Franz Mesmer
Franz Mesmer was an 18th-century German physician who theorized that an invisible force called "animal magnetism" flowed through living beings and could be manipulated to cure illness.
His theatrical healing sessions—patients sitting around magnetized tubs, entering trances—made him famous and controversial in Paris before being discredited.
His name gave English the verb *mesmerize*, originally meaning to hypnotize, now meaning to captivate completely.
- hypnotismTrance-inducing practice
- somnambulismWalking during deep sleep
- animal magnetismInnate power to attract
- pseudoscienceBogus methodology posing as factual
- ViennaAustrian capital
fixed gaze · trance states · deep sleep · passes · autosuggestion · placebo effect · crisis · energy healing · medical quackery · post-hypnotic suggestion · healing touch · laying on hands · Milton Erickson · altered consciousness · fraudulent claims · hypnotherapy · mind-body connection · convulsions
- paranormalghosts, paranormal, haunting, poltergeist, apparition
- Hypnotismhypnosis, hypnotism, hypnotist, mesmerist, trance
- hypnotistshypnotherapist, stage hypnotist, mesmerist, Svengali
- healersnurse, doctor, physician, surgeon, medic
- Natural Philosophersnatural philosopher, Isaac Newton, Francis Bacon, Joseph Priestley, Michael Faraday
- psychicspsychic, psychics, fortune teller, clairvoyant, clairvoyants
Franz MesmerBenjamin Franklin
Colonial American polymath statesman
evidence-based medicine · Louis Pasteur · scientific method · empiricism · clinical trials
Franz MesmerSigmund Freud
cognitive behavioral therapy · talk therapy · clinical psychology · neuroscience · psychopharmacology
Franz MesmerDavid Hume
Scottish Enlightenment philosopher
skeptic · materialist · rationalist · scientific skepticism · debunker