Doctoral Dissertation Research: Carin Berkowitz: "Discovering" the Nerves: Experiment in Early Nineteenth-Century British Pedagogical Culture

博士论文研究：Carin Berkowitz：“发现”神经：十九世纪早期英国教育文化中的实验

• 批准号: 0646371
• 负责人: Suman Seth
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Cornell University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2007
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2007-03-01 至 2009-02-28
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0646371&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Carin; Berkowitz

This NSF Science and Society Dissertation Improvement Grant in the History of Science will allow the co-PI to visit archives in Edinburgh and throughout the United Kingdom in order to investigate the unpublished papers of Charles Bell and his contemporaries. In the early nineteenth century, two physiologists, Charles Bell and Francois Magendie, became embroiled in a debate over the proper practice of physiology, a debate that emerged within the context of a priority dispute over the discovery of the separate roots of motor and sensory nerves. The dispute, which began in 1822, lasted for over twenty years and was not settled decisively within either Bell's or Magendie's lifetime. This priority dispute provides an entry point for an evaluation of connections between medical institutions and physiology and between pedagogy and research practice in nineteenth-century Britain. It allows for a discussion of ways in which British physiologists responded to competing models of experimentation in early medical sciences. Moreover, this controversy illuminates the ways in which communities of physiologists made sense of living bodies and the ways in which theory and practice were taken to be mutually supportive elements of discovery. More specifically research supported under the NSF dissertation support will allow the following questions to be answered: how did a debate over priority and experimentation embody divergent pedagogical cultures and alternative models for a discipline in formation? In what ways did the structures of British medical and surgical institutions lend themselves to a particular pedagogical style, publishing priorities, and perceived audience revealed by Bell? And can we identify wider political contexts for the role of vivisection or the role of experimental science in clinical medicine that help to explain the significance of this controversy to Bell's contemporaries? The intellectual impacts of this work include shedding light on the role of pedagogy in the establishment of research methodologies in the biological sciences; enhancing understandings of the ways in which natural philosophy and early science were incorporated into medicine; and exploring alternative models of experimentation. Furthermore, it will discuss the place of pedagogy within the print culture of the early nineteenth century. It will also have broader impacts by contributing to the training of a historian of science; it will produce an understanding of the politics and ethics of the early uses of vivisection both in research and in educational contexts; it will examine the role of nationalist politics in the resolution of priority disputes, and it will contribute to an understanding of the intertwined debates about ethical and technical aspects of research practice. Although much work has been done on continental physiology and medical sciences, British life sciences of the early nineteenth century remain understudied. The priority dispute between Bell and Magendie, which helped to unite British anatomists, promises to reveal the philosophical, professional, and pedagogical of a natural philosophical culture struggling over the place of experimentation in medical science. The fierce rivalry between French and British philosophers seen through this dispute serves to indicate that a British model of physiology provided serious competition for the French experimental model and merits further study.

这项《科学史》中的NSF科学和社会论文改进补助金将允许该合作者访问爱丁堡和整个英国的档案馆，以调查查尔斯·贝尔和他的同代人未发表的论文。19世纪初，两位生理学家查尔斯·贝尔和弗朗索瓦·马根迪卷入了一场关于生理学正确实践的辩论，这场辩论是在一场关于发现运动神经和感觉神经分开的根的优先权之争的背景下出现的。这场争端始于1822年，持续了20多年，在贝尔和马根迪的有生之年都没有得到决定性的解决。这场优先权之争为评估19世纪英国医疗机构与生理学、教育学与研究实践之间的联系提供了一个切入点。它允许讨论英国生理学家如何应对早期医学中相互竞争的实验模式。此外，这场争论阐明了生理学家群体理解活体的方式，以及理论和实践被视为发现的相互支持的要素的方式。更具体地说，在NSF论文支持下支持的研究将允许回答以下问题：关于优先级和实验的辩论如何体现不同的教学文化和学科形成的替代模式？英国医疗和外科机构的结构在哪些方面适合贝尔所揭示的特定的教学风格、出版优先事项和公认的受众？我们能否为活体解剖的作用或临床医学中实验科学的作用确定更广泛的政治背景，以帮助解释这场争论对贝尔同时代人的意义？这项工作的智力影响包括阐明教育学在建立生物科学研究方法方面的作用；增进对自然哲学和早期科学如何融入医学的理解；以及探索实验的替代模式。此外，它还将讨论教育学在十九世纪初印刷文化中的地位。它还将产生更广泛的影响，帮助培训科学史学家；它将使人们了解早期在研究和教育背景下使用活体解剖的政治和伦理问题；它将审查民族主义政治在解决优先权争端中的作用；它将有助于理解关于研究实践的伦理和技术方面的相互交织的辩论。虽然在大陆生理学和医学方面已经做了很多工作，但19世纪初的英国生命科学仍然没有得到充分的研究。贝尔和马根迪之间的优先权之争帮助团结了英国解剖学家，有望揭示自然哲学文化在医学科学中为实验的地位而斗争的哲学、专业和教育性。通过这场争论，法国和英国哲学家之间的激烈竞争表明，英国的生理学模式对法国的实验模式构成了严重的竞争，值得进一步研究。