In existographies, Giovanni Aldini (1762-1834) was an Italian physicist, nephew of Luigi Galvani, noted for []
Overview
On 18 Jan 1803, Aldini took the recently declared dead corpse of an aged 26 man named George Forster (1777-1803), a criminal hung for drowning his wife and daughter, into the operating theater of the Royal College of Surgeons, and before a packed crowd, began to experimentally apply a massive voltaic pile to the body, touching the electrode and counter-electrode to various parts of the body, therein obtaining the following reactions: [1]
Contact: Mouth and ear
Reaction: produced facial convulsions and opened left eye
Contact: mouth and rectum
Reaction: clenched fist punched air, legs kicked, and his back arched violently; he supposedly sat up
The following shows and depiction of the experiment:
News of this experiment, to note, made its way into the discussions of Mary Shelley, Percy Shelley, and George Byron, and the 1817 novel Frankenstein, by the former.
Quotes | By
The following are quotes by Aldini:
“The experiments I did on the hanged criminal did not aim at reanimating the cadaver, but only to acquire a practical knowledge as to whether galvanism can be used as an auxiliary, and up to which it can override other means of reanimating a man under such circumstances.”
— Giovanni Aldini (1804) [2]
References
1. (a) Anon. (2016). “Jan 18, 1803: Giovanni Aldini Attempts to Reanimate the Dead” (Ѻ), Odd Salon, Jan 18.
(b) Pilkington, Mark. (2004). “Sparks of Life” (Ѻ), The Guardian, Oct 6.
(c) Musolino, Julien. (2015). The Soul Fallacy: What Science Shows We Gain from Letting Go of Our Soul Beliefs (Forward: Victor Stenger) (pg. 162). Prometheus Books.
2. Anon. (2016). “Jan 18, 1803: Giovanni Aldini Attempts to Reanimate the Dead” (Ѻ), Odd Salon, Jan 18.
External links
● Giovanni Aldini – Wikipedia.
