Death - The Uncertain Certainty: Changing definitions of medical death in Britain c. 1750 to 1850

对所有的人类来说，死亡是必然的。然而，几个世纪以来，定义死亡的确切时刻一直是不确定的。在英国的乔治亚时期，生死之间的界限在医学界和科学界争论不休。当医生包中的设备仅限于跳蚤(检测血液循环)、胡椒(让患者打喷嚏)或镜子(看到呼吸)时，很难确定医疗死亡。在流行文化中，人们经常说，一个病人只有在医生确定之前才算死亡。医学理论的发展是为了解释导致身体明显从死前(温暖但看起来死气沉沉的)转变到死后(僵硬)的解剖学/生理学变化。大约在1800年，医生发现心脏、肺和大脑功能的停止会导致一个人“真正死亡”；然而，这一被忽视的话语在今天的复苏医学中仍然是关键--一段隐藏的历史。在18世纪和19世纪的大部分时间里，普通人害怕被误诊为死亡，担心自己的灵魂死后，并试图为那些留下来的人提供关怀。这样的社会担忧通过验尸官的调查、祈祷和使用临终遗嘱和遗嘱得到缓解。这位被提名的博士位于所有关于1750-1850年间英国死亡确定性的医学不确定性的交汇点。主要的研究问题：为什么医学死亡是一门如此不确定的科学，这对生活在1750-1850年间的英国人对死亡时间的文化理解有什么影响？为了研究这个被忽视的史学话题，第一年将进行一次文献回顾。在找出研究差距后，档案工作将在县档案馆和伦敦国家档案馆进行。定量和定性方法：1-2岁将分析私人日记、家书、医疗报告、医院记录和报纸报道，关于“活着的死”、“真正的死”和“危险的死”。这将涉及惠康信托基金、兰贝斯宫图书馆和英格兰教会记录中心关于死亡的宗教定义、对来世的担忧以及如何利用遗嘱和遗嘱提供死后护理的研究。人口学将探索从业者--詹姆斯·库里、安东尼·福瑟吉尔、亚历山大·约翰逊和查尔斯·凯特--所谓的医疗死亡的迹象、时机和定义方面的专家。到第三年，将创建一个独特的数据集，对英国被误诊为死亡的人进行统计重新评估。这将基于对农村、城市化、半工业、工业社区的精细案例研究分析，以比较地区、地区内和大都市的观点，即验尸官的死因和裁判法院如何被用来调查不确定的死亡，包括在1750年至1850年期间被复活论者偷走的身体。影响：18/19世纪的医生与21世纪的复苏医学顾问一样，面临着同样的基本伦理困境。尽管先进的技术可以追踪到最微弱的生命迹象--医学死亡的时间在现代生命伦理学中仍然是“不确定的”。

Death is a certainty for all humans. Yet, for centuries, defining the precise moment of death has been uncertain. The boundary between life and death was much debated in medical and scientific circles during the Georgian period in Britain. Determining medical death was difficult when the equipment in a doctor's bag was limited to a fleam [sic] (to test for blood circulation), pepper (to make the patient sneeze) or a mirror (to see breath). It was often said, in popular culture, that a patient was not dead until a doctor determined so. Medical theories developed to provide an explanation of the anatomical/physiological changes that caused the body to visibly shift from peri-mortem (warm but dead looking) to post-mortem (rigor mortis). Around 1800, medical practitioners identified that the cessation of heart, lung, and brain functions caused a person to be 'truly dead'; yet this neglected discourse continues to be pivotal in resuscitation medicine today - a hidden history. For much of the 18th and 19th centuries, ordinary people feared being misdiagnosed as dead, worried about their soul post-death, and sought to provide care for those left behind. Such societal concerns were mitigated through coroners'inquests, prayer, and the use of last wills & testaments. This proposed PhD sits at the intersection of all this medical uncertainty about the certainty of death in Britain between 1750 - 1850.The main research question: Why was medical death such an uncertain science, and what impact did this have on cultural understandings of the timings of death for those that lived between 1750 and 1850 in Britain? To investigate this neglected historiographical topic, in Year 1 a literature review will be undertaken. Having identified the research gap, archival work will be undertaken in County Record Offices and the National Archives, London.Quantitative and qualitative methods: Years 1-2 will analyze private diaries, family letters, medicalreports, hospital records and newspaper accounts, about the 'dead-alive', 'truly dead' and 'dangerous dead'. This will involve research at the Wellcome Trust, Lambeth Palace Library, and the Church of England Record Centre on religious definitions of death, concerns about the afterlife, and how last wills and testaments were used to provide posthumous care. Prosopography will explore practitioners - James Curry, Anthony Fothergill, Alexander Johnson, and Charles Kite - so-called experts on the signs, timing, and definition of medical death. By Year 3, a unique dataset will be created to produce a statistical reappraisal of people misdiagnosed as dead in Britain. This will be based on refined case- study analysis of rural, urbanized, semi-industrial, industrial communities to compare regional, intra- regional, and metropolitan perspectives on how coroners' inquests and assizes courts were used to investigate uncertain death, including bodies stolen by resurrectionists, in Britain c. 1750 to 1850.Impact: The 18th /19th century doctor shared the same fundamental ethical dilemmas as the 21stconsultant in resuscitation medicine. Although improved technology can trace the faintest signs of life - the timing of medical death has remained the 'uncertain certainty' in modern bioethics.