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Mirage of Health: Utopias, Progress, and Biological Change » (1st Edition)

Book cover image of Mirage of Health: Utopias, Progress, and Biological Change by Rene Dubos

Authors: Rene Dubos
ISBN-13: 9780813512600, ISBN-10: 0813512603
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Date Published: October 1987
Edition: 1st Edition

Author Biography: Rene Dubos

Book Synopsis

'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.

I.	The Gardens of Eden	1
	The Golden Ages
	The Return to Nature
	Health through Science
	Health as Adaptation
II.	Biological and Social Adaptation	30
	The Haunts of Life
	Biological Adaptations in Man
	Adaptation through Instinctive Patterns of Behavior
	Adaptation through Social Mechanisms
	Unstability of Ecological Systems
	Social Determinants of Human Fitness
III.	Struggle and Partnership in the Living World	62
	The Struggle for Existence
	Man and the World of Microbes
	Infection versus Disease
	Adaptive Mechanisms of Resistance to Infection
	Symbiosis and Parasitism
IV.	Environment and Disease	95
	The Weather, the Potato Blight, and the Destiny of the Irish
	The Doctrine of Specific Etiology
	Direct and Indirect Effects of the External Environment
	The Internal Environment
	Interplays between the External and the Internal Environment
	The Past as Factor of the Environment
V.	Hygeia and Asclepius	129
	Gods of Health
	Hippocratic Wisdom and the Goldheaded Cane
	The Philosopher's Search for Health
	The Magic Bullets of Medicine
	Drugs and the Conquest of Disease
	Orthobiosis
VI.	Social Patterns of Health and of Disease	170
	The History of Diseases
	Hunger and Surfeit
	The Diseases of Pestilence and of Sanitation
	Modern Horsemen of the Apocalypse
	From Madness to Boredom
	Medicine and Society
VII.	Effects of Disease on Populations and on Civilization	220
	Food, Disease, and Population Trends
	Effects of Disease and Nutrition on Military and Political History
	Disease and Social Evolution
	Effects of Disease on Cultural Forces
VIII.	Utopias and Human Goals	258
	Arcadias and Utopias
	From Biological Adaptation to Social Evolution
	Social Changes and Ecological Equilibria
	Health, Happiness, and Human Values
	Envoi

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Category Books

Mirage of Health: Utopias, Progress, and Biological Change » (1st Edition)

Author Biography: Rene Dubos

Book Synopsis

Table of Contents

Subjects