Titleman, Mark (2023) Rules, Reproducibility, and the Brief Frenzy of Animal Magnetism: Epistemological Foundations of Trust in French Enlightenment Medicine. [Preprint]
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Abstract
Enlightenment science and medicine achieved different levels of accuracy and precision as both sought rationality, empiricism, and the spread of human happiness. Animal magnetism was a unique medical phenomenon of late Enlightenment Paris that established trust with the public and had a significant cultural impact. Yet this method was not reproducible, involved limited rule-following, and lacked a coherent theoretical framework. Lessons from this phenomenon have included the first use of the placebo and the first design and implementation of careful, controlled experimentation in the medical context. Another lesson can be the power of demonstration and spectacle in communicating medical innovations. In fact, the underpinnings of science – the reproducibility of a certain scientific experiment and the rules, know-hows, and theories it assures – can be so conveyed to the public.
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| Item Type: | Preprint | ||||||
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| Subjects: | Specific Sciences > Medicine > Health and Disease General Issues > Social Epistemology of Science |
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| Depositing User: | Mark Titleman | ||||||
| Date Deposited: | 28 Jul 2025 12:53 | ||||||
| Last Modified: | 28 Jul 2025 12:53 | ||||||
| Item ID: | 26040 | ||||||
| Subjects: | Specific Sciences > Medicine > Health and Disease General Issues > Social Epistemology of Science |
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| Date: | 1 May 2023 | ||||||
| URI: | https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/id/eprint/26040 |
Available Versions of this Item
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Rules, Reproducibility, and the Brief Frenzy of Animal Magnetism: Epistemological Foundations of Trust in French Enlightenment Medicine. (deposited 23 May 2023 12:29)
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Rules, Reproducibility, and the Brief Frenzy of Animal Magnetism: Epistemological Foundations of Trust in French Enlightenment Medicine. (deposited 03 Jan 2024 20:57)
- Rules, Reproducibility, and the Brief Frenzy of Animal Magnetism: Epistemological Foundations of Trust in French Enlightenment Medicine. (deposited 28 Jul 2025 12:53) [Currently Displayed]
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Rules, Reproducibility, and the Brief Frenzy of Animal Magnetism: Epistemological Foundations of Trust in French Enlightenment Medicine. (deposited 03 Jan 2024 20:57)
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