Galen's Epistemology
Experience, Reason, and Method in Ancient Medicine

Explores Galen's contributions to (mainly scientific) epistemology and their legacy in the Islamic world.

R. J. Hankinson (Edited by), Matyáš Havrda (Edited by)

9781316513484, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 12 May 2022

348 pages
23.5 x 15.8 x 2 cm, 0.63 kg

'… a most valuable volume, incorporating contributions from most of the English-speaking authorities on Galen, on a topic of basic importance to our understanding of Galen as a practical physician as well as a (nominally) Platonic philosopher.' John Dillon, Bryn Mawr Classical Review

Determining what has gone wrong in a malfunctioning body and proposing an effective treatment requires expertise. Since antiquity, philosophers and doctors have wondered what sort of knowledge this expertise involves, and whether and how it can warrant its conclusions. Few people were as qualified to deal with these questions as Galen of Pergamum (129–ca. 216). A practising doctor with a keen interest in logic and natural science, he devoted much of his enormous literary output to the task of putting medicine on firm methodological grounds. At the same time he reflected on philosophical issues entailed by this project, such as the nature of experience, its relation to reason, the criteria of truth, and the methods of justification. This volume explores Galen's contributions to (mainly scientific) epistemology, as they arise in the specific inquiries and polemics of his works, as well as their legacy in the Islamic world.

Introduction R. J. Hankinson and Matyáš Havrda
1. 'Do I wake or sleep?' Galen, scepticism, and dreams Jonathan Barnes
2. Galen's empiricist background: A study of the argument in On medical experience Inna Kupreeva
3. Discovery, method, and justification: Galen and the determination of therapy R. J.Hankinson
4. From problems to demonstrations: Two case studies of Galen's method Matyáš Havrda
5. Galen's notion of dialectic Teun Tieleman
6. The relationship between perceptual experience and Logos: Galen's clinical perspective P. N. Singer
7. Galen against Archigenes on the pulse and what it teaches us about Galen's method of Diairesis Orly Lewis
8. On sense perception: Galen in dialogue with Plato and the stoics Katerina Ierodiakonou
9. Reason and experience in Galen's moral epistemology David Kaufman
10. The Arabic Alexandrians' summary of Galen's On the therapeutic method Elvira Wakelnig
11. What level of certainty can medical sign-inference reach? A discussion of Galen's demonstrative method in the Islamic world Pauline Koetschet.

Subject Areas: Philosophy of science [PDA], History of medicine [MBX], Western philosophy: Ancient, to c 500 [HPCA]