The Spark in the Machine: How the Science of Acupuncture Explains the Mysteries of Western Medicine

Daniel Keown

Singing Dragon, Mar 20, 2014 - Medical - 304 pages

Why can salamanders grow new legs, and young children grow new finger tips, but adult humans can't regenerate? What is the electricity that flows through the human body? Is it the same thing that the Chinese call Qi? If so, what does Chinese medicine know, that western medicine ignores?

Dan Keown's highly accessible, witty, and original book shows how western medicine validates the theories of Chinese medicine, and how Chinese medicine explains the mysteries of the body that western medicine largely ignores. He explains the generative force of embryology, how the hearts of two people in love (or in scientific terms `quantum entanglement') truly beat as one, how a cheating heart is also an ill heart (which is why men are twice as likely to die of a sudden heart attack with their mistress than with their wife), how neural crest cells determine our lifespan, and why Proust's madeleines evoked the memories they did.

The book shows how the theories of western and Chinese medicine support each other, and how the integrated theory enlarges our understanding of how bodies work on every level. Full of good stories and surprising details, Dan Keown's book is essential reading for anyone who has ever wanted to know how the body really works.

Contents

• Why Cant Humans Regenerate?: 1
• Part I The Science of Acupuncture or What God Forgot to Tell Surgeons: 5
• Part II The Embryology of Chinese Medicine: 87
• Part III Ming Men and the Six Channels: 119
• Epilogue: 265
• How Cancer Moves: 269
• Yin and Yang: 271
• Referred or Radiating Pain: 274
• Endnotes: 278
• Index: 286

About the author

Dr Daniel Keown has worked as a registered doctor since graduating with a medical degree from Manchester University in 1998. In 2008, he completed a degree in Chinese Medicine and Acupuncture from Kingston University, and he has studied alongside the renowned Dr Wang Ju-Yi at the Institute of Channel Diagnosis in Beijing. He lives and practises in Tunbridge Wells, UK.

Bibliographic information

• Title: The Spark in the Machine: How the Science of Acupuncture Explains the Mysteries of Western Medicine
• Author: Daniel Keown
• Publisher: Singing Dragon, 2014
• ISBN: 0857011545, 9780857011541
• Length: 304 pages
• Subjects: Medical / Acupuncture; Medical / Alternative & Complementary Medicine