Here is the only major work of Claude Bernard's now available in English. Ninety years ago, this great French physiologist saw that medicine could be a science rather than an art, and set down his observations in his Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine.
This classic of medical science records Bernard's far-reaching efforts to transform physiology into an exact science. Here he explains his principles of scientific research, illustrating them by specific case histories from his own work. He examines frankly the roles of chance and error, and even preliminary false conclusions, in leading eventually to scientific truth; and discusses with equal candor the use of hypothesis. Bernard is considered to be one of the fathers of biochemistry; much of the modern application of mathematics to biology rests upon a foundation set down by him in this book.
Claude Bernard is remembered today for such major contributions to physiology as the discovery of the vasomoter system; the action of curare, carbon monoxide and other poisons; the functions of the pancreas in digestion; and the glycogenic function of the liver. These considerable achievements give authority to his description of a dedicated scientist attacking his problem some 90 years ago. This account, writes Professor I. Bernard Cohen, in a new Foreword, continues to be "as splendid a statement of the basic features of scientific research as has ever been written."
Unaltered, unabridged republication of first English translation.
Translated by Henry C. Greene
Introduction by Lawrence J. Henderson
New Foreword by Professor I. Bernard Cohen of Harvard University
About the Author
Claude Bernard (1813—1878) was a French physiologist known chiefly for his discoveries concerning the role of the pancreas in digestion, the glycogenic function of the liver, and the regulation of the blood supply by the vasomotor nerves. On a broader stage, Bernard played a role in establishing the principles of experimentation in the life sciences, advancing beyond the vitalism and indeterminism of earlier physiologists to become one of the founders of experimental medicine. His most seminal contribution was his concept of the internal environment of the organism, which led to the present understanding of homeostasis—i.e., the self-regulation of vital processes.
