Body parts of scientists treated like religious relics
Next time you’re in Florence, find the Galileo Museum and have a look at Galileo’s finger.
Ninety-five years after his death in 1642, Galileo’s tomb was opened and his remains moved to a nearby basilica. En route, three of his fingers and a tooth were pinched.
Today, one of Galileo’s fingers points skywards in an egg-shaped glass container ornamented in gold. It is surrounded by a large gallery of lenses, telescopes, beautifully crafted brass sextants, nocturnal compasses, astrolabes and so on. The gnarled finger of Galileo, a hero and martyr of science, is almost like a religious relic and an object of pilgrimage.
Parts of other scientists have survived through the ages, including:
Jeremy Bentham’s body
If you hurry to the US this week, you can catch a glimpse of the British utilitarian philosopher Jeremy Bentham. Before his death in 1832, he instructed that his body be dissected for science. Accordingly, he was cut up, his head mummified, his skeleton dressed in fashionable clothes, and he was seated in a glass case at the University College, London. He is currently touring the US.
Einstein’s brain
Within eight hours of his death, Einstein’s brain was cut into 240 blocks about the size of sugar cubes.
One of his eyes was given to his ophthalmologist. There were a few distinctive things about Einstein’s brain. It lacked certain fissures, had more glial cells, had a stronger corpus callosum than usual, and neurons on the left side of his brain were a bit stronger than usual.
Nobody can see all of Einstein’s brain because it is scattered over several states.
Charles Babbage’s brain
Babbage was an English polymath, mathematician and engineer, who is known as the ‘‘father of the computer’’.
He invented a crank-handled mechanical ‘‘analytical engine’’ in the early 1800s. When he died in 1871, one half of his brain went to the Hunterian Museum and other half to the Science Museum in London. Babbage’s strangelooking
Other relics of science
❚ German Carl Gauss was one of history’s most notable mathematicians. On his death in
1855, his brain was removed and found to be exceptionally heavy
(1492 grams) and had highly developed convolutions.
❚ Antonio Scarpa, the so-called Father of Italian Ophthalmology, was decapitated in 1832. His urinary tract was removed and a finger cut off. He was a controversial figure and whether this was done for scientific reasons or vengeance is still argued.
❚ Sir Isaac Newton had a flourishing rock star’s hairdo. Nothing of his body remains but a lock of this tangle survives, as do cuttings of the famous apple tree at Cambridge under which he developed his theory of gravity.
❚ Nearer home, we have a few objects of scientific pilgrimage, including a lock of Lord Rutherford’s hair. However, his spectacles and tobacco pouch are still kept at Nelson College, his old school. Rutherford’s wife agreed to have his ashes interred at Westminster Abbey but later received a big bill she didn’t appreciate.