John Brown (1735-1788), Scottish doctor. In the Brownian view, life was the result of continuous stimulation, bought about by stimuli such as heat, food, emotions, movement etc. Disease was therefore dependent upon either a lack of stimuli (asthenic diseases, treated with strong doses of stimulant drugs) or an excess of stimuli (sthenic diseases, treated with counter-stimulants). It is said that Browns treatment methods killed more people than the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars put together.