Lecture: Classical Views of Disease: Hippocrates, Galen, and Humoralism

Description

Lecture Description

The form of medicine that arose in fifth-century Greece, associated with the name of Hippocrates and later popularized by Galen, marked a major innovation in the treatment of disease. Unlike supernatural theories of disease, Hippocrates' method involved seeking the causes of illness in natural factors. This method rested upon an analogy between the order of the universe and the composition of the body's "humors." Health, on this view, was a matter of achieving equilibrium between competing humoral forces. Although Hippocratic theory would later be challenged for a number of different reasons, notably including the experience of epidemic diseases, it persists today in various traditions of holistic medicine.

Course Description

This course consists of an international analysis of the impact of epidemic diseases on western society and culture from the bubonic plague to HIV/AIDS and the recent experience of SARS and swine flu. Leading themes include: infectious disease and its impact on society; the development of public health measures; the role of medical ethics; the genre of plague literature; the social reactions of mass hysteria and violence; the rise of the germ theory of disease; the development of tropical medicine; a comparison of the social, cultural, and historical impact of major infectious diseases; and the issue of emerging and re-emerging diseases.

from course: Epidemics in Western Society