Medicine and evolution : current applications, future prospects (Introduction)

Elton, S.; O’Higgins, P.

Abstract

There is increasing interest in examining aspects of health and disease in the context of evolutionary theory [1, 2, 3], and the past decade has witnessed the rise of evolutionary or ‘Darwinian’ medicine as an entity distinct from anthropology, evolutionary biology or evolutionary psychology. Nonetheless, evolutionary concepts are often viewed as being tangential to medical teaching and practice, which tend to emphasise technical and proximate factors together with the treatment of the individual. Williams and Nesse [4] recognised early on that it would be not easy to persuade clinicians of the relevance of evolutionary medicine, regardless of the benefits brought by the approach. To this end, one major aim of this volume is that contributors should, where possible, indicate how their research and scholarship informs practical applications in clinical settings, health promotion or medical education.

Citation

Elton, S., & O’Higgins, P. (2008). Medicine and evolution : current applications, future prospects (Introduction). In P. O’Higgins, & S. Elton (Eds.), Medicine and evolution : current applications, future prospects (1-8). CRC Press. https://doi.org/10.1201/9781420051377

• Publication Date: 2008
• Deposit Date: May 20, 2013
• Publicly Available Date: Mar 1, 2016
• Pages: 1-8
• Series Title: Society for the study of human biology series
• Book Title: Medicine and evolution : current applications, future prospects.
• ISBN: 9781420051346
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1201/9781420051377
• Public URL: https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1652264