Autocross Blogs - Song Liang

2010-7-23Curiosity about natural phenomena has always been the fuel for scientific endeavor. One by one, great cufflinks clearance mysteries of life have been illuminated by the inquisitive mind, often going against the grain of accepted dogma. Medical science has been no exception, as demonstrated by the overlapping eras of thought that supposed, for example, demons and spirit activity as the cause of disease, even as more secular, modern explanations were emerging.

The early predominating theory of disease in ancient Greece - as well as India and Tibet - was the concept of the "four humors," generally associated with the four elements of earth, air, fire and water, which in turn configure human personality. The theory of humors postulated that all human afflictions resulted from imbalances in these internal elements, manifest in phlegm, blood, yellow bile and black bile. For instance, an individual suffering from depression was diagnosed as having a surfeit of black bile. (The term melancholy is formed from the Greek words meaning "black" and "bile"). Likewise, a "phlegmatic" personality was associated with the more lethargic or apathetic qualities. This school of thought was prominent in the time of the great Greek physicians such as Herophilus, the first systematic anatomist; Hippocrates, whose medical canon rejected supernatural explanations of disease; and Erasistratus, follower of Herophilus and one of pendants clearance the last of that era - and the eon to come - to dissect human bodies.

The role of humors was articulated most eloquently by the man known as Galen of Pergamum (129-200 AD). Galen's magnum opus on treatment, De methodo medendi, along with other tracts by him, were the first great written works of medicine and served as the universal guide to human disease for more than a millenium. During the time of Galen and of his disciples who followed, the unapproved dissection of a human body was fervently condemned. As a result, Galen based most of his understanding of human anatomy on the dissection of animals, including Barbary macaques, a type of monkey found predominantly earrings clearance in North Africa. Galen made the reasonable but dangerously imperfect assumption that the inner structure of such animals was close enough to that of humans to be sufficient for an understanding of human anatomy. Galen's teachings persisted in Europe and Greece until the 16th century, and some ancient schools of medicine, such as the Ayurvedic and Tibetan traditions, still practice metaphysical healing and humor-based diagnostics that sprang from the same roots, combined with highly sophisticated pharmacology and therapeutics. Indeed, when Tibetan rulers held two major medical conferences in the 8th and llth centuries, bringing together physicians (and translators) from India, Persia, Nepal, Greece, China and elsewhere to share their knowledge, it was Galen's medicine they used as the basis for their integrative medical system.