-
Are Human Rights Contingent?
Here’s a question: are human rights contingent or emergent? In other words, do they depend on the circumstances and the cultural milieu? Do they depend on the context in which the events in question are imbedded, and maybe even the time-frame –the Epoch? Or, do they exist a priori and exist no matter what the circumstances and so transcend any particular event? An existential…
-
A Medical Chinese Curse?
Change. We are condemned to live in interesting times, as the Chinese Curse purportedly observed -although there seems to be no evidence that there ever was such a curse, nor does anyone appear to have any idea what it means… But I have always assumed that it had to do with change, and our sometime antipathy to it.…
-
A Picture is worth…
Communication -explanation- in Medicine is so important that one might even consider it paramount. Except in circumstances where the patient receives a treatment of which she is unaware because of an accident or the severity of the illness, her understanding of the reasons for the therapy and the side effects it may engender often determines whether or not the…
-
A test for Alzheimer’s Disease…
Now here’s a scientific and epidemiologic conundrum: Suppose you develop a test that will give you advance warning of a fatal disease you can neither treat nor prevent. But that foreknowledge might allow an understanding of the really early aspects of the disease -while it was still asymptomatic- that could eventually lead to a treatment. Especially if…
-
Diet in Pregnancy
There was a time when the prevailing dietary wisdom was simple: food contained calories, weight was a function of caloric imbalance. If you used less calories than you took in you gained weight, and vice versa. It was intuitively appealing and it still is; anybody with even an elementary grasp of mathematics understands. But it is becoming increasingly…
-
Once Upon a Time…
You learn new things every day; sometimes, learning about learning is one of them. I am learning about babies. As an obstetrician, I deal with them every day -or, more accurately, them as developing organisms- from shortly after conception until birth. Then, as the mother’s needs change -and the baby’s- I kind of lose track…
-
Just Right Baby Bear?
There is a problem in the modern world, I think: we honestly believe there is an answer to any question we ask if we pursue it with enough effort. It leads to unrealistic expectations and a suspicion that there should be no need to compromise -or if we do, a sense of disappointment that it…
-
Plus ca Change?
You know if you wait long enough, what was old becomes new again. Old fashions become retro and are seriously nouveau. I don’t wear ties or cuffed pants, but I’m sure if I hunted around in the closet I could find something that would make a teenager’s eyes water. Theories are sometimes like that, although…
-
Science and Simulacra
One of the problems with Science for many people is that it keeps changing its mind. We are in an era when to say that an idea is scientifically proven is to imply that something profound has been uncovered: a truth has been revealed that is forever irrefutable. It is a time of global angst, when religions…
-
Subscribe
Subscribed
Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
musingsonwomenshealth.com 