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  3. Because early man viewed illness as divine punishment and healing as purificatio

Because early man viewed illness as divine punishment and healing as purificatio

游客2025-01-28  11
问题 Because early man viewed illness as divine punishment and healing as purification, medicine and religion were inextricably linked for centuries. This notion is apparent in the origin of our word "pharmacy," which comes from the Greek pharmakon, meaning "purification through purging."
    By 3500 B.C., the Sumerians in the Tigris-Euphrates Valley had developed virtually all of our modern methods of administering drugs. They used gargles, inhalations, pills, lotions, ointments, and plasters. The first drug catalog, or pharmacopoeia, was written at that time by an unknown Sumerian physician. Preserved in cuneiform script on a single clay tablet are the names of dozens of drugs to treat ailments that still afflict us today.
    The Egyptians added to the ancient medicine chest. The Ebers papyrus, a scroll dating from the 1900 B.C. and named after the German Egyptologist George Ebers, reveals the trial-and-error know-how acquired by early Egyptian physicians. To relieve indigestion, a chew of peppermint leaves and carbonates (known today as antacids) was prescribed, and to numb the pain of tooth extraction, Egyptian doctors temporarily stupefied a patient with ethyl alcohoL The scroll also provides a rare glimpse into the hierarchy of ancient drug preparation. The "chief of the preparers of drugs" was the equivalent of a head pharmacist, who supervised the "collectors of drugs", field workers who gathered essential minerals and herbs. The "preparers’ aides," (technicians) dried and pulverized ingredients, which were blended according to certain formulas by the "preparers." And the "conservator of drugs" oversaw the storehouse where local and imported mineral, herb and animal-organ ingredients were kept.
    By the 7th century BC, the Greeks had adopted a sophisticated mind-body view of medicine. They believed the physician must pursue the diagnosis and treatment of the physical (body) causes of disease within a scientific framework, as well as cure the supernatural (mind) components involved. Thus, the early Greek physician emphasized something of a holistic approach to health, even if the suspected "mental" causes of disease were not recognized as stress and depression, but interpreted as curses from displeased deities.
    The modern era of pharmacology began in the 16th century, ushered in by the first major discoveries in chemistry. The understanding of how chemicals interact to produce certain effects within the body would eventually remove much of the guesswork and magic from medicine. Drugs had been launched on a scientific course, but centuries would pass before superstition was displaced by scientific fact One major reason was that physicians, unaware of the existence of disease-causing pathogens, continued to dream up imaginary causative evils. And though new chemical compounds emerged, their effectiveness in treating disease was still based largely on trial and error. Many standard, common drugs in the medicine chest were developed in this trial-and-error environment Such is the complexity of disease and human biochemistry that even today, despite enormous strides in medical science, many of the latest sophisticated additions to our medicine chest shelves were accidental finds. [br] The author cites the Greek word "pharmakon" underlined in Paragraph 1 to
选项 A、stress the mental and physical causes of disease
B、emphasize the early nature of Greek medical science
C、point out that many of the beliefs of early man are still held today
D、illustrate that early man thought healing illness was linked to purification
答案 D
解析 第1段第1句说，古代人把疾病视为神的惩罚，将病愈视为涤罪，认为医学和宗教密不可分。第2句提到这种观念可从pharmacy的词源pharmakon中看出，可知作者提到pharmacy的希腊词源是为了说明疾病跟宗教净化(即涤罪)有关，故选D。作者举pharmakon的例子是作说明，支持第1段中的观点。A“强调生理和心理病因”、B“强调古希腊医学的本质”和C“指出现代人延续了古人持有的一些观念”均不如A准确。
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