Dr. Daedalus: Editorial on Lauren Slater's Masterful Article

Lauren Slater's report entitled "Dr. Daedalus", investigates the work of Dr. Joe Rosen, a well educated, respected and inventive plastic surgeon in New England. Throughout the article, Slater tags along with Rosen on his trip to the ER, an important meeting and to his house to discuss his ambitious and creative mind along with what it means to be a human. She goes in depth with her findings and gives her own opinions to let us know how she really feels about plastic surgery, the meaning of being human and her own imperfections. I found Slater's opinions to be very down to earth and well thought out. My opinions on the important topics are not only strongly supported but well researched. I believe that to be human means that we have the ability to problem solve complex enigmas and do go beyond the reach of acceptability to create and recreate ourselves as we choose.

Humans have been around for thousands of years, living in the beginning among monsters and superior beings of power and intellect. We have adapted, grown, matured and significantly evolved over a massive time period and we continue that progression today. We have grown into a distinct and intellectual species and have reached a point where we are the dominate force on the planet, and maybe soon, outside our comfortable confines of Earth. What makes us human is that we have many attributes, like problem solving, that separate us from other species and our predecessors.

Being human means that we are able to separate ourselves from other species physically, mentally, and emotionally and change ourselves to what we want to be. We are able to problem solve, adapt, and in the case of "Dr. Daedalus", reconstruct if imperfections are evident. As for the meaning of being human, asking if there is a core to our existence, there most definitely is.

Slater writes:

"Assuming, probably wrongly but assuming nevertheless, that human beings represent some higher form of species adaptation, at least in terms of frontal-lobe intelligence, the brain might find it odd to be rewiring itself to presumably more primitive structures, structures we shed a long time ago when we waded out the swamps and shed our scales and feathers."

This quote is talking about Dr. Rosen's idea to add wings, webbed feet, hands and other alterations seeming out of this world to our bodies. He believes that in the future humans will evolve with these qualities anyway. Every species has a core that makes them what they are, and we are no different.

Making this statement shows that Slater feels in that she does not really think that human beings are at the forefront of intelligence and that our brains would not support say a wing or webbed feet, rather it would reject these additions and not be able to rewire our bodies to their normal state. I disagree with her on this point; I think that we are at the forefront of intelligence in the world and that our brains are complex, yet simple enough to rewire our body to adapt to changes. People, who receive plastic surgery and necessary changes due to accidents, adapt to their new features to the point where they can function normally once again. We are the only species to master technology and still are progressing toward better finds and more complex ideas. We shape not only ourselves and physical features, but our minds. And this fact proves that we have created a world in which we control, good or bad, our actions mold the way every other species on the planet lives and acts in everyday life.

One may argue though, using the text that humans are not at the forefront of existence in the world. At one point during the article Slater quotes Martha Beck when she talked about her child with Down syndrome: "as dissimilar from me as a mule is from a donkey. He is in ways both obvious and subtle, a different beast." If one little imperfection makes a human completely different than other humans, what makes us better than the savage beasts that roam the rest of the uncontrolled world?

We are better because we still care and look after our less fortunate and weak. As in other cases, different species will disown their young if they have an imperfection and leave them out to care for themselves at a vulnerable age. For humans, children with Down syndrome or other cruel diseases are cared for just as much, possibly more than regular humans. My high school class was roughly four hundred kids, and about thirty of them were kids with some sort of disease or other imperfection. They were looked after by the faculty and the students alike. We understand the imperfections people can have and adapt to those problems and make it easier for them to have a full life. As humans, we have a deeper understanding and higher intelligence that maybe, in certain occasions these "special" people may be "extraordinary". Even though if those select few do not become "extraordinary", we understand that they have the same rights to life as the rest of us, we just need to help them along a little more. Cures and treatments are continually being attempted to help what seems to be incurable diseases; creating these cures and medicines is something that only humans have the ability to do.

There are though, other imperfections we can change about ourselves and that is exactly what makes us human. The final example is at the beginning of Slater's article. The man named Sweeny was attacked by cancer and his face was corroded until he would have been viewed in society as a "monster". In many species this would be reason for disownment or even death. In our culture, there are ways to fix these problems and people understand the fight that Sweeny and people like Sweeny put up everyday to continue to live. We are able to think outside the box and fix problems that other species aren't. Creating medicines and using plastic surgery are excellent examples of our more advanced and more complex society.

An example of our ability to adapt to imperfections and change ourselves is plastic surgery. We use this to fix what we feel is not acceptable about our own bodies or to help in the reconstruction after a disaster. There are institutions and medical offices to help fix complex diseases and injuries, and these are only seen in the human world. Another fine example is our universities and colleges because they are there for our own improvement in education. We are surrounded by things that can improve our lives in every way.

Humans can interpret problems and adjust to fix them as we see necessary. We can use our minds and abilities to help those who were injured severely or even slightly or we can go beyond acceptability and get unnecessary adjustments to ourselves. Separate from other species, we can fix imperfections by means of plastic surgery and life saving procedures, as seen in "Dr. Daedalus". We take care of our unfortunate and look after them if they can not look after themselves. Humans are at the forefront of intelligence and are able to solve problems in and outside of the box; it separates us from other species and is at our core. It is what makes us who we are.