The Science of Human Perfection: How Genes Became the Heart of American Medicine - Hardcover

Comfort, Nathaniel

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0300169914 ISBN 13: 9780300169911

Publisher: Yale University Press, 2012

Synopsis

Almost daily we hear news stories, advertisements, and scientific reports promising that genetic medicine will make us live longer, enable doctors to identify and treat diseases before they harm us, and individualize our medical care. But surprisingly, a century ago eugenicists were making the same promises. This book traces the history of the promises of medical genetics and of the medical dimension of eugenics. While mindful of the benefits of genetic medicine, the book also considers social and ethical issues that cast troublesome shadows over these fields.

Keeping his focus on America, Nathaniel Comfort introduces the community of scientists, physicians, and public health workers who have contributed to the development of medical genetics from the nineteenth century to today. He argues that medical genetics is closely related to eugenics, and indeed that the two cannot be fully understood separately. He also carefully examines how the desire to relieve suffering and to improve ourselves genetically, though noble, may be subverted. History makes clear that as patients and consumers we must take ownership of genetic medicine, using it intelligently, knowledgeably, and skeptically.

About this title

About the Author:

Nathaniel Comfort is associate professor, Department of the History of Medicine, Johns Hopkins University, and a participant in The Oral History of Human Genetics project.

Review:

“Comfort explains how eugenics became part of medicine, and how medical and human genetics therefore derive in large part from eugenics.  The great strength of this book is to work this through agnostically and calmly.”—Alison Bashford, The University of Sydney  (Alison Bashford 2012-03-13)

"Comfort's compelling narrative transforms our understanding of the history of human genetics in the United States. This book sheds penetrating light on how the simultaneously meritorious and fraught goals of biological improvement and of the alleviation of physical suffering have driven the development of genetic science."—Alexandra Stern, University of Michigan (Alexandra Stern 2012-03-16)

"This is a rich and important book, laced with lively vignettes and provocative judgments, Comfort  recounts with an unblinking eye the evolution of medical genetics from its origins in eugenics to the era of the genome. An absorbing and informative work."—Daniel J. Kevles, Stanley Woodward Professor of History, Yale University, and author of In the Name of Eugenics

  (Daniel J. Kevles 2012-05-01)

"Nathaniel Comfort – an historian of medical genetics aims to demonstrate with extensive historical data that the rejection of eugenics when compared with modern medical genetics is not fully justified. A novel interpretation of the 100 year history of heredity and health in North America!"—Arno G. Motulsky, author of Vogel and Motulsky, Human Genetics, 4th Edition, 2010 (Arno G. Motulsky 2012-05-01)

“A well-balanced consideration of both the promise and problems involved in the scientific search for human betterment.”—Kirkus Reviews (Kirkus Reviews)

“[An] intriguing history...Comfort provides some complex food for thought about the balance between creating good for individuals and for the human species, and about the ways we define the methods we use.”

—Publishers Weekly

(Publishers Weekly)

“[A] beautifully written account of how genes became central to American medicine.”—Science  (Science)

“Other books. . . have traced portions of the history of genetics, but none have put together the whole story in the way that Comfort has.”—Choice

(Choice)

“This is the ideal scientific history: details of the science itself are integrated with the intimate details of the extended family that made up the field generation by generation, through the workers’ correspondence with each other and through the oral histories. It is their internal history, informed by records of the workers’ own thoughts, feelings, and words. And it suggests a new approach to the history of eugenics.”—Pauline M. H. Mazumdar, Bulletin of the History of Medicine (Pualine M. H. Mazumdar Bulletin of the History of Medicine)

“Excellent . . . bears all the marks of an outstanding social and intellectual history of medical genetics . . . readers of this fine book will find [it] an accessible, yet nuanced, account.”—Stephen Pemberton, Isis (Stephen Pemberton Isis)

About this edition

• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 0300169914
• ISBN 13: 9780300169911
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 336