[5] During Alcmaeon's time, the medical school in Magna Graecia was regarded as the most famous; illnesses were studied in a scientific and experimental manner.

It was he who first suggested that health was a state of equilibrium between opposing humors and that illnesses were because of problems in environment, nutrition and lifestyle.

[17] This served as a defining difference between animals who can only sense, and the superior man who can also think, a notion accepted and confirmed by Aristotle.

[18][17] Calcidius' commentary on Plato's Timaeus praises Alcmaeon, Callisthenes, and Herophilus for their work on the nature of the eye.

Many scholars believe that Plato referred to Alcmaeon's work, when writing in Phaedo about the senses and how we or animals think.

Based on Theophrastus, Cicero and Clement refer to Alcmaeon as believing that the celestial bodies were divine, and Aetius presents the argument for the soul's immortality due to its continuous autonomous motion.

These ideas in themselves were not innovative, for the notion of the eternal self-caused motion of nature served the arguments of Anaximenes and the Pythagorians and the divinity of heavenly bodies was well accepted in popular religion, but Alcmaeon was unique in that he presented them in a logical fashion.

He said that the human soul was immortal and partook of the divine nature, because like the heavenly bodies it contained in itself a principle of motion.

[26] Alcmaeon of Croton, an ancient Greek philosopher, physician, and scientist who lived during the 5th century BCE, is widely regarded as one of the founders of the medical tradition in ancient Greece and made some significant contributions to the fields of anatomy and physiology and the overall field of medicine as well.

He also recognized the importance of the heart in regards to the circulating of blood throughout the body, although his understanding of the circulatory system was not as advanced as that of later physicians.

His understanding of the brain as the area where intelligence and consciousness were created challenged the beliefs about the nature of the soul and the mind at the time.

[31] Alcmaeon's work laid the foundation for later philosophical and scientific debates about the relationship between the body and the mind, and his ideas continue to influence our thinking about these issues today.

His emphasis on observation and dissection helped to establish a scientific approach to medicine that highlighted the importance of empirical evidence and experimentation.

Alcmaeon's ideas continue to influence our thinking about the conscious, the relationship between the body and the mind, and the physiological mechanisms of diseases.