The Anticipatory Corpse: Medicine, Power, and the Care of the Dying

Year 2014, Volume: 11 Issue: 1, 149 - 151, 01.05.2014

Darrell Kirtland Shomaker

Abstract

The Anticipatory Corpse: Medicine, Power, and the Care of the Dying by Jeffrey Bishop is an
absorbing analysis of how contemporary medicine’s epistemology and metaphysics relate to the dying
body and death in a biomedical context. From the perspectives of medicine, philosophy, and history,
Bishop’s powerful synthesis is aimed at medicine’s attainment of power and efficient control over life,
death, and dying in the twentieth century. Moreover, his thesis can aptly be interpreted as a counter to the
arguments of Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens who have declared
religion the loser in the centuries old war between science and religion. 

Keywords

JEFFREY BISHOP, Medicine, Power

The Anticipatory Corpse: Medicine, Power, and the Care of the Dying

Abstract

The Anticipatory Corpse: Medicine, Power, and the Care of the Dying by Jeffrey Bishop is an
absorbing analysis of how contemporary medicine’s epistemology and metaphysics relate to the dying
body and death in a biomedical context. From the perspectives of medicine, philosophy, and history,
Bishop’s powerful synthesis is aimed at medicine’s attainment of power and efficient control over life,
death, and dying in the twentieth century. Moreover, his thesis can aptly be interpreted as a counter to the
arguments of Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens who have declared
religion the loser in the centuries old war between science and religion. 

Keywords

JEFFREY BISHOP, Medicine, Power

References

• JEFFREY BISHOP, The Anticipatory Corpse: Medicine, Power, and the Care of the Dying (University of Notre Dame Press, 2011), 432 pp. ISBN 978-0-268-02227-3