Immortal Life Of Henrietta Lacks Summary

Rebecca Skloot, in the second part of the “Immortal life of Henrietta Lacks”, extensively examines the relationship of science with the non-scientific and indicates the reality of the scientific community. Basically, the reading explicates the consequences, both within and outside science, of the research enthusiasm of the scientists.
Humans are classified in terms of their ability and regularity of exercising science. This categorization is quite different from those based on identity such as gender, race etc.: the latter is tied to a person since (s)he is born and is not detachable, while a reputable rank in the former is attained through material efforts. Although, a person’s status in the former depends partially on his/her association with the latter, it still has a considerable degree of freedom. This distinction is rather dangerous: the people belonging to the ‘elite’ scientific community believe that their position is due to their virtuous and endeavoring attitude. It gives them a self-derived authorization on the ones not part of their class, the non-scientific.
The practitioners of scientific discourse consider themselves nobler than other mortal beings. Friedrich …show more content…
It defies itself by distancing from its subjects: science has become extremely un-comprehendible and unreachable to the laymen. Henrietta never understood the nitty-gritty details of her treatment. Day himself confessed that whenever doctors asked him for something, he nodded with an affirmative reply because he had no idea about what they said. Even within the scientific community, it is difficult for scientists to apprehend ideas of an entirely different field to theirs. Understanding hardcore research results require sufficient mastery of the field itself. Whenever I attempt to study an intense research paper, I have to cover a lot of pre-requisites before making the material comprehendible, or even