were added later to give an aura ed world had not prevented Helmont of mysticism and philosophy. Depend- from viewing chemistry as the privileged ing on the specific idelogical need, the access to knowledge of life in the new Arabs (Rhazes and Avicenna, in particu- foundation of medicine, the great ma- lar) were extolled to the detriment of jority of physicians and anatomists, in Paracelsus’ contribution, or vice versa. keeping with the more reassuring tenets In his Histoire de la médicine (1696) of the chemical Galenism à la Sennert, Daniel LeClerc restated the belief that preferred to maintain the foundations of “Hermes, or Mercury, or Toth” was the medicine and chemistry separated and to “Inventor of Physick” and repeated the relegate the chemical contribution to the traditional genealogy from the Arabic manufacture of metallic-based remedies. alchemists to Paracelsus via Roger Ba- We have to wait for the medical theore- con and Arnald of Villanova. John ticians of the Montpellier school (a re- Freind replied to LeClerc’s alchemical- nowned center of vital medicine) such ly-biased account with his History of as François Bossier de Sauvages, Théo- Physick (1744) in which he presented phile Bordeu, and Paul-Joseph Barthez, medicine and chemistry as evolving to- to find a deliberate attempt to bridge the ward a fully realized Newtonian system.
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