A Philosophical Disease: Bioethics, Culture, and Identity (Reflective Bioethics) [Paperback]

Carl Elliott (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0415919401 | ISBN-13: 978-0415919401 | Publication Date: November 13, 1998 | Edition: 1

Drawing on the work of writers such as Ludwig Wittgenstein, Walker Percy, Paul Auster and Graham Greene, this text brings to the bioethical discussion larger philosophical questions about the sense and significance of human life. Carl Elliott explores the relationship of illness to identity, and of mental illness to spiritual illness. He also examines the treatment of children born with ambiguous genitalia, the claims of deaf culture, and the morality of self-sacrifice. This book focuses on a different sensibility in bioethics - how we use concepts, and how they relate to our own particular social institutions.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Listing in the ISI Index to Scientific Book Contents (ISBC).
This book is one of the finest--and freshest--works of bioethics criticism I have had the pleasure to read. It will challenge philosophers of medicine and reflective clinicians alike. -- JAMA
The author uses a Wittgensteinian anti-theory to discuss issues in biomedical ethics. Topics include illness and identity, psychopharmacology, the role of clinical ethicists, and narrative in medicine The Hastings Center Report.
[A] wide-ranging, intelligent, engaging and irreve of reflections on some deeply puzzling moral and c phenomena. -- John D. Arras, Porterfield Professor Biomedical Ethics, University of Virginia
Keeping close to the language of daily experience in a way that may remind some of Oliver Sacks, Carl Elliott shows us the ways in which medicine is losing its way at the end of the twentieth century. A Philosophical Disease is a notable blend of honest doubt and humane imagination. -- Stephen Toulmin, Henry R. Luce Professor, University of Southern California
As we read Carl Elliott, we become aware of the contexts in which decisions arise: the state of medicine, the state of the nation, the state of the soul. He does not sound like other bioethicists; he sounds like Walker Percy, with a distinctive Southern voice, at once self-assured and ruminative. That voice transforms bioethics. -- Peter D. Kramer, author of Listening to Prozac and Should You Leave?
An extraordinarily fine book--the best thing I have seen on the subject. It takes a broad, reflective view of the subject that is neded...It is its practice-centered, inside view of things which is so remarkable--that, and the clarity and force of exposition. -- Clifford Geertz, Harold F. Linder Professor of Social Science, Institute of Advanced Study, Princeton, New Jersey
An absorbing look at the effort to help doctors answer all those questions modern technology poses... Draw[s] on the best kinds of storytelling to illuminate bioethical decision making. He uses [Walker} Percy and other writers such as Kurt Vonnegut to make the point that the big, old questions about the good life and how to live it lie behind the immediate issues of bioethics... A refreshing alternative to routine bioethics discussions. -- New Scientist
I had come to the conclusion that I could not stand to read another book in bioethics. They all go over the same ground in the same way. So thank God for Carl Elliott, who has written a book about the philosophy and ethics of medicine that is wise, illuminating, and funny. Elliott has learned Wittgenstein's lessons well and uses them to help us see the moral challenges modern medicine confronts. Even more, he helps us see how we must live if we are to survive not only the care medicine holds out, but our own longings as well. -- Stanley Hauerwas, Gilbert T. Rowe Professor of Theological Ethics, Divinity School, Duke University
This book is one of the finest--and freshest--works of bioethics criticism I have had the pleasure to read. It will challenge philosphers of medicine and reflective clinicians alike. -- JAMA
It is a welcome and original contribution to bioethics. -- Medical Humanities Review
[A] wide-ranging, intelligent, engaging and irreverent set of reflections on some deeply puzzling moral and cultural phenomena. -- John D. Arras, Porterfield Professor of Biomedical Ethics, University of Virginia

About the Author

Carl Elliott is Associate Professor at the University of Minnesota Center for Bioethics. He is co-editor with John Lantos of The Last Physician and editor of Slow Cures and Bad Philosophers, both forthcoming.

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Routledge; 1 edition (November 13, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0415919401
• ISBN-13: 978-0415919401
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #561,344 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Carl Elliott prefers to write about himself in the third person in order to give the impression that he is too important to submit his own biography. A native South Carolinian, Elliott teaches bioethics and philosophy at the University of Minnesota and writes occasionally for magazines such as The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly and Slate.com. His estranged younger brother ridicules him periodically at the unfortunate website, www.whitecoatblackhat.com. His attorneys are addressing the situation.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Thought-provoking for the layperson and the bioethicist, May 9, 2003

By 

Alison Reiheld (Lansing, MI) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Philosophical Disease: Bioethics, Culture, and Identity (Reflective Bioethics) (Paperback)

The funny thing about the mid-20th century philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein is that it's nigh on impossible to understand what he means if one just readd his Philosophical Investigations (PI)... yet when Elliott applies Wittgenstein's PI to issues in medicine, it becomes possible to see why Wittgenstein is considered such a revolutionary figure.

One of the excellent things about this work is that Elliott, himself, is so clearly fascinated by the subjects he delves into that his enthusiasm is infectious. The book is thus quite engaging. It helps that Elliott uses familiar references. For example, in Chapter 2, "You Are What You Are Afflicted By", Elliott deals with how it is that the way we label ourselves (particularly when we have been diagnosed with a disease) constructs our identities. One of his epigraphs at the beginning of the chapter is a quote from Casablanca... Major Strasser: What is your nationality; Rick: I'm a drunkard. Elliott then proceeds to apply Maggie Little, Art Frank, Wittgenstein, and anthropologist Clifford Geertz to the matter of identity and disease, with particular reference to deafness and intersex (children who are born neither clearly male nor clearly female).

This sort of connection between the mundane/real and elegant philosophy persists throughout. Who can fault an author who uses the Talking Heads to introduce a chapter that tackles the philosophically tricky issue of how the use of Prozac affects our very sense of self, and our relation to social problems?

1 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, May 18, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: A Philosophical Disease: Bioethics, Culture, and Identity (Reflective Bioethics) (Paperback)

Dr. Elliott raises awareness about some very socially significant points. The issues raised range in topic from bioethics, language, and psychology. It is very nicely written; he presents his points very logically. A great philosophy book.