JF Ptak Sciene Books LLC Post 380
This non-metaphorical, truth-be-told image is the responsibility of the irrepressible everyone's-favorite-18th-century-Jesuit, Athanasius Kircher. Fr. Kircher was extremely learned and had a superb memory and a great scientific bent; and for the stuff that he didn't know or hadn't read about or couldn't prove by experimentation or produce by logical means, well, he just made the stuff up and pressed on. But there is *so* much that he got correct and he published such a terrific amount of material that we'll forgive these forays into The Twilight Zone His detractors and critics couldn't keep up with the man; almost nobody could--the bit about the hypnotized chicken that appears in his incredible Physiologia Kircheriana Experimentalis...(Amsterdam, 1680, edited and compiled by Kircher's pupil Johann Stephan Kestler), which is packed with so much diverse material that the chicken pretty much gets lost in the intellectual sauce. Kircher's reach was deep, formalizing bunches of natural science expositions by physical and mathematical experimentation and proof, not the least of which was proving the lunar influence on the tides and the construction of a magic lantern (below) .
The hypno-chicken comes into the picture via Kircher's interests in the magnetic art and electricity, dabbling away at the edges of science in a precursor to Mesmerism. He also came up a little short with his experimental proof that insects were born of animal dung, but, as I said, he got much more right than he did wrong, and forgive him his rush to publication on some things that he may not have been happy with.
To press the point only slightly (the list and breadth of his accomplishments is just too much for this prankish little post about the chicken), have a look at the partial list of his publications:
A partial list of Kircher's works include:
* 1631 Ars Magnesia
* 1635 Primitiae gnomoniciae catroptricae
* 1636 Prodromus coptus sive aegyptiacus
* 1637 Specula Melitensis encyclica, hoc est syntagma novum instrumentorum physico- mathematicorum
* 1641 Magnes sive de arte magnetica
* 1643 Lingua aegyptiaca restituta
* 1645–1646 Ars Magna Lucis et umbrae in mundo
* 1650 Obeliscus Pamphilius
* 1650 Musurgia universalis, sive ars magna consoni et dissoni
* 1652–1655 Oedipus Aegyptiacus
* 1654 Magnes sive (third, expanded edition)
* 1656 Itinerarium extaticum s. opificium coeleste
* 1657 Iter extaticum secundum, mundi subterranei prodromus
* 1658 Scrutinium Physico-Medicum Contagiosae Luis, quae dicitur Pestis
* 1660 Pantometrum Kircherianum ... explicatum a G. Schotto
* 1661 Diatribe de prodigiosis crucibus
* 1663 Polygraphia, seu artificium linguarium quo cum omnibus mundi populis poterit quis respondere
* 1664–1678 Mundus subterraneus, quo universae denique naturae divitiae
* 1665 Historia Eustachio-Mariana
* 1665 Arithmologia
* 1666 Obelisci Aegyptiaci ... interpretatio hieroglyphica
* 1667 China Monumentis, qua sacris qua profanis
* 1667 Magneticum naturae regnum sive disceptatio physiologica
* 1668 Organum mathematicum
* 1669 Principis Cristiani archetypon politicum
* 1669 Latium
* 1669 Ars magna sciendi sive combinatorica
* 1673 Phonurgia nova, sive conjugium mechanico-physicum artis & natvrae paranympha phonosophia concinnatum
* 1675 Arca Noe
* 1676 Sphinx mystagoga
* 1676 Obelisci Aegyptiaci
* 1679 Musaeum Collegii Romani Societatis Jesu
* 1679 Turris Babel, Sive Archontologia Qua Primo Priscorum post diluvium hominum vita, mores rerumque gestarum magnitudo, Secundo Turris fabrica civitatumque exstructio, confusio linguarum, & inde gentium transmigrationis, cum principalium inde enatorum idiomatum historia, multiplici eruditione describuntur & explicantur. Amsterdam, Jansson-Waesberge 1679.
* 1679 Tariffa Kircheriana sive mensa Pathagorica expansa
* 1680 Physiologia Kicheriana experimentalis
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