In the Renaissance, studying nature meant (most of the time) encountering nature. But these encounters, as Peter Dear has indicated, tended to generate a discussion (in the period and in the historiography) between unmediated sensory experiences and experiences organized by prior conceptual categories. This paper focuses on anatomical encounters, when anatomists articulated that distinction with clarity, in order to reconsider the significance of ephemeral and permanent anatomy theaters.

The relationship between the two is usually described chronologically:
theaters were temporary before they were permanent. This has encouraged a second view, namely that temporary theaters initiated the study of anatomy through human and animal dissection (the encounter with nature), and permanent theaters further developed that study. This paper will argue against such a seamless transition. Even when the permanent anatomy theater was built and in use in Padua, temporary theaters continued to provide more immediate, sensory experiences for professors as well as students.

This talk is sponsored by the working group on Medicine, Philosophy, and the Scientific Revolution (http://www.pitt.edu/~pmd17/MPSR.html) and supported by the Center for Philosophy of Science. The event is free and open to the public.