“Surgeon philosophers” debate vitalism, the soul, and consciousness

My friend Seamus O’Mahony in his book on psychoanalysis describes Willfred Trotter, a fine surgeon and originator of the concept of the “herd instinct,” as a philosopher in “a profession that has no philosophers.” Those of us who have spent a lifetime hobnobbing with surgeons admire them for their dexterity, decisiveness, stamina, and authority but think of them as closer to carpenters and plumbers than philosophers. But it wasn’t always so: one of the great intellectual debates at the beginning of the 19th century was led by two surgeons with the Royal College of Surgeons at its centre. The debate was over vitalism: What makes us and all other creatures alive? Is it the soul, an act of God, or some force akin to an electric charge, nothing to do with God or the soul? Are we made by God or by earth and chemicals? Are oysters and humans simply variants of the same thing? On one side of the debate was John Abernethy, a pious Scottish Calvinist surgeon who trained in Edinburgh and came…