基本信息出版社：Vintage Books
页码：320 页
出版日期：2004年11月
ISBN：0679758356
条形码：9780679758358
装帧：平装
正文语种：英语
内容简介 What does it mean to live in a time when medical science can not only cure the human body but also reshape it? How should we as individuals and as a society respond to new drugs and genetic technologies? Sheila and David Rothman address these troubling questions with a singular blend of history and analysis, taking us behind the scenes to explain how scientific research, medical practice, drug company policies, and a quest for peak performance combine to exaggerate potential benefits and minimize risks. The Rothmans bring an authoritative clarity to a subject often obscured by rumor, commerce and inadequate reporting, revealing just what happens when physicians view patients’ unhappiness and dissatisfaction with their bodies–short stature, thunder thighs, aging–as though they were diseases to be treated.
作者简介 Sheila M. Rothman is Professor of Public Health at Columbia University. Her books include Living in the Shadow of Death. Her articles in the New York Review of Books and other periodicals, often cowritten with David Rothman, address human rights and medicine. She is now investigating the social and ethical implications of linking race and ethnicity to genetic disease.
David J. Rothman is Bernard Schoenberg Professor of Social Medicine and History at Columbia University. His books have explored the history of prisons and mental hospitals and the impact of bioethics and law on medicine. He has recently been named president of the Institute on Medicine as a Profession, funded by George Soros.
媒体推荐 "The authors shrewdly look backward at the history of medical innovation over the past century. . . Their prescription for society is wise" --"The New York Times
"
"Is being short a medical problem that warrants treatment? What about the diminished strength that accompanies lower testosterone levels in men as they age? . . . These are among the provocative questions that . . . a pair of eminent medical historians from Columbia University thoughtfully explore in their new book." --"The Washington Post
"
"A thoroughly documented and readable book. 'What science creates medicine rapidly dispenses, ' [the Rothmans] warn, and this uncritical acceptance by both physician and consumer is precisely the problem." --Sherwin Nuland, "The New York Review of Books
" "An important contribution to the debate about medical enhancement" --"The New England Journal of" "Medicine
"
?A fascinating history and analysis of an important medical trend that threatens to overwhelm an already strained system.?
?Arnold S. Relman, M.D., editor in chief emeritus, The New England Journal of Medicine
?A compelling and informative book. The Pursuit of Perfection engagingly explores the growing number of biomedical means that serve the long-standing eagerness of Americans to sustain their powers, sexual and otherwise. Estrogen therapy, testosterone injections, plastic surgery, growth hormone infusions, and, around the corner, genetic enhancements?the Rothmans cover them all, attending appreciatively yet critically to the science, its medical applications, and the cultural and commercial forces that encourage their use.?
?Daniel Kevles, Stanley Woodward Professor of History, Yale University
?This authoritative and compelling chronicle of twentieth-century medical enhancements is a must-read for anyone who thinks government regulation or professional oversight can effectively discourage Americans and at least some of our physicians from embracing dangerous attempts to genetically improve our bodies and alter our biological fates.?
?George J. Annas, author of The Rights of Patients
?The Rothmans have effectively overturned the myth that history has no lessons for contemporary health policy?makers. Their book puts flesh on the bioethical bones of the debate over the ?enhancement? uses of medicine, and, in the process, usefully reforms our view of the fundamental anatomy of the problem.?
?Eric Juengst, professor of bioethics, Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine
From the Hardcover edition. -- Review
编辑推荐 Review
"The authors shrewdly look backward at the history of medical innovation over the past century. . . Their prescription for society is wise" --"The New York Times
"
"Is being short a medical problem that warrants treatment? What about the diminished strength that accompanies lower testosterone levels in men as they age? . . . These are among the provocative questions that . . . a pair of eminent medical historians from Columbia University thoughtfully explore in their new book." --"The Washington Post
"
"A thoroughly documented and readable book. 'What science creates medicine rapidly dispenses, ' [the Rothmans] warn, and this uncritical acceptance by both physician and consumer is precisely the problem." --Sherwin Nuland, "The New York Review of Books
" "An important contribution to the debate about medical enhancement" --"The New England Journal of" "Medicine
"
?A fascinating history and analysis of an important medical trend that threatens to overwhelm an already strained system.?
?Arnold S. Relman, M.D., editor in chief emeritus, The New England Journal of Medicine
?A compelling and informative book. The Pursuit of Perfection engagingly explores the growing number of biomedical means that serve the long-standing eagerness of Americans to sustain their powers, sexual and otherwise. Estrogen therapy, testosterone injections, plastic surgery, growth hormone infusions, and, around the corner, genetic enhancements?the Rothmans cover them all, attending appreciatively yet critically to the science, its medical applications, and the cultural and commercial forces that encourage their use.?
?Daniel Kevles, Stanley Woodward Professor of History, Yale University
?This authoritative and compelling chronicle of twentieth-century medical enhancements is a must-read for anyone who thinks government regulation or professional oversight can effectively discourage Americans and at least some of our physicians from embracing dangerous attempts to genetically improve our bodies and alter our biological fates.?
?George J. Annas, author of The Rights of Patients
?The Rothmans have effectively overturned the myth that history has no lessons for contemporary health policy?makers. Their book puts flesh on the bioethical bones of the debate over the ?enhancement? uses of medicine, and, in the process, usefully reforms our view of the fundamental anatomy of the problem.?
?Eric Juengst, professor of bioethics, Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine
From the Hardcover edition. -- Review
Review
“The authors shrewdly look backward at the history of medical innovation over the past century. . . Their prescription for society is wise” --The New York Times
“Is being short a medical problem that warrants treatment? What about the diminished strength that accompanies lower testosterone levels in men as they age? . . . These are among the provocative questions that . . . a pair of eminent medical historians from Columbia University thoughtfully explore in their new book.” --The Washington Post
“A thoroughly documented and readable book. ‘What science creates medicine rapidly dispenses,’ [the Rothmans] warn, and this uncritical acceptance by both physician and consumer is precisely the problem.” --Sherwin Nuland, The New York Review of Books
“An important contribution to the debate about medical enhancement” —The New England Journal of Medicine
文摘 Penetrating Nature
For the past 150 years, the biological sciences have been at war with nature, determined to penetrate its secrets in order to perfect it. Investigators are eager to intervene, tamper, modify, and revise the forms and substance of animal life and human life. They may share a grudging respect or even wholesale admiration for the complexity of a biological system or a particular organism, but their readiness to improve on it is not inhibited. The proposition that the natural represents what can be or should be is altogether alien. No matter how intricate the existing design, it may still be enhanced, even if the result might be unusual or unimagined. Biology has no fixed boundaries, only opportunities.
When confronting resistance from a secular or religious spokesmen, some biologists attempt to deflect criticism by conflating scientific methods with scientific goals. Since their methods are objective and neutral, their findings should be considered objective and neutral. Others emphasize the tangible benefits of the research, offering many examples of better and longer living through biology. To be sure, critics challenge their contentions, rejecting the idea of scientific neutrality or the premise that a longer life is a better life. Although their negativity may appear to represent a post-atomic age or post-genomic era response to science, its roots are much deeper. In 1818, Mary Shelley was asking whether Dr. Frankenstein ought to be plundering the graveyards of body parts in order to try to create a living being, and in 1896, H. G. Wells wondered whether Dr. Moreau ought to be transplanting body parts between animals so as to construct a more perfect beast. But however persistent the hostility, modern biology has not altered its fundamental approach to nature.
Its ambitious, even combative, attitude was articulated with particular brilliance and confidence by the pioneering figure in the field, Claude Bernard. Chair of
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