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[Shadowclaimer]

Was thinking about this earlier, would be kinda cool to have your dwarves capable of performing autopsies for the sake of learning more about creatures. IE: Extra corpse of a goblin lying in your refuse, your Patholodwarf will take it to his lab and dissect it, studying more about Goblins, learning some things about where their organs are etc. this information not only provides more lore on individual creatures, it can also make your military more knowledgeable on how to combat these creatures. (Could also be performed on captured live creatures too!)

Generally I'd assume this practice would label all the organs and vitals on a creature should you check their info afterwards (Species-based), it should provide information on habitat, level of intelligence, etc. and should increase the output if these creature types are being Hunted or Fished, or just being in general combat against a Dwarf.

Would be kinda cool to have a Dwarf with a lab that keeps bodies of various creatures in tanks and such, with scribbled notes on chalkboards everywhere and a half-dissected troll in the middle of the room. I could see the poor goblin in a cage in the corner just waiting for his turn.

[TheyTarget]

Has potential, to be a good idea, I dont know about your big image. but studying creatures and gaining combat prowess, seems like a good idea. Maybe it could end with eventually being able to brainwash captured peoples as slaves, so we can use them to man the farms.

[Shadowclaimer]

Yea my big image less-so, I did post this at like 4 in the morning. Was just thinking moreso the ability to learn more about each species and it help out your civilization to be nice.

[Kattaroten]

This is great! You know that suggestion that you should be able to look at injuries after death? Enter ze Autopzy!

[Shadowclaimer]

This is great! You know that suggestion that you should be able to look at injuries after death? Enter ze Autopzy!

It could lead to making your medical staffs more skilled at saving dwarves and fixing up injured ones.

[Andeerz]

Though it might be a bit past the 1400's tech thing in general (though there was dissection done for educational purposes throughout history), I could imagine a medical school in DF with this suggestion...  Imagine a dissection table in the middle of an amphitheater or whatever, with a bunch of students watching Urist McAnatomist cutting up a rhesus macaque corpse.

Or an appointed coroner to help the "justice" system (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coroner#History).   

There's surprisingly (to me) a good deal of history of dissection of human and animal cadavers for study!  Perhaps it could be something a philosopher dwarf could do...  Read these to see what I mean!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autopsy#History
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissection#History
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatomy_Lesson_of_Dr._Nicolaes_Tulp <-this is particularly interesting.  Sort of follows the "coroner" thing listed earlier.  The Amsterdam Guild of Surgeons had an appointed City Anatomist and was allowed one dissection a year of an executed criminal.

[TheyTarget]

A useful noble. I hear?

[Shadowclaimer]

A useful noble. I hear?

*smacks*

No such bloody thing!

[Medicine Man]

This would be great.You could discover goblins weaknesses which would make your military more efficiant while fighting them.

[Andeerz]

A weakness other than magma, pointy things, and blunt-object-to-head?   

Perhaps it could also be useful for training medical dwarves and developing better surgical techniques, treatments, understanding of pathologies, forensics, etc.  This could tie nicely into a knowledge-spread/technology/books arc if it ever happens.  I could imagine a particular city or fort where a famous doctor/apothecary/anatomist develops a treatise like De humani corporis fabrica which eventually becomes the medical text of choice throughout the civilized world. 

EDIT: the fame of such a treatise was highly dependent upon technology past the ca. 1400's tech limit (printing press)... hmmmm... well, whatever.  There were still famous people before the printing press that were famous for their knowledge of the effects of certain medicines/herbs, as well as anatomy and other medical stuff...

ALSO!!!  After reading some of the links I linked to earlier, the OP could also tie in nicely with procedurally generated civ-specific ethics.  The Romans were quite averse to the dissection of humans and so it was against the law for people to dissect humans.  However, in many places in medieval Europe after significant changes in civilization and culture, human dissection was not as taboo.  The same sort of phenomena could be reflected in DF!

[Shadowclaimer]

I still think at the very very least, it would make for great medical practice for your medical dwarves to perform autopsies.

Then again this could also tie into writing books and general learning/knowledge that would eventually be added in I'm sure.

[AxiumCog]

1 Up!

Love the idea. Make my dwarfies keener with their blades and better with the medicines!

[BurningLed]

My favorite part of this is training your medical staff without bludgeoning/stabbing/breaking bones of dwarves. That alone is by far the most useful aspect.  That and upgrading your military.

[Andeerz]

I really don't see how dissection would somehow make the military more effective except in the most contrived of circumstances (i.e. finding the magic weak spot that exists for no good reason on the giant crab that you attack for massive damage)...  I mean, maybe it would be useful for something like presumed constructs like colossuses for finding an off switch, or how they work so you could maybe make something like them.  Or maybe the effects of poisons or drugs on different creatures...

But I don't think there should be any sort of bonus added to your military against goblins because a dwarf in your fort cut up a ton of them and learned about their insides.  If it's a creature of flesh and bone, it's gonna have the same general weaknesses of other things of flesh and bone, and any soldier or peasant levy is going to know that without having to learn about its anatomy.

[Aramco]

While there isn't a dwarven ethic directly against this, I'm sure one would be added with this being added. Dwarves don't like torturing for information, so a live specimen would almost certainly not be something dwarves would like.

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[ETHIC:TORTURE_FOR_INFORMATION:UNTHINKABLE]