Here Is a Human Being: At the Dawn of Personal Genomics

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

Here Is a Human Being: At the Dawn of Personal Genomics

by Misha Angrist (Goodreads Author)

3.76 of 5 stars 3.76 · rating details · 49 ratings · 20 reviews

The first in-depth look at personal genomics: its larger-than-life research subjects; its entrepreneurs and do-it-yourselfers; its technology developers; the bewildered and overwhelmed physicians and regulators who must negotiate it; and what it means to be a "public genome" in a world where privacy is already under siege

In 2007, Misha Angrist became the fourth subject in...more

ebook, 352 pages

Published November 2nd 2010 by HarperCollins e-books (first published November 1st 2010)

more details... edit details

Get a copy:

More…

Friend Reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

Lists with This Book

This book is not yet featured on Listopia. Add this book to your favorite list »

Community Reviews

(showing 1-30 of 220)

filter | sort: default (?) | rating details

Jul 28, 2012 Melankalia rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: first-reads

When I entered and won this book from the Goodreads Giveaways promotion, I wasn't entirely sure I would like it. It sounded really interesting, but maybe just a bit too dry for someone who reads mostly fiction.

I could not have been more wrong.

This was such an interesting read. In the narrative, the author walks that fine line between informative and entertaining, thus doing an excellent job of keeping you engaged in the work. The book is written in a way that makes the more technical aspects e...more

1 like · like · see review

Dec 21, 2010 cheryl rated it 3 of 5 stars

Although I tend to be a fiction gal, the topic drew me to Here is a Human Being: At The Dawn of Personal Genomics by Misha Angrist as a book to receive (and then review) from the folks at Harper. I never really focused on science studies but I was always intrigued by genetics and fulfilled one of my natural science requirements in college with a course titled Human Genetics, Ethics and Public Policy. I was in college in the later 90s so obviously there has been change since then. I say all this...more

like · see review

Mar 04, 2012 Roger rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction, science

I was fascinated by the genome for years, but didn't have a lot of background. This book gives me some answers, but even more questions about how personalized medicine will be handled in the future.

Angrist gives us a first-person account of his PGP-10 experience. (PGP-10 is the first 10 individuals to publish their complete genomes.) The account was easy to read as it flows like a stream of conscientiousness tale. It is personal and you actually get an idea of the personalities of people he foll...more

like · see review

Dec 26, 2012 DeLene Beeland rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This was a wonderful read! Angrist's story is an engaging blend of humanism and science. I wrote a review of this book on my personal blog, here's a taste: "Angrist also delves in to the human dimension of what it means when an individual chooses to dive into their own genome — he likens it to drinking from a fire hose — an experience that is as individualistic as it is communal in terms of how the information you learn about yourself can affect your loved ones, and even your children. In short,...more

like · see review

Feb 27, 2012 Lorne Daniel rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Human genomics is one of those big waves of science and change that I have mostly tried to ignore, in the hopes that it will just wash over me and I will come up, sputtering but alive, after it crashes through.

If you are a non-scientist like me, you also hope that when the term human genomics is thrown out at some dinner party you can deliver one pithy line of commentary and then retreat to the kitchen to refill your glass.

Here Is a Human Being is an entertaining tale about one man’s foray into...more

2 likes · like · see review

Jun 07, 2012 PF rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: health-healthcare, geek-and-tech

Blogged here: http://pgenpt.wordpress.com/2012/06/0...
-----
Of course, working in healthcare, I had heard about personal genomics. It was on my horizon, something about which I wanted to know more. When I was offered a review copy of the new edition of Here Is A Human Being, At the Dawn of Personal Genomics by Misha Angrist, I thought that would be a great way for me to accomplish that goal.

For context, I’ve written a few book reviews in my past. Enough so, that I have my usual strategy: read the...more Blogged here: http://pgenpt.wordpress.com/2012/06/0...
-----
Of course, working in healthcare, I had heard about personal genomics. It was on my horizon, something about which I wanted to know more. When I was offered a review copy of the new edition of Here Is A Human Being, At the Dawn of Personal Genomics by Misha Angrist, I thought that would be a great way for me to accomplish that goal.

For context, I’ve written a few book reviews in my past. Enough so, that I have my usual strategy: read the intro and conclusion closely; give attention to the Table of Contents and the index; flip through and do spot checks for chapters or sections or illustrations that particularly attract my attention, read those; extrapolate to the rest of the book. Please note, that for a solicited book review, I rarely actually read the entire book, instead reading enough to get a sense of the overall work. This was different.

Ruth, who sent me my copy, kept gently nagging me to actually write the review. I kept pleading for more time because I wasn’t done yet. I wasn’t making it through more than a page or two at a time. I kept stopping to look things up. Checking the footnotes or citations. These were often incomplete (which, as a librarian, frustrated me NO END!), so I’d break out my phone and look it up myself. Pop the link out to Twitter or send it to myself to bookmark. Prowl a couple related links while I’m there. Then go back to the book. Someone’s mentioned. A name or a company I don’t know yet. Repeat.

This is a slow process. Rewarding, engaging, intriguing, demanding, but not remotely speedy. As you can see from the photo, I’ve been carrying this book around for quite a while now. The actual object of the book is ornamented with papers sticking out of it, embroidered inside with scribbles and underlines and comments and questions, highlighted with wear and grime along the edges from having been a close companion over a period of time. I didn’t just read the book, I immersed myself in it.

For those who don’t want to read the actual “review” part of this, I’m going to interject here the main takeaways that influenced me. As I read this book, there was certain themes that slowly took shape. In the book, Misha switches between telling his part of the story, and conversations or events that involved the key players. In these candid conversations, the leaders in the personal genomics field kept talking about their own reasons why they believe this is important, what they hope will come from personal genomics, the potential impact, the benefits, the barriers. They worry. There are concerns about what happens if people DON’T participate? What if people’s concerns over personal privacy win out over the sharing of data necessary for leaping into a new realm of research and discovery?

They’re talking about a powerful shift in the model of how science is done. And it depends on us. The book doesn’t pound on the issue, but in different ways, different words, different places, different people kept expressing similar concerns. The idea sank in. I found myself concerned about the same ideas. I started hearing and seeing the same concerns expressed in other areas. Gradually, over a period of months, it became clear to me that this — big data, sharing data, personal transparency — are all critical to this paradigm shift in science as well as general knowledge, critical to moving us forward, beyond the status quo into the next level of understanding and learning. And if we don’t, we don’t go forward, but backwards. This is when and why I started to feel driven to get involved, somehow.

Now, about the book. Here is a Human Being really needs to be read like a story, and it also calls out to be read like deconstructing a piece of jewelry or craftwork prior to replicating the design in a new media. It has both a natural flow, and a sense of profoundly subtle (almost invisible) craft and design.

There is no conceptual organizer given at the beginning of the book, like the Dramatis personae or a timeline. There is no cognitive structure to help me understand this is where I began, this is how the book is evolving, and this is the expected path for getting there. My masters research focused on applying an educational technique that was then called an “advance organizer.” The oversimplified rule of thumb was tell them what you’re going to say, say it, and then tell them what you told them. Me, I like to include something about WHY, why it’s important, why it’s valuable information to you, what are *you* going to get out if it. In this case, he might also want something on what the value was to him.

Through reading this, I’ve ended up reading the personal stories provided on a number of the personal genomic corporate websites, but I just can’t trust them. They read a bit fake, like the marketing pieces they are. Misha doesn’t. Misha sounds honest and real. He says, I had these questions, I had these doubts, I had these concerns. I did it anyway. This is why. This is what I found, what I learned, how I learned it.

The book has important, excellent, well-crafted content. It tells a critical story. It tells a complex story. I agree that you don’t need to be a scientist to understand it. However, it doesn’t always include the context to make it easily accessible or an easy read. The story parts read easily, but without the cognitive construct into which to fit the pieces, I am having to create that myself as I go along. I am kind of mentally outlining the book as we go. Just when I think I know where he’s headed, and I settle in to just focus on reading, he changes direction. I react, “Whoa, that isn’t what I expected, what’s going on now?” and I start again digging into footnotes and background research.

My approach to reading this book might have been a mistake. It certainly took long enough! It might be easier to see the most important part of the book, the story. The story only gets more intense and engaging as the book progresses. And it has a worthy ending.(less)

like · see review

Jun 05, 2011 Jonathan Hunsberger added it · review of another edition

I bought this because the author is an acquaintance and I always like to read books that are written by people I know. Given the topic and his profession, I was expecting a hard slog through something very technical, but this book is very accessible and kept me interested throughout.

Several people who saw me reading this book asked what it was about. When I gave the basic premise, the first question was always "what did he find out?" That's the natural first question, but once you've read (or e...more

like · see review

Mar 13, 2011 Katie rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction, science

I also read this book for my Genomics class, in hopes of finding something based a little more in hard science land than The Seven Daughters of Eve. That it does, though it really does more focus on ethics of personal genomics than the science itself, but it is most firmly grounded on the cutting edge, as it were. Angrist describes and examines with clarity and humor the sociological implications of where human genomics is headed after the sequencing of human genome, particularly in what the imp...more

like · see review

Feb 26, 2011 Haley rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-and-literary-non-fiction

This book was kind of all over the place and not really what I was expecting, but still a lot of fun to read. I thoroughly enjoyed it, but I'm not sure if I'd recommend it to people who aren't already super excited about genomes.

Misha Angrist was one of the first participants accepted into the "Personal Genome Project" (PGP) -- the brainchild of Harvard scientist George Church. The underlying premise of PGP is to not only sequence people's genomes (or maybe just exomes?) but also to give all of...more This book was kind of all over the place and not really what I was expecting, but still a lot of fun to read. I thoroughly enjoyed it, but I'm not sure if I'd recommend it to people who aren't already super excited about genomes.

Misha Angrist was one of the first participants accepted into the "Personal Genome Project" (PGP) -- the brainchild of Harvard scientist George Church. The underlying premise of PGP is to not only sequence people's genomes (or maybe just exomes?) but also to give all of that information back to them and make their identities and genomic information public, the assumption being that this will lead to an incredible, life changing moment in which your personal genome and all of its secrets are laid bare. Misha Angrist's account makes it clear that if such a moment exists, it is still many years away. He recounts the trials and setbacks of PGP, his reactions to the (very limited) data that he receives, and the various technologies that are currently being used and developed to sequence genomes at a faster pace.

I was excited to see guest appearances in these pages from a number of scientists I've met and other major players in the field of genomics, but Angrist spends far too much time delving into the intricacies of sequencing technologies and (worse) the business practices of various start ups and other companies trying to bring these technologies to market. The best chapters in this book revolve around people -- a father who is trying to understand and diagnose his daughter's Marfan-like disease, a young woman who has a homemade laboratory in her closet, the first 10 PGP participants who joined the project for very different reasons, and even Skip Gates, who makes a bizarre but engaging appearance in the final chapter to talk about how looking at one's genome can shed light on ancestry.

Obviously, the author couldn't do anything to change what sounds like fairly uninteresting results from the PGP thus far, but a clever editor might have found ways to strip out some of the boring, lengthy descriptions of at least half a dozen companies that may or may not be working on the next great sequencer. Angrist really strives to give us a thorough account of the current state of personal genomics,which is impressive, but most readers -- myself included -- may be most interested in the personal stories.(less)

1 like · like · see review

Mar 14, 2011 Jacqueline Ogburn rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: nonfiction

A fascinating combination of science and the personal, Angrist was one of the first people to have his genome sequenced and made public. He takes readers through the fast-evolving field of personal genomics, introducing key players and meditations on the implications revealing his genetic information. It's also quite funny in places.

like · see review

Feb 27, 2013 Ariadna73 rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Not extremely bad... It was difficult for me to connect to what the author was trying to say: a recount of his adventure as a Ginny pig in a genome decoding project. I was expecting something else; like descriptions of genes and relations to the human way of being; but it was more like a journal.

like · see review

May 17, 2011 Aaron rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Martin Samuel, Amit Aggarwal, Marie Wong

Shelves: science

A very good overview of the state of the art, well as of mid last year anyway. An insightful and informative read, with lots of introspective anecdotes all over. I almost feel like I know these folks now... the champions of personal genomics. Highly recommended for all interested in the field (or who have family members who are happy to publicize their genomes). Forget social media, here comes gen-X, the genetic-exhibitionists :)

like · see review

Sep 25, 2012 Skepticallyspeaking added it · review of another edition

Shelves: guests, non-fiction

Featured on Skeptically Speaking show #143 on December 18, 2011, during an interview with author Misha Angrist. http://skepticallyspeaking.ca/episode...

like · see review

May 25, 2012 Mimi rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Angrist was chosen as one of ten scientists to have their personal genome mapped as an example of what could be learned. Ethics about disclosing propensities for certain diseases that have no cure or way of being prevented is discussed. There is a lot about Angrist's own feelings and misgivings, especially about disclosing a genetic predisposition for a disease that his daughters might inherit and wouldn't be prepared to hear about yet.

like · see review

Sep 19, 2012 Daniel Hooker rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: medicine, science

Tough subject. Deeply scientific, parts of this book are fascinating. But he launches into the story without much of a preamble, I never felt I understod what the author was trying to explain to us at a high level. The beginning chapters (and portions of each subsequent chapter) are bogged down by names and places of corporations that power genomic testing, but without a context for what they're doing, it's just plain boring. It gets better in the middle when talking about the actual science and...more

like · see review

Sep 10, 2011 Misha Angrist added it · (Review from the author)

This is my book. I think it's pretty good and that you should read it. Duh. I say more about it on my blog:
blogs.plos.org/genomeboy

1 like · like · see review

Dec 02, 2011 Danielle rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: first-reads

What caught my eye was the cover very colorful.In the beggining it started out good then toward the rest of it I find that it dragged on.My brain was wondering and had a hard time focusing on this book,lots of information.

like · see review

Mar 10, 2013 Robin Hulbert rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I recommend this book for anyone interested in human genetics and personal genome sequencing. Very enlightening and informative. Misha Angrist has a good sense of humor and explains the biology in a way that the non-biologist can understand.

like · see review

Nov 12, 2011 Joanne Manaster rated it 4 of 5 stars

I like it! I did a video review here, along with The $1000 Genome by Kevin Davies!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q99ZJx...

Enjoy!

like · see review

Aug 23, 2012 Sharron rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

*recieved this book in giveaway.

Fascinating and entertaining!

like · see review

May 17, 2013 Mia added it · review of another edition

May 12, 2013 Nevermind is currently reading it · review of another edition

May 05, 2013 Bryce Haymond marked it as to-read · review of another edition

May 03, 2013 Ampop451 marked it as to-read · review of another edition

Apr 25, 2013 Amanda Wong rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Apr 23, 2013 Kylie Tingley rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Apr 23, 2013 Doenermoelp marked it as to-read · review of another edition

Apr 21, 2013 Sarah rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Apr 09, 2013 Sarah is currently reading it · review of another edition

Mar 23, 2013 Nihark is currently reading it · review of another edition

« previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 next »

new topic
Discuss This Book

There are no discussion topics on this book yet. Be the first to start one »

Recommend it | Stats | Recent status updates

combine
Other Editions (3)

Videos About This Book

Add a comment

Genres

Non Fiction

8 users

Science

7 users

See top shelves...

About Misha Angrist

Misha Angrist is Assistant Professor of the Practice at the Duke University Institute for Genome Sciences & Policy. In April 2007 he became the fourth subject in the Personal Genome Project. In 2009 he had his full genome sequenced and made it public. His book, Here is a Human Being: At the Dawn of Personal Genomics (2010) is published by HarperCollins. "

More about Misha Angrist...

Share This Book

Facebook Twitter Your website

Trivia About Here Is a Human B...

No trivia or quizzes yet. Add some now »

title link	preview: Here Is a Human Being: At the Dawn of Personal Genomics
avg rating	preview: Here Is a Human Being: At the Dawn of Personal Genomics Goodreads rating: 3.76 (49 ratings)
small image	preview: click here [close]
med image	preview: click here [close]
BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9665896-here-is-a-human-being?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1347349911l/9665896.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9665896-here-is-a-human-being?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Here Is a Human Being: At the Dawn of Personal Genomics by Misha Angrist[/url]

Here Is a Human Being: At the Dawn of Personal Genomics

Friend Reviews

Lists with This Book

Community Reviews

new topicDiscuss This Book

combineOther Editions (3)

Videos About This Book

Genres

About Misha Angrist

Share This Book

Share This Book on Your Website

Trivia About Here Is a Human B...

new topic
Discuss This Book

combine
Other Editions (3)