Every clinician knows that careful observation is the foundation for all knowledge. Reading the account of how Nabokov correctly anticipated the outcome of DNA analysis of butterfly taxonomy, using only his acute powers of observation, I am reminded of historical accounts of physicians who could estimate a person's hematocrit value just by looking at the palm of a patient's hand.
One of the problems, with the rise of the machine in medicine, is that these observational talents are being lost.
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