Page "Phrenology" Paragraph 26

Phrenology had been mostly discredited as a scientific theory by the 1840s.

This was only in part due to a growing amount of evidence against phrenology.

Phrenologists had never been able to agree on the most basic underpinnings with mental organ numbers going from 27 to over 40, and had also never been able to locate the mental organs.

Instead phrenologists relied on cranioscopic readings of the skull to find organ locations.

Jean Pierre Flourens experiments on the brains of pigeons indicated that the loss of parts of the brain either caused no loss of function, or the loss of a completely different function than what had been attributed to it by phrenology.

Flourens experiment, while not perfect seemed to indicated that Gall's supposed organs were imaginary.

Scientists had also become disillusioned with phrenology since its popularization with the middle and working classes by entrepreneurs.

The popularization had resulted in the simplification of phrenology and the mixing of principles with physiognomy, which had from the start been rejected by Gall as an indicator of personality.

Phrenology from its inception had never stopped being followed by accusations of promoting materialism, atheism and being destructive of morality were also factors that led to the downfall of phrenology.