Better Than Well: American Medicine Meets the American Dream

Better Than Well: American Medicine Meets the American Dream
Author :
Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
Total Pages : 384
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9780393346664
ISBN-13 : 0393346668
Rating : 4/5 (64 Downloads)

Book Synopsis Better Than Well: American Medicine Meets the American Dream by : Carl Elliott

Download or read book Better Than Well: American Medicine Meets the American Dream written by Carl Elliott and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2004-06-17 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Elliott's absorbing account will make readers think again about the ways that science shapes our personal identities."—American Scientist Americans have always been the world's most anxiously enthusiastic consumers of "enhancement technologies." Prozac, Viagra, and Botox injections are only the latest manifestations of a familiar pattern: enthusiastic adoption, public hand-wringing, an occasional congressional hearing, and calls for self-reliance. In a brilliant diagnosis of our reactions to self-improvement technologies, Carl Elliott asks questions that illuminate deep currents in the American character: Why do we feel uneasy about these drugs, procedures, and therapies even while we embrace them? Where do we draw the line between self and society? Why do we seek self-realization in ways so heavily influenced by cultural conformity?

Better Than Well: American Medicine Meets the American Dream

Better Than Well: American Medicine Meets the American Dream
Author :
Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
Total Pages : 384
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9780393325652
ISBN-13 : 0393325652
Rating : 4/5 (52 Downloads)

Book Synopsis Better Than Well: American Medicine Meets the American Dream by : Carl Elliott

Download or read book Better Than Well: American Medicine Meets the American Dream written by Carl Elliott and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2004-06-17 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An examination of "enhancement technologies" in America considers the pervasiveness of self-improvement drugs and procedures in spite of society's general unease about their use.

White Coat, Black Hat

White Coat, Black Hat
Author :
Publisher : Beacon Press
Total Pages : 233
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9780807061442
ISBN-13 : 0807061441
Rating : 4/5 (42 Downloads)

Book Synopsis White Coat, Black Hat by : Carl Elliott

Download or read book White Coat, Black Hat written by Carl Elliott and published by Beacon Press. This book was released on 2011-09-13 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: By New Yorker and Atlantic writer Carl Elliott, a readable and even funny account of the serious business of medicine. A tongue-in-cheek account of the changes that have transformed medicine into big business. Physician and medical ethicist Carl Elliott tracks the new world of commercialized medicine from start to finish, introducing the professional guinea pigs, ghostwriters, thought leaders, drug reps, public relations pros, and even medical ethicists who use medicine for (sometimes huge) financial gain. Along the way, he uncovers the cost to patients lost in a health-care universe centered around consumerism.

Our Present Complaint

Our Present Complaint
Author :
Publisher : JHU Press
Total Pages : 236
Release :
ISBN-10 : 0801887151
ISBN-13 : 9780801887154
Rating : 4/5 (51 Downloads)

Book Synopsis Our Present Complaint by : Charles E. Rosenberg

Download or read book Our Present Complaint written by Charles E. Rosenberg and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 2007-12-26 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At a time when clinical care and biomedical research generate as much angst as they offer cures, this volume provides valuable insight into how the practice of medicine has evolved, where it is going, and how lessons from history can improve its prognosis.--Thomas S. Huddle, M.D., Ph.D. "Journal of the History of Medicine"

Better Than Well?

Better Than Well?
Author :
Publisher : iUniverse
Total Pages : 143
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781491715420
ISBN-13 : 1491715421
Rating : 4/5 (20 Downloads)

Book Synopsis Better Than Well? by : Paul J. Fitzgerald

Download or read book Better Than Well? written by Paul J. Fitzgerald and published by iUniverse. This book was released on 2013-12-11 with total page 143 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Is it possible, through use of existing psychiatric medications or talk therapy, to treat someone who has become slightly to severely mentally ill, and not only eliminate symptoms of his illness but also leave him better than well? This is a question with which eminent American psychiatrist, Peter Kramer, grappled in his landmark 1993 book, Listening to Prozac. Kramer concluded, based largely on responses of his own patients to the then relatively new antidepressant Prozac, that better than well may indeed be attainable in some persons. Not surprisingly, this is a controversial conclusion that has been met with a large degree of skepticism, including in a number of books that have since appeared. The current book explores this issue in detail, including analysis of cutting edge neuroscience and psychiatric research, concluding that "better than well" may indeed be attainable in some individuals. If so, this phenomenon may have broad reaching implications for medicine and society in general.

Our Grandchildren Redesigned

Our Grandchildren Redesigned
Author :
Publisher : Beacon Press
Total Pages : 322
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9780807066621
ISBN-13 : 0807066621
Rating : 4/5 (21 Downloads)

Book Synopsis Our Grandchildren Redesigned by : Michael Bess

Download or read book Our Grandchildren Redesigned written by Michael Bess and published by Beacon Press. This book was released on 2016-09-06 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A panoramic overview of biotechnologies that can endlessly boost human capabilities and the drastic changes these “superhuman” traits could trigger Biotechnology is moving fast. In the coming decades, advanced pharmaceuticals, bioelectronics, and genetic interventions will be used not only to heal the sick but to boost human physical and mental performance to unprecedented levels. People will have access to pills that make them stronger and faster, informatic devices will interface seamlessly with the human brain, and epigenetic modification may allow people to reshape their own physical and mental identities at will. Until recently, such major technological watersheds—like the development of metal tools or the industrialization of manufacturing—came about incrementally over centuries or longer. People and social systems had time to adapt: they gradually developed new values, norms, and habits to accommodate the transformed material conditions. But contemporary society is dangerously unprepared for the dramatic changes it is about to experience down this road on which it is already advancing at an accelerating pace. The results will no doubt be mixed. People will live longer, healthier lives, will fine-tune their own thought processes, and will generate staggeringly complex and subtle forms of knowledge and insight. But these technologies also threaten to widen the rift between rich and poor, to generate new forms of social and economic division, and to force people to engage in constant cycles of upgrades and boosts merely to keep up. Individuals who boost their traits beyond a certain threshold may acquire such extreme capabilities that they will no longer be recognized as unambiguously human. In this important and timely book, prize-winning historian Michael Bess provides a clear, nontechnical overview of cutting-edge biotechnology and paints a vivid portrait of a near-future society in which bioenhancement has become a part of everyday life. He surveys the ethical questions raised by the enhancement enterprise and explores the space for human agency in dealing with the challenges that these technologies will present. Headed your way over the coming decades: new biotechnologies that can powerfully alter your body and mind. The possibilities are tantalizing: • Rejuvenation therapies offering much longer lives (160 and even beyond) in full vigor and mental acuity • Cognitive enhancement through chemical or bioelectronic means (the rough equivalent of doubling or tripling IQ scores) • Epigenetic tools for altering some of your genetically influenced traits at any point in your lifetime (body shape, athletic ability, intelligence, personality) • Bioelectronic devices for modulating your own brain processes, including your “pleasure centers” (a potentially non-stop high) • Direct control of machines by thought, and perhaps direct communication with other people, brain-to-brain (a new dimension of sharing and intimacy) But some of the potential consequences are also alarming: • A growing rift between the biologically enhanced and those who can’t afford such modifications • A constant cycle of upgrades and boosts as the bar of “normal” rises ever higher—“Humans 95, Humans XP, Humans 8” • The fragmentation of humankind into rival “bioenhancement clusters” • A gradually blurring boundary between “person” and “product” • Extreme forms of self-modification, with some individuals no longer recognized as unambiguously human

Hearers and Doers

Hearers and Doers
Author :
Publisher : Lexham Press
Total Pages : 151
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781683591351
ISBN-13 : 1683591356
Rating : 4/5 (51 Downloads)

Book Synopsis Hearers and Doers by : Kevin J. Vanhoozer

Download or read book Hearers and Doers written by Kevin J. Vanhoozer and published by Lexham Press. This book was released on 2019-05-15 with total page 151 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The foundation of discipleship is sound, scriptural doctrine. The value of sound doctrine is often misunderstood by the modern church. While it can be dry and dull, when it flows from the story of Scripture, it can be full of life and love. This kind of doctrine, steeped in Scripture, is critical for disciple-making. And it's often overlooked by modern pastors. In Hearers and Doers, Kevin Vanhoozer makes the case that pastors, as pastor- theologians, ought to interpret Scripture theologically to articulate doctrine and help cultivate disciples. scriptural doctrine is vital to the life of the church, and local pastor-theologians should be the ones delivering it to their communities. With arresting prose and striking metaphors, Vanhoozer addresses the most pressing problems in the modern church with one answer: teach sound, scriptural doctrine to make disciples.