It is hard to look at the tumor and not come away with the feeling that one has encountered a powerful monster in its infancy
Siddhartha MukherjeeRead
The history is important because science is a discipline deeply immersed in history. In other words, every time you perform an experiment in science or in medicine, what you're actually doing is you're answering someone, answering a question raised by someone in the past.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Science builds upon historical knowledge and past inquiries.
Siddhartha Mukherjee emphasizes the significance of history in scientific endeavors. He argues that every scientific experiment is not just a standalone effort but a response to historical questions and challenges posed by previous thinkers, showcasing the continuity of knowledge and the importance of understanding the past in advancing current scientific practices.
Themes
ScienceHistoryExperimentationKnowledgePast
In practice
Example use cases
In a lecture on the history of science, you could introduce this quote to highlight how historical context shapes modern research.
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Nearly every one of the genes that turns out to be a key player in cancer has a vital role in the normal physiology of an organism. The genes that enable our brains and blood cells to develop are implicated in cancer.
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It remains an astonishing, disturbing fact that in America - a nation where nearly every new drug is subjected to rigorous scrutiny as a potential carcinogen, and even the bare hint of a substance's link to cancer ignites a firestorm of public hysteria and media anxiety - one of the most potent and common carcinogens known to humans can be freely bought and sold at every corner store for a few dollars.
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It felt—nearly twenty-five hundred years after Hippocrates had naively coined the overarching term karkinos—that modern oncology was hardly any more sophisticated in its taxonomy of cancer.
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