This edited volume aims to better understand the multifaceted phenomenon we call health.Going beyond simple views of health as the absence of disease or as complete well-being, this book unites scientists and philosophers. The contributions clarify the links between health and adaptation, robustness, resilience, or dynamic homeostasis, and discuss how to achieve health and healthy aging through practices such as hormesis. The book is divided into three parts and a conclusion: the first part explains health from within specific disciplines, the second part explores health from the perspective of a bodily part, system, function, or even the environment in which organisms live, and the final part looks at more clinical or practical perspectives. It thereby gathers, across 30 chapters, diverse perspectives from the broad fields of evolutionary and systems biology, immunology, and biogerontology, more specific areas such as odontology, cardiology, neurology, and public health, as well as philosophical reflections on mental health, sexuality, authenticity and medical theories.The overarching aim is to inform, inspire and encourage intellectuals from various disciplines to assess whether explanations in these disparate fields and across biological levels can be sufficiently systematized and unified to clarify the complexity of health. It will be particularly useful for medical graduates, philosophy graduates and research professionals in the life sciences and general medicine, as well as for upper-level graduate philosophy of science students.
This edited volume aims to better understand the multifaceted phenomenon we call health.
Going beyond simple views of health as the absence of disease or as complete well-being, this book unites scientists and philosophers. The contributions clarify the links between health and adaptation, robustness, resilience, or dynamic homeostasis, and discuss how to achieve health and healthy aging through practices such as hormesis.
The book is divided into three parts and a conclusion: the first part explains health from within specific disciplines, the second part explores health from the perspective of a bodily part, system, function, or even the environment in which organisms live, and the final part looks at more clinical or practical perspectives. It thereby gathers, across 30 chapters, diverse perspectives from the broad fields of evolutionary and systems biology, immunology, and biogerontology, more specific areas such as odontology, cardiology, neurology, andpublic health, as well as philosophical reflections on mental health, sexuality, authenticity and medical theories.
The overarching aim is to inform, inspire and encourage intellectuals from various disciplines to assess whether explanations in these disparate fields and across biological levels can be sufficiently systematized and unified to clarify the complexity of health. It will be particularly useful for medical graduates, philosophy graduates and research professionals in the life sciences and general medicine, as well as for upper-level graduate philosophy of science students.
Section 1: Health across disciplines
Biology
1. Evolutionary understanding of health - Tom Kirkwood
2. Evolutionary explanation of health - Michael Rose
3. Biodemographic perspective on social health – Jay Olshansky
4. Biological health and homeodynamic space – Suresh Rattan
Sociology/psychology
5. Epidemiological view of health – Alex Broadbent, & Likhwa Ncube
6. Healthy society – Uffe Juul Jensen
7. Public health – Carsten Obel
8. Social relations and health – Robert Zachariae
Philosophy
9. Philosophical concepts of health – Jonathan Sholl & Maël Lemoine
10. Interdisciplinary health – Jan-Pieter Konsman
11. Health and authenticity – Des O´Neill
Section 2: Health across systems
Biological structural aspects
12.Healthy nervous system - Vittorio Calabrese
13. Healthy face – Tine Hjorth
14. Healthy immune system
15. Immunity and health - Tamas Fülöp, Jacek Witkowski
16. Healthy heart – Olé Færgeman
17. Healthy skeletal system – Moustapha Kassem
18. Healthy blood – Syed Rizvi
19. Molecular biomarkers of health – Jan Nehlin
20. Healthy genome – Robi Tacutu
Functional aspects
21. Healthy sleep – Jean-Arthur Micoulaud-Franchi & Julien Coelho
22. Healthy sexuality – Andreas De Block
23. Healthy mind – Robert Zachariae
24. Healthy psyche – Dominic Murphy and Caitrin Donovan
Ecological aspects
25. Healthy organism – Anders Olsen
26. Health in non-human animals/organisms – Henrik Lerner
27. Environmental perspective on health – Ed Calabrese
Section 3: Health in practice
28. Healthspan versus lifespan – Eric Le Bourg
29. Health and immortality – Ilia Stambler
30. Health versus frailty – Arnold Mitnitski
31. Health in clinical practice – Marios Kyriazis
32. Health and pro-longevity interventions – Alex Vaiserman
33. Regulatory understanding of health – Ed Calabrese
34. Health in AI-driven healthcare – J.C Bjerring and Jacob Busch
Section 4: Bringing health back together
35. Reflections/Conversations on integrated explanations of health with short response to question:
Can there be an integrated science of health? (to be compiled by the editors based on the response of all authors).
