ESHS/HSS Annual Meeting

Reconsidering Spontaneous Generetation

Session Submission Type: Organized Session

English Abstract

For centuries, the belief that many life forms arise by spontaneous generation—often, though not exclusively, from decaying matter of other species—was the norm rather than the exception in European natural science. Even after Francesco Redi demonstrated in 1668 that insects are born from parents belonging to the species of the offspring, and despite the insistence by Redi’s contemporaries that all life originates from seeds or eggs, spontaneous generation still thrived well into the nineteenth century. Under a different guise, the explanatory power of spontaneous generation—abiogenesis, that is the growth of life from non-life—remains strong up to our present, if nothing else in the attempts at explaining the origin of life on Earth–which, unless it came from another planet or a miracle, must have first emerged from non-organic forms in the primordial soup. This panel offers a fresh interrogation of early modern debates on spontaneous generation. We will investigate how the theory was applied to bodily parasites, plants, fungi, and even humans, and we will probe the broader intellectual world that sustained it. Key questions include: What religious, philosophical, and cosmological frameworks underpinned beliefs in spontaneous generation? What experimental and observational practices were marshaled to study the spontaneous generation of these organisms? And what kinds of worlds—ecological, moral, economic, and metaphysical—did proponents of spontaneous generation envision? By reframing spontaneous generation as a versatile explanatory system rather than merely another obsolete scientific theory, the panel illuminates how early modern thinkers integrated observation, experiment, and broader cultural commitments to make sense of life’s origins and transformations.

Sub Unit

• Organized Session

Chair

• Monica Azzolini, University of Bologna

Individual Presentations

• As in the Earth, So in the Womb: Astral Powers, Virginal Conceptions, and the Spontaneous Generation of Humans - Ivano Dal Prete, Yale University

• Intestinal Worms and Caterpillars: The Precarious Equilibrium of Spontaneous Generation - Javier Patiño Loira, University of California, Los Angeles

• The “Spontaneous” Cultivation of Mushrooms in the 18th century - Barbara Di Gennaro, University of Bologna

Session Organizer

• Barbara Di Gennaro, University of Bologna