Editor’s Note
Since the separation between medicine and philosophy traditionally attributed to Hippocrates, the relationship between these disciplines has always been intense and at times conflictual. The fifteen studies brought together in this volume offer a history of these interactions, focusing on key figures or decisive moments: Plato, Aristotle, Galen, the Empirical and Methodic schools, al-Rāzī, Averroes, sixteenth-century Italy, Locke, Kant, Cabanis, the philosopher-physicians of the French Third Republic, Canguilhem, and Jaspers.
While today the main expectation physicians have of philosophy concerns ethics, historically the dialogue between the two disciplines has centered first and foremost on the epistemological status of medicine: Is the best physician necessarily a philosopher? What can philosophy learn from the physician’s method? Is medicine an art of the singular case, a science, or both?
By adopting a long-term perspective, these studies remind us that the current institutionalization of the philosophy of medicine is sometimes accompanied by a forgetting of the historical origins of reflection on medicine. Since contact with medicine also leads philosophy to recall that it defines itself as a way of life, the question that arises is how to improve human well-being and health within an environment constantly reshaped by the introduction of new therapeutic techniques.
About the authors
Claire Crignon is Professor of History and Philosophy of Medical Sciences at the Université de Lorraine. Together with Alexandre Escargueil, she co-founded the Biomedical Humanities Master’s programme and Initiative at Sorbonne University. She has published several works exploring the intersections between the history of British philosophy and the history of medical sciences, as well as the links between the history of philosophy, the history of medicine, and anthropology.
David Lefebvre is a former student of the ENS (Ulm) and holds the French agrégation in philosophy. After studying ancient philosophy at the Université Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne, he completed his PhD in philosophy in 2000 under the direction of Rémi Brague and obtained his Habilitation to Supervise Research in 2012. Since 2018, he has been Professor of the History of Ancient Philosophy at the Department of Philosophy of Sorbonne University and a member of the Centre Léon Robin (UMR 8061). His research focuses on Aristotle and the Aristotelian tradition.