Frankenstein's Cat: Cuddling Up to Biotech's Brave New Beasts - Brossura

Anthes, Emily

Brossura

ISBN 10: 1851689680 ISBN 13: 9781851689682

Casa editrice: Oneworld Publications, 2013

Riassunto

From the petri dish to the pet shop, meet the high-tech menagerie of the near future, as humans reinvent the animal kingdom Fluorescent fish that glow near pollution. Dolphins with prosthetic fins. Robot-armoured beetles that military handlers can send on spy missions. Beloved pet pigs resurrected from DNA. Scientists have already begun to create these high-tech hybrids to serve human whims and needs. What if a cow could be engineered to no longer feel pain - should we design a herd that would assuage our guilt over eating meat? Acclaimed science writer Emily Anthes travels round the globe to meet the fauna of the future, from the Scottish birthplace of Dolly the sheep and other clones to a `pharm' for cancer-fighting chickens. Frankenstein's Cat is an eye-opening exploration of weird science - and how we are playing god in the animal world.

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Recensione:

Emily Anthes gets the balance just right... There are brilliant stories of the entrepreneurs who want to bring glowing fish and remote controlled cockroaches to market, contrasted with the potentially lifesaving work of pharmed animals modified to produce medicine in their milk. We got GM crops horribly wrong - and Anthes shows us the approach we should take to avoid making the same mistakes with modified animals. Always enjoyable, a page turner of a popular science book with a surprise awaiting around every corner. - Brian Clegg, author of Inflight Science and The Universe Inside You

Emily Anthes' creatures are far stranger (and, at times, scarier) than Frankenstein's monster. She compellingly balances the pluses and minuses of science's increasing ability to alter the animals we share the planet with. A fascinating read. - Alex Boese, author of Elephants on Acid and Electrified Sheep

Frankenstein's Cat is a report from the frontiers of the scientific campaign to re-engineer animals to fulfil human desires. At the same time Anthes, whose love of animals shines through on every page, takes her readers on a rich and challenging quest of self-discovery: what rights do the animal objects of our creativity possess, and what obligations to them and to ourselves must we accept as we reshape (again!) the living world? A great read... Funny and deep.

--Thomas Levenson, author of Newton and the Counterfeiter

With wit, high intelligence, and a lively writing style, Emily Anthes portrays the new world of biotechnology - in which we control the bodies and brains of other animals - and the moral and philosophical issues so raised. - Alan Lightman, author of Einstein's Dreams

Frankenstein's Cat is smart, lucid, and full of surprises. There is hardly a page that doesn't contain something new or unexpected. - Anne Fadiman, author of The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down

Animals are fascinating if reluctant soldiers in the biotech revolution, writes [Emily] Anthes... in witty and thought-provoking book.

--Publishers Weekly

An elegant tour of the wild and fraught sideshow of animal biotechnology... Learned, entertaining and illuminating. - Kirkus Reviews

Medicine-producing goats, a glowing beagle, and remote-controlled rats seem like science fiction, but not only are they scientifically possible, they're already here... Anthes not only explores what is being done but also asks why and if it should be done. Along the way, the book reveals much about humans and our connections to animals and the world we all inhabit.

--Booklist

“An elegant tour of the wild and fraught sideshow of animal biotechnology... Learned, entertaining and illuminating.” - Kirkus Reviews

“Medicine-producing goats, a glowing beagle, and remote-controlled rats seem like science fiction, but not only are they scientifically possible, they're already here... Anthes not only explores what is being done but also asks why and if it should be done. Along the way, the book reveals much about humans and our connections to animals and the world we all inhabit.”

--Booklist

L'autore:

Emily Anthes is a science journalist who contributes a regular column on biomimickry to BBC Future online. She is also the founder of the Wonderland blog, part of the Public Library of Science, one of the most prestigious and most read science research publishers in the world. This is her first book.

Su questa edizione

• Editore: Oneworld Publications
• Data di pubblicazione: 2013
• ISBN 10: 1851689680
• ISBN 13: 9781851689682
• Rilegatura: Copertina flessibile
• Numero di pagine: 256