On immunity an inoculation By Eola Biss

A well crafted , well thought out book, that reads almost like a collection of essays. She , while dealing with her own doubts , uncovers part of why people--privileged, educated people, no less--choose not to vaccinate their children, disregarding scientific evidence and social responsibility. 

She hooked me with her first metaphor of Achilles , and kept me from definition to definition. 

Definitely on the 'should read 'list . The following our conversation starters from her book:

Immunity is a myth the story suggest and no mortal can ever be made invulnerable. 

A trust – in the sense of valuable asset placed in the care of someone to whom it does not ultimately belong – captures more or less my understanding of what it is to have a child.

Heard immunity – thinking not in terms of how it affects a single body but also in terms of how it affects the collective body with community mass vaccination becomes far more effective than individual vaccination. Those of us who draw on collective immunity owe our health to our neighbors.

Their primary concern in other words was with people like them- risk groups. Vaccination works by listing the majority in the protection of the minority.

When we encounter information that contradicts our believes we tend to doubt the information not ourselves.

Metaphors of alternate medicine address our base anxieties when we feel bad we want something unambiguously good.

The purpose of heroic medicine was not so much to heal the patient as it was to produce a measurable and ideally dramatic effect for which the patient could be billed.

Refusing immunity the privilege 1% are sheltered from risk when they draw resources from the other 99%.

Paternalism is interference with the liberty of another for the purpose of promoting some good preventing some harm. Not always necessarily a bad thing.

The term conscientious objector, now associated primarily with war, originally referred to those who refused vaccination.

Think about the conscience is an inner voice to keep your actions in line with publicly defendable moral standards (which may shown the lack of conscience in today's society)

Stale metaphors reproduce stale thinking mixed metaphors confuse.

It Is essential to motherhood – we must live the questions our children raise for us.

Jean-Paul Sartre said "freedom is what you do with what's been done to you."

Community is shared space - a garden we tend together