On Fri, 13 Sep 1996 21:40:59 -0400 konsler@ascat.harvard.edu (Reed
Konsler) writes:
>Another book I'd look at if you are interested in medicine, aging, and
>health from a genetic perspective:
>
>"Why We Get Sick: The New Science of Darwinian Medicine" by Randolph
>M.
>Nesse and George C. Williams. Published by Vintage Books (Random
>House),
>New York, 1994.
I'll put it on my reading list, but it's a long list. Any excerpts or
synopses you would care to provide would be more than welcome. I'll do
the same for Dennett's "Kinds of Minds." Has anyone read "The Axe
Maker's Gift" by Burke and Ornstein? I've been meaning to do so for
months now. When I found my-self at Barnes and Noble, it wasn't there.
Was that fate intervening to save me from a bad book? Given the authors,
that's hard to beleive.
>
>One of it's sections deals specifically with senesence, aging, and the
>failure of modern medicine to significantly increase the maximum human
>lifespan. Advances have reduced your chance of death at birth (or by
>giving birth) and during childhood 10 fold in the last 60 years. You
>chance of death at 70 is still almost the same. As a result, average
>lifespan has increased (Figure 8-1, p 110 is a decent graph...although
>Tufte would kill whomever made the Y axis lograthmic with un-marked
>ticks)
Well, there's some coroboration for the claim that recent increases in
life expectancy are mathematical illusions fostered by a drastically
reduced infant mortality rate.
>
>
>>From the back cover: "By two copies and give one to your doctor."
> - Richard Dawkins
When I get a doctor, I'll buy two copies and give one to him.
Thanks, Reed.
Take care. -KMO