Nothing is more important to a doctor's studies than the freshman anatomy class in which he learns how the human body is put together by taking one apart. But dissection of the dead has always filled nonmedical men with horror. Popes and emperors have forbidden it. Such great artist-anatomists as Da Vinci and Vesalius had to cut through layers of superstition and prejudice before they could use the dead to reveal the secrets of life. Ghouls such as Britain's famed Body-snatchers Burke and Hare committed murder to supply the anatomists' demand, and added the word "burking" to the language. Even today,...
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