Special Topics in the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine: Experiments in Early Science

This class approaches the history of early science and medicine by asking how past societies responded to the challenge of observing and testing nature. Historically, what counted as an experiment and how did experiment become the arbiter of scientific discovery in the European world? Drawing on ancient, medieval, and early modern sources, as well as historical reconstructions of past experiments, we trace the changing role of experience across such diverse fields as astronomy, surgery, alchemy, and magic.