An inaugural dissertation on animal heat : submitted to the public examination of the faculty of physic under the authority of the trustees of Columbia College, in the state of New-York, the Right Rev. Benjamin Moore, D.D. president ; for the degree of Doctor of Physic, on the first day of May, 1810 / by Robert Morrell.

  • Morrell, Robert.
Date:
1810
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An inaugural dissertation on animal heat : submitted to the public examination of the faculty of physic under the authority of the trustees of Columbia College, in the state of New-York, the Right Rev. Benjamin Moore, D.D. president ; for the degree of Doctor of Physic, on the first day of May, 1810 / by Robert Morrell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

    15/38
    fluidity, red colour, and heat of the mass which is here perfected. They aver also that arterial blood is sensibly hotter than venous, which they consider as a further proof of the position. But objections to these may very easily be adduced—if the arteries were cones, the blood would move quicker the farther it was from the heart a basi ad apicem. The contrary is proved; the motion is slow in the lesser arteries: and it is altogether unphilosophical to say that heat should be produced by the attrition of a fluid on a solid, which is exemplified in falls of water, where there is great friction and no heat. The falsity of the notion that arterial blood is sensibly hotter than venous, is proven by the experiments of Dr. Craw- ford. 2. It was supposed by some that the lungs were the fountain head of heat in the human body; they adduce, in proof, that the numberless air vesicles in the lungs cause the blood to be pressed forwards and backwards until it becomes hot. In opposition to this opinion, the same arguments, with respect to the attrition of solids on fluids, mentioned in the pre- ceding section, are applicable. Dr. Hook's experi- ment is much against the alternate motion of the vesicles being necessary to produce heat; he fixed the nose of a double pair of bellows in a wind-pipe of a dog, and cut away the ribs, diaphragm and pe- ricardium, and made several small punctures through the outer coat of the lungs. By blowing in a stream of fresh air, which continued to escape through the small apertures made in the lungs, he was enabled to keep those organs fully distended: as long as he supplied the lungs with air the actions of life conti- nued and the heart beat very regularly; but on in.