Animal Locomotion: An Observational Experiment
I think that Eadweard Muybridge’s Animal Locomotion Studies qualifies as an experiment even though there was nothing specific being tested for, besides Stanford’s question about a horse being airborne. It is an observational experiment where the sole purpose is to gain new knowledge about a subject. In this case the subject is the motion of animals and humans, and Muybridge sought to learn the order in which such motion takes place. He was interested in the biomechanics of motion, such as what muscles are involved in a certain motion and how they work together to carry out that motion. This could be determined by examining specific photographs and seeing which muscles are flexed at a particular point in the motion. This observational experimentation can be compared to psychology experiments where the purpose is to determine which parts of the brain are active when solving a math problem or reading a paragraph. Both of these are examples of experiments that do not have a specific hypothesis or theory, yet neither of which are as unethical as the Tuskegee Experiment. They show that it is possible to experiment ethically without a hypothesis and with the sole intention of gaining new knowledge about a subject.
Even though he used very unscientific methods in misrepresenting his findings by using the same images over again or by combining separate sequences to exaggerate effects, Muybridge’s experiments still qualify as scientific. His altering of his photos makes him a bad scientist in that regard, but it does change elegance of the experiment itself nor make the experiment unscientific. With the development of more advanced technology such as cinematography and film, scientists can carry out the same experiments and use the film to gain insight into how groups of muscles work together to produce one fluid motion.
I also would not consider his work pornographic. The definition of pornography is: “Sexually explicit pictures, writing, or other material whose primary purpose is to cause sexual arousal.” I argue that Muybridge wanted his subjects nude in order to better examine the biomechanics of motion, not to cause sexual arousal in any way. Even if sexual arousal was associated with his pictures, it was not their primary purpose. Their primary purpose was to study mechanisms of human motion. Muybridge considered himself an artist; and as an artist he probably valued the beauty of the human body much like the Greeks and Romans.
Even though he used very unscientific methods in misrepresenting his findings by using the same images over again or by combining separate sequences to exaggerate effects, Muybridge’s experiments still qualify as scientific. His altering of his photos makes him a bad scientist in that regard, but it does change elegance of the experiment itself nor make the experiment unscientific. With the development of more advanced technology such as cinematography and film, scientists can carry out the same experiments and use the film to gain insight into how groups of muscles work together to produce one fluid motion.
I also would not consider his work pornographic. The definition of pornography is: “Sexually explicit pictures, writing, or other material whose primary purpose is to cause sexual arousal.” I argue that Muybridge wanted his subjects nude in order to better examine the biomechanics of motion, not to cause sexual arousal in any way. Even if sexual arousal was associated with his pictures, it was not their primary purpose. Their primary purpose was to study mechanisms of human motion. Muybridge considered himself an artist; and as an artist he probably valued the beauty of the human body much like the Greeks and Romans.
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