ScienceBloggers Answer: What is a Disease?

i-0f8e86ec8b2a30d740e202f3f45b4147-dice.jpgIt's winter. And here in NYC, that means it's cold, icy, and generally miserable. Everyone I know is coughing, aching, sneezing, and blowing noses. Ten million sick readers undoubtedly want to know the answer to our latest "Ask A ScienceBlogger" question:

What is a Disease?

Four scibling responses below the fold...

Greg and John discuss how evolution changes what's classified as a "disease." Mike narrows the question down to infectious diseases. And Janet wonders how pharmaceutical advertising may affect our feelings of health.

More like this

Student guest post by Anne Dressler The idea of evolutionary medicine is new to me and my understanding is quite shallow but it has piqued my interest. Currently, the book "Why We Get Sick" by Randolph M. Nesse and George C. Williams has been satisfying my curiosity during the 15 minutes of…
Figures. I'm even mentioned in last week's "Ask a Scienceblogger" question, and I'm not around to answer it! How is it that all the PIs (Tara, PZ, Orac et al.), various grad students, post-docs, etc. find time to fulfill their primary objectives (day jobs) and blog so prolifically?... Looking…
Student guest post by Sean McCaul Image Source:  http://www.cejournal.net/?p=1934 The next time somebody in your office or household has the flu, you might want to consider keeping your distance.  A new study published this month in Nature Communications suggests that about half of the…
I'm still working on finishing up 3 manuscripts (one book, 2 journal articles) so I've not blogged quite as much this week as I generally do. Next week I should be back up to speed, and have a few topics in the queue that I want to get to. Luckily for you, though, John Hawks has a pair of…