Renaissance natural philosophy, brain, and epilepsy (and some ideas about science)

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Renaissance natural philosophy, brain, and epilepsy (and some ideas about science) Eduardo Henrique Peiruque Kickhöfel Department of Philosophy, Federal University of São Paulo, Estrada do Caminho Velho, 333, 07252-312 Guarulhos, SP, Brazil

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Article history: Received 24 June 2019 Revised 23 September 2019 Accepted 23 September 2019 Available online xxxx Keywords: Renaissance Epilepsy Mondino de' Luzzi Leonardo da Vinci Modern science Contemporary science

a b s t r a c t Renaissance was a period full of religious and supernatural concepts and practices distant from the contemporary scientific world. Some erratic behaviors were considered demonic possessions and treated by exorcisms. It is supported by many sources. However, some important sources of the Renaissance point to a different picture. They show trends towards naturalistic explanations of many diseases, including epilepsy. This critical review discusses this approach, using texts by Mondino de' Luzzi and Leonardo da Vinci. However, more than an historical study, this review considers the passage from religious and supernatural practices to modern science. Contemporary consequences of that passage are considered, considering this Special Issue of Epilepsy & Behavior. © 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

When studying and writing history of ideas, it is important to forget some ideas we take for granted. Some concepts used here by no means are evident to the contemporary reader. It is common to translate the Greek word “epistēme” as “science”, but science from the Ancient Greece until the Renaissance was something very different from contemporary science. Thus, the first point is to clarify the concepts used in this review. As a scholar of the Renaissance philosophy, I follow authors like Benedetto Varchi [1], who in a well-known lecture on arts delivered in 1546 makes this point clear: “The first thing required in any dispute, in order to avoid equivocations and change of names, is to clarify the main terms.”1 Renaissance is considered here as the period from the middle 14th century to the middle 17th century. The first date corresponds to the writings of Francesco Petrarca, and the late date to the persistence of the Aristotelian tradition in the European universities [2–4]. Hundreds of ancient sources from classical antiquity were discovered, and wellknown texts were read afresh by men who called themselves “humanists”. Kristeller [5] says that those men were interested in “a well-defined cycle of studies called Studia humanitatis, which included grammatica, rhetorica, poetica, historia and philosophia moralis, as these

terms were then understood.” Humanists like Coluccio Salutati, Leonardo Bruni, and Giannozzo Manetti proposed a new dignity to the vita activa (practical or active live), which eventually would surpass the vita contemplativa (theoretical or contemplative life) as understood by Aristotle and medieval theologians and philosophers. This was one of the most important traits of the Renaissance. According to Vasoli [6], “the typical humanist approach to the philosophical tradition was to seek out the most ancient sources unmuddied by centuries of dubious exegesis and to shift the chief focus of attention away from metaphysics towards ethics and politics in search of virtues with good classical credentials and yet relevant to the needs of their changing society.” The Renaissance as an historical period was conceived by the French historian Jules Michelet in 19th century. However, Renaissance-educated men knew that they were doing something different from the most recent past, a period of decline with respect to the classical antiquity. They called it the Middle Ages, and in the end they invented the “myth” of the Dark Ages. Today, it is well-known that the period was not so dark, but documents show clearly that thousands of texts have been lost forever. Leon Battista Alberti, humanist and architect, was the key-figure in the 15th century. In the preface of his book Della pittura (On painting), dedicated to Filippo Brunelleschi in 1436, Alberti [7] writes:

E-mail address: [email protected]. 1 “In ciascuna disputa si debbe la prima cosa, per fuggire l'equivocazione e scambiamento dei nomi, dichiarare i termini principali.”

I used to marvel and at the same time to grieve that so many excellent and superior arts and sciences from our most vigorous antique past could now seem lacking and almost wholly lost. We know from [remaining] works and through references to them that they were

1. Introduction

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once widespread. Painters, sculptors, architects, musicians, geometricians, rhetoricians, seers and similar noble and amazing intellects are very rarely found today and there are just a few of them to praise. Thus, I believed, as many said, that Nature, the mistress of things, had grown old and tired. She no longer produced either geniuses or giants which in her more youthful and more glorious days she had produced so marvelously and abundantly.”2 Then Alberti writes about Brunelleschi, the architect who invented the perspective for the use of the painters and built the cupola of Santa Maria del Fiore, the main church of Florence, “ample enough to cover with its shadow all the people of Tuscany, and […] probably unknown and unthought of among the Ancients.”3 The Renaissance was a period of renewal and celebration of man's dignity, from which a new conception of mankind and its place in the world was born. “Philosophy” is a tricky word. Today it is used to mean the doctrines of such and such philosopher (Aristotelian or Kantian philosophy), historical traditions consolidated in the last two centuries (Greek or Modern philosophy), and contemporary schools (Analytical or Continental philosophy). In the Renaissance, the word was used in a different way and had different meanings. In the book Margarita philosophica (Philosophical Pearl or Pearl of Wisdom), an encyclopedia used as a textbook for youthful students during the 16th century, Gregor Reisch [9] writes the standard definition of philosophy: “Philosophy is knowledge of the divine and human things, joined with the study for the good life.”4 Some years later, Varchi [10] says: “Philosophy, which is the cognition of all things that exist, human or divine, has as object and matter the being, that is, everything that exists; and in short [it knows] all earthly and mortal, heavenly and eternal.”5 To quote just one more example, Franciscus Toletus [11], a Jesuit from the Collegio Romano, in his Commentaria to Aristotle's Physics, follows the standard definition and adds another goal: “Philosophy is knowledge of the divine and human things” whose end is to be “similar to God”.6 These very broad notions of philosophy encompass everything whose principles and causes could be known and explained by reasonings and demonstrations. There were three criteria for the division of philosophy: abstraction from matter, certainty, and utility. The more abstracted and certain, and the less useful the knowledge, the better it was. Notwithstanding the new values given to the practical forms of knowledge, in this sense the Renaissance humanists and philosophers remained ancient. The theoretical philosophy comprised three parts. Metaphysics concerned with being in general, abstracting from its material and immaterial instantiations. Mathematics was concerned with quantitative being. Physics, natural philosophy, or natural science considers qualitatively everything that falls under the senses, and its contents were provided by Aristotelian libri naturales: Physics, Generation and Corruption, On the Heavens, Generation of Animals and so on. The practical philosophy comprised active disciplines like ethics and politics, and various forms of productive arts as well, including agriculture, navigation, architecture, painting, and so on [12]. Theoretical forms of knowledge were

2 “Io solea maravigliarmi insieme e dolermi che tante ottime e divine arti e scienze, quali per loro opere e per le istorie veggiamo copiose erano in que’ vertuosissimi passati antiqui, ora così siano mancate e quasi in tutto perdute: pittori, scultori, architetti, musici, ieometri, retorici, auguri e simili nobilissimi e maravigliosi intelletti oggi si truovano rarissimi e poco da lodarli. Onde stimai fusse, quanto da molti questo così essere udiva, che già la natura, maestra delle cose, fatta antica e stracca, più non producea come né giuganti così né ingegni, quali in que’ suoi quasi giovinili e più gloriosi tempi produsse, amplissimi e maravigliosi.” 3 “Ampla da coprire con sua ombra tutti e’ popoli toscani, e […] forse appresso gli antichi fu non saputo né conosciuto.” Both English translations from Spencer [8]. 4 “Philosophia est divinarum humanarumque rerum cognitio cum studio bene vivendi coniuncta.” 5 “La Filosofia, la quale è la cognizione di tutte le cose che sono, così umane come divine, ha per soggetto e materia sua l'ente, cio è tutto quello che è; ed in somma tutte le cose così terrene e mortali, come celesti e sempiterne.” 6 “Philosophia est diuinarum, humanarumque rerum cognitio” and “Philosophia est Dei similitudo.”

searched by themselves, but the practical forms were searched for their ends. It is important to note that the words “philosophy” and “science” were used interchangeably. The distinction between philosophy and science as we know today was elaborated later. Thomas Hobbes in 1651 still wrote: “Science, that is, knowledge of consequences, which is called also philosophy.” However, if in the preface of the Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers (Encyclopedia, or a Systematic Dictionary of the Sciences, Arts, and Crafts) it is still written “Philosophie ou Science”, by 1751 the distinction between speculative and experimental disciplines was well on the way. By the way, the word “scientist” was coined by William Whewell, in response to a challenge made in 1833 by the poet Samuel Thomas Coleridge [13]. Anyway, for Aristotle and other Renaissance philosophers, medicine was part of the practical branch of philosophy. However, authors like Reisch [9], following Arab and Medieval philosophers, considered medicine both theoretical and practical. Andreas Vesalius [14], writing in a period in which man was the main concern, considers anatomy as “the preeminent part of natural philosophy”, for “it comprises the natural history of man and should rightly be regarded as the firm foundation of the whole art of medicine.”7 Another aspect of medicine in the Renaissance regards the illustrations. Leonardo da Vinci was the pioneer here, but he did not publish his drawings. Andreas Vesalius, the greatest anatomist of the Renaissance, employed craftsmen to do drawings and woodcuts for his great book De humanis corporis fabrica. Vesalius does not refer clearly to them, but it is supposed that they included Jan Stephan van Calcar, a student of Titian.8

2. Brain and epilepsy in the Renaissance The Greek word “ἐπιληψία” was transliterated as “epilēpsia” in Latin, and literally means “seizure”. It was a condition known since Hippocrates' Περί ιερής νούσου (On the sacred disease). Diamantis et al. [15] argue that epilepsy in Europe in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance was “overrun by the domination of the Catholic Church” that led to superstitious views of the disease: “Therapy for epilepsy was based on rituals with patients considered ‘possessed’ or labeled as witches and warlocks. Victims experienced prejudice, exorcisms and social marginalization.” The paper is an historical review based on Medieval and Renaissance sources. Lay people's attitudes at the time also considered practices like votive gifts, as documented by Wolf et al. [16]. However, this was not the only approach to the study of the brian. For example, Mondino de' Luzzi [38] wrote by 1316 the Anothomia (Anatomy). It is a small treatise based on authorities, but possibly Mondino did dissections himself after centuries of oblivion. The treatise shows an empirical approach to the human body, and he says “according to manual operations I will give you notice” about human anatomy.9 However, Mondino quickly was made an authority of sorts, and his book was used as a guide to perform dissections in European universities. The statutes of Padova, the great medical university of the Renaissance, expressly laid down that the exposition of human anatomy should follow the words of Mondino.10 The Anatomy was reprinted in the Johannes de Kethan's Fasciculus medicinae (Compendium of medicine), a collection of six medieval 7 “Praecipua naturalis philosophiae partis, cui quum hominis historiam complectatur, firmissimusque totius medicae artis fundamentum.” 8 Vesalius refers to him in the Tabulae anatomicae sex, published in 1538, and Giorgio Vasari credits him as the maker of “the eleven pieces of large plates of anatomy, which were made by Andreas Vesalius and designed by the Flemish Stephan van Calcar, an excellent painter, which were later made in smaller dimensions and carved in copper by Valverde, who wrote on anatomy after Vesalius.” (“Gl'undici pezzi di carte grandi di notomia, che furono fatte da Andrea Vessalio e disegnate da Giovanni di Calcare fiamingo, pittore eccellentissimo, le quali furono poi ritratte in minor foglio et intagliate in rame dal Valverde, che scrisse della notomia dopo il Vessallio.”). 9 “Secundum manualem operationem vobis tradam notitiam.” 10 Cf. Singer [17]: “Ut Anatomici explicationem ipsius Mundini sequantur.”

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medical treatises from early 14th century and published for the first time in 1491. The figure shows the anatomy professor (lector) reading the anatomical text, and the demonstrator (demonstrator) instructing the barber surgeon (sector) to cut the corpse (Fig. 1). Siraisi [18] writes: “The objective of the dissections conducted as part of medical or surgical training in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries was not investigation but instruction. In this context, dissection seldom functioned as a means of controlling or correcting the written word and certainly not as an independent research tool.” Let us see an example. Traditional medicine sustained that men had five external senses (touch, taste, smell, hearing and sight), and a set of internal senses was required to explain the functions of the soul. These inner senses were located in the ventricles of the brain. The doctrine had many variations, and few lines will show Mondino's doctrines on the cerebral ventricles and his style, as it were. Following Galen and other authorities, Mondino writes: After that, proceed cautiously with a midline incision until you reach the large anterior ventricle; before entering into the gap, note that (this) ventricle (anterior) is divided, as I said, into right and left and (that) the walls descend here and there (of the medial line) to the base and divide the right from the left; then you will immediately see the width of each of the ventricles in its anterior part; that is, in the front corner is located the fantasy, which holds the images gathered by the special senses. In the back corner there is the imagination, which makes the images retained by the imagination and includes them in itself by composing and dividing without being

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conscious of it. Right in the middle of this (ventricle) is located the common sense, that makes the images brought by the special senses, for the sensory modalities end in that region equal to streams (which go) to the source, as you will see. All these things are presented following the opinion of Avicenna in De virtutibus animalium, although according to the opinion of Aristotle and Galen here (in this ventricle) there would be only common sense, which can alternatively be called both fantasy and imagination, as I said before.11 Somehow professors and students saw the ventricles in dissections, and they were pictured (for a review, see [19]; Fig. 2). We have to consider the conditions they had: fresh bodies and no chemical preservatives. Anyway, Mondino explains epilepsy in a naturalistic way: This ventricle can suffer from a disease of the composition or, saying more precisely, of the complexio, which, if it obstructs incompletely or is a gaseous substance, then causes vertigo and scotoma; if the disease is humoral it causes numbness, paralysis and similar symptoms; if it obstructs completely, blocks the ventricles and tissues at the same time, or only the ventricles. If obstructs the ventricles and tissue, an apoplexy occurs; if only the ventricles, it causes epilepsy.12 Mondino followed the naturalistic approach of ancient Greek texts read by Islamic physicians and philosophers like Avicenna. Leonardo da Vinci [20] shows another empirical approach to the human anatomy. He repeated traditional notions about the ventricles of the brain (Fig. 3), but he made dissections, and at the end of his life he said to have dissected more than thirty human bodies. By 1507–08, he made an original procedure to find the real form of ventricles (Fig. 4): Make 2 vents in the horn of the great ventricles and inject melted wax with a syringe, making a hole in the ventricle of the memoria [IVth ventricle] and through such a hole fill the 3 ventricles of the brain. Then, when the wax was set, take away the brain [substance] and you will see the shape of the ventricles perfectly. But first put narrow tubes into the vents so that the air which is in these ventricles can escape and make room for the wax which enters in the ventricles.13 In order to know this, Leonardo manipulated the brain of an ox. However, Leonardo still repeated the idea of mental faculties inside the ventricles. Notwithstanding his great natural talent (ingegno) and discipline (arte), he was a man of the Renaissance. In an earlier folio, he considered the “mal caduco” or the “falling sickness” in a naturalistic

Fig. 1. Johannes de Ketham. Anatomy lesson, from the Fasciculo di medicina (Venice: Gregorius de Gregoriis, 1494). Hand-colored woodcut. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

11 “Postea vade scindendo leviter per medium donec pervenias ad ventriculum anteriorem magnum, et antequam profundes usque ad lacunam nota ventriculum esse divisum ut dixi in dextrum et sinistrum, et parietes hinc inde sunt descendentes usque ad basim et dividentes dextrum a sinistro, et tunc statim videbis amplitudinem uniuscuiusque ventriculorum; in anteriori parte eius, id est [in] angulo anteriori, locata est phantasia, quae retentiva est specierum sensibus particularibus receptarum. In angulo posteriori est imaginativa, quae apprehensiva est harum specierum in phantasia retentarum, et eas comprehendit componendo et dividendo, non asserendo hoc esse hoc. In medio vero huius est sensus communis, qui est apprehendens species delatas a sensibus particularibus, et ideo sensitiva haec terminantur ad illum locum ut rivi ad fontem, ut videbis. Et haec omnia dicta sunt secundum sententiam Avicennae, de virtutibus animalibus, et licet secundum sententiam Aristotilis et Galieni ibi tantum sit sensus communis qui diversimode potest dici et phantasia et imaginatio, ut alias declaravi.” 12 “Potest pati aegritudinem compositionalem vel complexionalem, ut melius dicam, quae si est oppilans non ex toto aut est substantia vaporosa et sic est vertigo et scotomia, aut humoralis et sic est stupor, paralisis et huiusmodi; si sit oppilans ex toto, aut oppilat ventriculos et substantiam simul aut ventriculos tantum. Si ventriculos et substantiam est apoplexia, si ventriculos tantum est epilepsia.” 13 “Fa’ due sfiatatoi ne’ corni de’ ventriculi maggiori e metti la cera fonduta collo schizzatoio, facendo un buso nel ventriculo della memoria, e empi per tale buso li tre ventriculi del cervello; e poi, quando la cera è rassodata, disfa il cervello e vedrai la figura delli tre ventriculi di punto. Ma, prima, metti le canne sottili nelli sfiatatoi, acciò che l'aria che è in essi ventriculi, possa spirare e dar loco alla cera che entra innelli ventriculi.”

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Fig. 3. Leonardo da Vinci. Ventricles of the brain. Sanguine, pen, and ink, 203 × 152 mm, c. 1490–93. Royal Library, Windsor Castle. Fig. 2. Gregor Reisch. Anima sensitivae, from Margarita philosophica (Frieburg: Johannes Schottun, 1503). Woodcut. Freiburg, Universitätsbibliothek.

vogue, that one man should carry out the dissection of the human body, and another give the description of the parts”:

way. He asks “How the nerves sometimes act of themselves without the command of other functions or of the mind”, and then writes:

These latter are perched up aloft in a pulpit like jackdaws, and with a notable air of disdain they drone out information about facts they have never approached at first hand, but which they merely commit to memory from the books of others, or of which they have descriptions before their eyes; the former are so ignorant of languages that they are unable to explain their dissections to the onlookers and botch what ought to be exhibited in accordance with the instruction of the physician, who never applies his hand to the dissection, and contemptuously steers the ship out of the manual, as the saying goes. Thus everything is wrongly taught, days are wasted in absurd questions, and in the confusion less is offered to the onlooker than a butcher in his stall could teach a doctor.16

This is clearly apparent for you will see paralytics, cowards and the benumbed move their trembling members, such as the head or the hands, without permissions of the mind. The mind with all its powers cannot prevent these members from trembling. This also happens in epilepsy and in members which have been severed, as in the tails of lizards.14 In another folio, Leonardo seeks the origin of many conditions, including epilepsy: “Represent whence catarrh is derived. Tears. Sneezing. Yawning. Trembling. The falling sickness. Madness. Sleep. Hunger. Sensuality. Anger, where acts in the body. Fear likewise.”15 Vesalius [14] openly criticized the traditional approach to dissections, and in the preface of the De humanis corporis fabrica (On the fabric of the human body) he condemns “the detestable procedure now in

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“Come i nervi operano qualche volta per lora, sanza comandamento delli altri offiziali e dell'anima. Questo chiaramente apparisce, imperò che tu vederai movere ai paraletici e a’ freddolenti e assiderati le loro tremanti membra, come testa e mani sanza licenza dell'anima, la quale anima con tutte sue forze non potrà vietare a essi membri che non triemino. Questo medesi b mo N accade del mal caduco e ne’ membri tagliati, come code di lucerte.” 15 “Figura donde diriva il catarro, le lagrime, lo starnuto, la spaviglio, il tremito, il mal caduco, lo immatire, il sonno, la fame, la lussuria, l'ira, dove s'adopera nel corpo, la paura similmente, la febbre, il morbo, dove offende il veleno.” English translations from Saunders and O'Malley edition (Leonardo [21])

Something similar happened in other parts of natural philosophy, Galileo Galilei's condemnation for supporting the Copernican system being the most famous case. An anecdote told by Cassirer [23] encapsulates the new aims and methods of the modern philosophers:

16 “Detestabilem ritum in Gymnasiis non inveheret, quo alii humani corporis sectionem administrare, alii partium historiam enarrare consueverunt. His quidem graculorum modo, quae numquam aggressi sunt, sed tantum ex aliorum libris memoriae commendant, descriptave ob oculos ponunt, alte in cathedra egregio fastu occinentibus: illis autem adeo linguarum imperitis, ut dissecta spectatoribus explicare nequeant, atque ex physici praescripto ostendanda lacerent, qui manu sectioni nunquam adhibita, tantum ex commentario nautam non sine supercilio agit. Atque ut sic omnia perperam docentur in scholis, ac ridiculis quaestionibus dies aliquot abeunt, ita quoque spectatoribus in illo tumultu pauciora proponuntur, quam lanius in macello medicum docere posset.” English translation from Vesalius [22].

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Fig. 4. Leonardo da Vinci. Ventricles of the brain. Black chalk, pen, and ink, 200 × 262 mm, c. 1506–08. Royal Library, Windsor Castle.

Descartes was a great admirer of Vesalius. He was deeply interested in anatomical problems, and he made a regular practice of dissecting animals, the bodies of which he had himself procured from his butcher. During his sojourn in Holland, Descartes once had a visit from a French gentleman who in the course of the conversation asked him which were his favorite books in the field of physics and natural history. “I will show you my books”, replied Descartes, “if you follow me.” After this he led his guest to the courtyard, and pointing to the body of a calf that he had just received from his butcher and that he intended to dissect next morning, he said: “These are my books!” However, magic and other forms of mythical thinking were still considered. The Malleus maleficarum (Hammer of Witches), according to Sapolsky [24] “the definitive treatise about why someone becomes a witch, how to identify them, and what to do with them”, was published in 1487 and widely used in the next two centuries. In this book, epilepsy is coupled with leprosy, and although the authors accept these conditions could be triggered by inclinations and defects of the internal organs, they could be inflicted through acts of sorcery as well. What was necessary to be modern? Let us move beyond anatomy and epilepsy in order to understand it. 3. Going modern Just new methods of observation and eventually some experiments did not make the modern science. Nature in the Renaissance had meanings provided by classical antiquity. Close [25] summarizes the commonplaces about nature: “(a) The principle or processes of generation, evolution, and growth in the physical cosmos; (b) the universal causative power; (c) the original and permanently subsisting ground of the cosmos, whether in the pre-Socratic sense of matter and the elements

or in the Platonic sense of the Ideas; (d) the essential form of physical things, giving them life and specific identity; (e) the cosmic scheme or the natural world.” Christian philosophers and theologians introduced concepts like souls, and Hermeticism, a religious and esoteric tradition based upon writings attributed to Hermes Trismegistus, but de facto Egyptian-Greek texts from the 2nd century AD, revived magic and made nature full of “spirits” and other occult forces like sympathy and antipathy. Astrology was widely practiced, and the image from Fasciculus medicinae shows that each organ and part of the human body was related to a sign of the zodiac (Fig. 5). Nature was a projection of the human psyche. Nicolaus Copernicus [26] still considered this kind of conception of nature. In the first chapter of his book De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the revolutions of the heavenly spheres), he writes that drops of water and other fluid bodies desire (cupiunt) to be selfcontained.17 Renaissance natural philosophy coupled metaphysical eternal truths and plain common sense. However, in order to make plausible the idea of the Earth in motion proposed by Copernicus, natural philosophers needed a new physics. Aristotelian physics was based on the immobility of the Earth, and according to which the heavy elements (earth and water) tended by nature to the center of the universe (which corresponded to the center of the Earth), and the light elements (air and fire) tended to move away from it. Bodies contained within themselves the causes of their local movements, now alive with human affections and intentions. The refusal of this conception becomes clear when Johannes Kepler, considering the dynamics of planetary motions and the fact that the farther planets were removed from the sun, the less the power of the sun was able to move them, substituted the word “soul” (“anima”) by “force” (“vis”). According to Westfall [27], “from anima motrix to vis, from 17

“In aquæ guttis cæterisque liquidis corporibus apparet, dum per se terminari cupiunt.”

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the traditional and the modern, and even Isaac Newton wrote texts that now can be classified as occult studies. What was at stake there? The passage from supernatural beliefs and speculations to knowledge based on evidence and mathematical reasoning. In the first case, the explanations were narratives that had images, fantasies, and other affective contents. In the second, forms of knowledge that use mathematical languages precisely to avoid images, fantasies, and affects. We could say it was the passage from myth to reason. It had happened in ancient Greece, but in the Renaissance, natural philosophy in many ways was related to theology and other forms of prescientific knowledge. To Europe became modern, the process had to happen again. 4. Concluding remarks

Fig. 5. Johannes de Ketham. Zodiac-man, from the Fasciculo di medicina (Venice: Gregorius de Gregoriis, 1494). Woodcut. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

the animistic to the mechanistic, the development of Kepler's thought foreshadowed the course of 17th century science.” Moreover, Galileo outlined the concept of inertia to explain how it was possible for a body the size of the Earth to move and, simultaneously, not cause movements in bodies on its surface. Movements were states to which the bodies were indifferent and participated in the movements of the Earth. Matter became inanimate and passive, and could now be studied through experiments and subjected to mathematical treatments. The new natural philosophers coupled physics and mathematics, and moved away from theology. Westfall [27] says the new mechanical philosophy was suggested by Galileo and Kepler and assumed its final form in the writings of Descartes, who excised “every trace of the psychic from nature with surgical precision, leaving it a lifeless field knowing only the brute blows of inert chunks of matter”: “It was a conception of nature startling in its bleakness – but admirably contrived for the purposes of modern science.” In the 17th century, the efforts of Galilei and Kepler were summarized by Isaac Newton in his Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica (Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy). The new physics described a new nature, as it were. By the way, Descartes conceived of living beings as mechanisms or automata, common in his time, and in the 18th century, a period in which instruments of time measurement had unprecedented precision, countless natural philosophers imagined the universe as a clock. Of course, this process was not so linear. Paracelsus, born Theophrastus von Hohenheim, was physician, alchemist ,and astrologer, maybe a typical figure of the Renaissance. Kepler was a curious amalgam of

We consider today's sciences as descriptive and/or explanatory forms of knowledge obtained from controlled observations and/or experiments. From data considered statistically significant, scientists form hypotheses that predict new observational and experimental phenomena. However, it comes at a price. (a) Sciences do not consider metaphysical concepts, and essential definitions and foundations do not make sense among scientists. Scientists build on previous theoretical frameworks and hypotheses, but that's it. Scientists describe patterns, not principles and causes in metaphysical sense. (b) Sciences do not consider theology, that is to say, systematic discourses about an omnipotent and omniscient being who observes and protects human beings. The meaning of life and individual salvation are nothing more than fantasies from ancient times, for they presuppose predetermined paths to be traveled. (c) Sciences do not consider teleology, that is, conceptions related to final causes in some way inherent in the bodies. Physicists consider matter as particles in fields of force (say, quarks or strings), and evolutionary biologists consider mechanisms of random variations (mutations in DNA) in reproducing populations. (d) Finally, sciences also cast doubts on the notions of “conscience” and “free will”, the basis of Christian theology and of secular ethical and juridical conceptions of our daily life. It is well-known that Descartes elaborated a dualistic conception: on the one hand, the res extensa, to which could be attributed extension, place, and motion; on the other hand, the res cogitans, free from such attributes and causal relations. The new philosophy of nature could study res extensa, but not res cogitans, still in the domain of the speculative philosophers. Since the end of 19th century, scientists apply the patterns they know on res extensa to res cogitans. It destroys our intuitive dualism, leaving no place for the so-called “ghost in the machine”. Neuroscientists like Crick and Koch [28], Edelman and Tononi [29] and Baars [30], among many others, seek for neural correlates of consciousness, but maybe this is a road or passage from which no exit is possible. Eliminative materialism claims that folk psychology is deeply wrong and has no role to play in a mature science of the mind [31]. Instead of free-will, many neuroscientists consider neurobiology of decision [32], and scientificminded philosophers like Churchland [33] suggest to “shift the debate away from the puzzling metaphysics of causal vacuums to the neurobiology of self-control.” Anyway, assuming natural explanations, we arrive at a bleak picture of our existence. Searle [34] put this question in the following way: We understand that the universe consists entirely of particles (or whatever entities the ultimately true physics arrives at), and these exist in fields of force and are typically organized into systems. […] There is, however, an interesting tension. It is not at all easy to reconcile the basic facts with a certain conception we have of ourselves. Our self-conception derives in part from our cultural inheritance, but mostly it derives from our own experience. We have a conception of ourselves as conscious, intentionalistic, rational, social, institutional, political, speech-act performing, ethical and free will

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possessing agents. Now, the question is, “How can we square this self-conception of ourselves as mindful, meaning-creating, free, rational, etc., agents with a universe that consists entirely of mindless, meaningless, unfree, nonrational, brute physical particles?” Nagel [35] thinks that to solve it using science “is ruled out by the conditions that have defined the physical sciences from the beginning”, for the modern science depended on a crucial limiting step at the start: without consciousness, meaning, intention, or purpose, important aspects of nature remain unexplained. We do not know how to solve it. Be that as it may, it is quite difficult to accept this bleak view today. Moreover, we consider the non-Western traditional medicines as curiosities from prescientific periods. Considering the current political trends in our western societies, we have the duty to preserve and respect traditional forms of knowledge. However, scientists do not make incantations and other forms of magic, as we see in this Special Issue of Epilepsy & Behavior. Maybe some sensible people can think that these conceptions are “victims of patriarchal white societies” and so on. We have rejected worldviews, it is true, but the duty of scientists is to study the world. We have done it to Aristotle and Copernicus already, and Renaissance natural philosophy is a relic from a bygone era. We do it to ourselves in thousands of laboratories every day. Many forms of traditional Western and non-Western knowledge have been lost, and many more will be lost. Many hypotheses that today withstand experiments and analysis sooner or later will be considered to be wrong or incomplete, in agreement with Popper [36]. Science promises no dogmas, no truth, no certain knowledge. With hard work and some luck, we can make progress. Copernicus could not imagine Mars as a planet, and any planet beyond Saturn. Charles Darwin could not imagine the structure of DNA, exons and introns, epigenetics, and so on. Today we send rovers to Mars and Saturn, we make astonishing photos of Pluto and of strange bodies like black holes. We know the structure of DNA in vast amounts of detail, and the extended synthesis considers coevolution of genes and cultures. Sciences make our experiences richer. Sagan [37] says: In some respects, science has far surpassed religion in delivering awe. How is it that hardly any major religion has looked at science and concluded, “This is better than we thought! The Universe is much bigger than our prophets said, grander, more subtle, more elegant. God must be even greater than we dreamed?” Instead they say, “No, no, no! My god is a little god, and I want him to stay that way.” Once we overcome our fear of being tiny, we find ourselves on the threshold of a vast and awesome Universe that utterly dwarfs – in time, in space, and in potential – the tidy anthropocentric proscenium of our ancestors. Science as we know it is just 400 years old. It is not the result of musings of a few white men able to imagine big pictures like speculative philosophers in very specific places, but a collective enterprise conducted by thousands of men and women in laboratories around the world. To think about their scope and ends can help us to understand one of the main forms of knowledge of our Western civilization. The case of epilepsy discussed in this review shows clearly the passage from religious and supernatural practices to modern science based on experimental and mathematical tools. We do not perform exorcisms and burn witches anymore, at least in our western societies. Epilepsy is a group of neurological disorders characterized by seizures, and we consider erratic behaviors as triggered by natural causes. Clearly, progress has been made in order to improve our human condition. We have a long way to go, but the building blocks were laid by the Renaissance and early modern natural philosophers and mathematicians.

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Conflict of interest The author has no conflict of interests to report that would influence the content of this paper. Acknowledgments The author is very grateful to Prof. Dr. Norberto Garcia-Cairasco for his invitation to write this critical review and his comments. Thanks are also extended to Jessica Lury Kumada Imaeda de Carvalho and Henrique Marins de Carvalho for their academic help and friendship. Thanks to FAPESP (Proc. 2012/01124-2 and 2014/16549-4) for financial support. References [1] Varchi B. Sopra la pittura e scultura: lezione due. In: Racheli A, editor. Opere di Benedetto Varchi. Trieste: Sezione Letterario-Artistica del Lloyd Austriaco; 1859. p. 611–47. [2] Bianchi L. Continuity and change in the Aristotelian tradition. In: Hankins J, editor. The Cambridge companion to Renaissance philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 2007. p. 49–71. [3] Kuhn H. Aristotelianism in the Renaissance. In: Zalta EN, editor. The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophySpring ed. ; 2018. [4] Schmitt CB. Aristotle and the Renaissance. Cambridge (Mass.): Harvard University Press; 1983. [5] Kristeller PO. Humanism. In: Schmitt CB, Skinner Q, editors. The Cambridge history of Renaissance philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1988. p. 113–37. [6] Vasoli C. The Renaissance concept of philosophy. In: Schmitt CB, Skinner Q, editors. The Cambridge history of Renaissance philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1988. p. 57–74. [7] Alberti LB. Della pittura. In: Grayson C, editor. Opere volgari. Laterza: Bari; 1973. p. 5–107. [8] Alberti LB. On painting. Translated by John R. Spencer New Haven: Yale University Press; 1970. [9] Reisch G. Margarita philosophica. Argentinae [Straßburg]: Johannes Schottus; 1503. [10] Varchi B. Divisione della filosofia. In: Racheli A, editor. Opere di Benedetto Varchi. Trieste: Sezione Letterario-Artistica del Lloyd Austriaco; 1859. p. 794–6. [11] Toletus F. Commentaria una cum Quaestionibus in Octo Libros Aristotelis de Physica Auscultatione. Coloniae Agrippinae: Haeredes Arnoldi Birckmani; 1574. [12] Wallace WA. Traditional natural philosophy. In: Schmitt CB, Skinner Q, editors. The Cambridge history of Renaissance philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1988. p. 201–35. [13] Snyder LJ. William Whewell. In: Zalta EN, editor. The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophySpring ed. ; 2019. [14] Vesalius A. De humani corporis fabrica. Basileae: Joannes Oporinus; 1543. [15] Diamantis A, Sidiropoulou K, Magiorkinis E. Epilepsy during the Middle Ages, the Renaissance and the Enlightenment. J Neurol 2010;257:691–8. [16] Wolf P, et al. Absence status epilepticus: the first documented case? Epilepsia 2007; 48(Suppl. 8):4–5. [17] Singer C. A study in early Renaissance anatomy, with a new text: the Anothomia of Hieronymo Manfredi (1490). In: Singer C, editor. Studies in the history and method of science. New York: Arno Press; 1975. p. 80–164. [18] Siraisi NG. Medieval and early Renaissance medicine: an introduction to knowledge and practice. Chicago: University of Chicago Press; 1990. [19] Verboon A. Brain ventricle diagrams: a century after Walther Sudhoff. New manuscript sources from the XVth century. Sudhoffs Archiv: Zeitschrift für Wissenschaftsgeschichte 2014;98(2):212–33. [20] da Vinci Leonardo. In: Windsor di, Keele K, Pedretti C, editors. Corpus degli studi anatomici nella collezione di Sua Maestà la Regina Elisabetta II nel Castelo. Firenze: Giunti Barbèra; 1980–85. [21] da Vinci Leonardo. Leonardo on the human body. The anatomical, physiological and embriological drawings of Leonardo da Vinci. New York: Wings Books; 1997. [22] Vesalius A. The preface of Andreas Vesalius to his own books on the anatomy of the human body addressed to the most great and invincible emperor the divine Charles V. Translated by B. Farrington , In: Schartz G, Bishop PW, editors. The Development of Modern Science. New York: Basic Books Inc.; 1958. p. 517–32. [23] Cassirer E. The place of Andreas Vesalius in the culture of the Renaissance. In: Francis WW, editor. The four hundredth anniversary of the De humanis corporis fabrica. Yale University Press; 1943. p. 9–20. [24] Sapolsky RM. Behave. New York: Penguin Press; 2017. [25] Close AJ. Commonplace theories of art and nature in Classical Antiquity and in the Renaissance. J Hist Ideas 1969;30(4):467–86. [26] Copernicus N. De revolutionibus orbium coelestium. Norimbergae: Ioh. Petreium; 1543. [27] Westfall RS. The construction of modern science: mechanisms and mechanics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1977. [28] Crick F, Koch C. A framework for consciousness. Nat Neurosci 2003;6(2):119–26. [29] Edelman G, Tononi GA. Universe of consciousness. New York: Basic Books; 2000. [30] Baars B. In the theater of consciousness. Oxford: Oxford University Press; 1997. [31] Ramsey W. Eliminative materialism. In: Zalta EN, editor. The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophySpring ed. ; 2019.

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