Abstract
WORKS on physiology commonly appeal either to the usual types of student, or else to those engaged in teaching or research work. The work before us claims to appeal in the first place to the general reader “who desires to know what modern medical teachers think of the marvellous contrivances of the human machine.” The title of the book, with the foregoing quotation, indicates the spirit in which the author has approached the subject. Prof. Keith's fertile imagination has sought analogies between the various functions of the organs on one hand, and divers mechanisms of human design on the other, and he certainly never seems at a loss for them. - In so far as the general reader has no previous knowledge of the subject, the method of treatment by analogy alone seems calculated to give rise to an abundant harvest of grotesque misconceptions, as all those who have taught elementary physiology are well aware; but the book should be truly welcome to a teacher who, while having some acquaintance with the subject, is yet lacking in the knowledge or imagination necessary to evolve instructive analogies to help to fasten in the pupil's mind what he wishes to impart.
The Engines of the Human Body: Being the Substance of Christmas Lectures Given at the Royal Institution of Great Britain, Christmas, 1916–1917.
By Prof. Arthur Keith. Pp. xii + 284 + ii plates. (London: Williams and Norgate, 1919.) Price 12s. 6d. net.
Article PDF
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
E., C. The Engines of the Human Body: Being the Substance of Christmas Lectures Given at the Royal Institution of Great Britain, Christmas, 1916–1917. Nature 105, 195 (1920). https://doi.org/10.1038/105195a0
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/105195a0