dominated their existence. Swirling above, the constellations reigned over
the learned, while humankind was confusingly vulnerable.
As Luca closes the shutters to the eastward-facing windows, I notice
inscriptions burned into the panels surrounding Apollo. On the gently
curved, shield-like panels, surrounded by graceful curlicues, are Latin
phrases. The most poignant axiom proclaims, ET CUNCTORUM SUBIECTA
POTENTIA NOBIS, meaning, “To us, and before all, their power.”
For the ten millennia that man has domesticated crops and animals,
organized towns and cities, computed math on clay tablets and paper,
bartered in money, sailed on the seas, conducted warfare with fabricated
weapons, brewed alcohol and cured cheese, spun cotton and weaved wool
blankets, created roads, formulated concrete, dredged canals, constructed
dams, diverted rivers, siphoned away sewage, and conveyed fresh water, he
could make no progress on understanding life’s most pressing inquiry:
Why do we get sick?
With no possible way of explaining, our forefathers turned their gaze to
the heavens to disentangle themselves from their snare. It was the
influenza.
After eons of bewilderment, our present generation has (mostly) grown
comfortable with the explanations of the scientific community about the
causes and treatment of disease. The implant revolution has been so
successful that we are nearing the point that a lack of diagnosis or the
failure to completely restore function is entirely unacceptable.
Additionally (in America at least), it is becoming challenging to find an
individual above the age of fifty who doesn’t have some type of permanent
implant in his mouth or body, and downright impossible to find a young
person who can’t name an implant recipient. This transformation has
occurred in the last generation, and will only get more profound.
What will the next few decades bring? My guessing is perhaps true
folly (if the last few hundred pages are instructive), but surgeons aren’t
timid, so here goes. But first, a story about one of mankind’s most
remarkable interventions.
In July 1982, a gentleman in his early forties was admitted to the Santa
Clara Valley Medical Center, in San Jose, California, in a state of frozen
wakefulness. He was motionless and stiff as a board, and while he was
almost totally (physically) unresponsive, the admitting neurologist,