The Mirage of Health: Utopia, Progress, and Biological Change

by Jean Dubos

Overview

'Complete freedom from disease and from struggle is almost incompatible with the process of living, ' Rene Dubos asserted in this classic essay on ecology and health. All the accomplishments of science and technology, he argued, will not bring the utopian dream of universal well-being, because they ignore the dynamic process of adaptation to a constantly changing environment that every living organism must face.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780813512600
Publisher:	Rutgers University Press
Publication date:	10/01/1987
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	294
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Rene Dubos (1901 - 1982) is also an author of The White Plague: Tuberculosis, Man and Society, which is also available from Rutgers University Press. 

Table of Contents

1. The Gardens of Eden
2. Biological and Social Adaptation
3. Struggle and Partnership in the Living World
4. Environment and Disease
5. Hygeia and Asclepius
6. Social Patterns of Health and of Disease
7. Effects of Disease on Populations and on Civilization
8. Utopias and Human Goals

Editorial Reviews

This book will be a treat for readers, and it will make them think.

Science

A learned, well-written, and delightful introduction to medicine as a social science. It must be read particularly by the new generation of doctors, the human biologists as yet unencumbered by the pile of facts and loose thinking that is curative medicine today.

Nature

An exceptional book - plain, lucid, elegant, lively. It draws its facts and illustrates not only from the corpus of medicine but from authors from Lao-tzu to Proust. It is logical and persuasive... a confession of faith and humility by a great scientist.

Lancet

A learned, well-written, and delightful introduction to medicine as a social science. It must be read particularly by the new generation of doctors, the human biologists as yet unencumbered by the pile of facts and loose thinking that is curative medicine today.-- "Nature"

An exceptional book - plain, lucid, elegant, lively. It draws its facts and illustrates not only from the corpus of medicine but from authors from Lao-tzu to Proust. It is logical and persuasive... a confession of faith and humility by a great scientist.-- "Lancet"

This book will be a treat for readers, and it will make them think.-- "Science"

From the Publisher

This book will be a treat for readers, and it will make them think.

Science

A learned, well-written, and delightful introduction to medicine as a social science. It must be read particularly by the new generation of doctors, the human biologists as yet unencumbered by the pile of facts and loose thinking that is curative medicine today.

Nature Lib