Original scientific paper

Empiricism in Hellenistic Medicine – Generalizations without Aetiologies

Maja Hudoletnjak Grgić

Abstract

The Empiricists argued that medical knowledge is a matter of experience, and that no theory is required either for its formation or application. The central part of their position was rejecting the possibility of the discovery of causal connections by the use of reason. The theorems that make up medical knowledge are empirical generalizations that do not include the specification of the cause. However, the Greek authors outside Empiricism, both medical and philosophical, made a strong case for the claim that a generalization must be explanatory to be scientific or artistic. In this paper I discuss how non-explanatory generalizations, being statements of frequency
of joint occurrences which are statistically accurate, can be taken by the Empiricists as scientific.

Keywords

Empiricism; medicine; aetiology; causes; experience; generalization

Hrčak ID:

4019

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/4019

Publication date:

30.6.2006.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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