The set of books, referred to as Pernkopf's Atlas is no longer in print and surgeons are prepared to pay thousands of pounds for a second-hand set. These books are widely considered to be the best example of anatomical drawings in the world. It is richer in detail and more vivid in color than any other. Yet, few would proudly display it in their clinic, library or home.
That is because the research for these books was done on the bodies of hundreds of people killed by the Nazis. It is their bodies - cut up and dissected - that are shown across thousands of pages. Critics say the book is tainted by its dark past and scientists have grappled with the ethics involved in its use. Dr. Sabine Hildebrandt, from Harvard Medical School, says at least half of the 800 images in the atlas came from political prisoners. They included gay men, lesbians, gypsies, political dissidents and Jews.
In 1939, a new Third Reich law ensured the bodies of all executed prisoners were immediately sent to the nearest department of anatomy for research and teaching purposes. During this period Dr. Eduard Pernkopf, a dedicated Nazi, worked 18-hour days dissecting corpses, while a team of artists created images for his book. Sometimes the anatomy institute was so full, executions had to be postponed.
Pernkopf was arrested after the war and sacked from the university. He was held at an Allied prison camp for three years but
was never charged with any crime. Following his release he returned to the university and continued his work on the atlas, publishing the third volume in 1952. He died in 1955, shortly before the publication of a fourth volume. Thousands of copies of the atlas were sold across the world, and it was translated into five languages. It was only in the 1990s that students and academics really began questioning who the people in the atlas were. After the brutal history was revealed, the atlas went out of publication in 1994.
A Washington based nerve surgeon, Dr. Mackinnon says she feels uncomfortable with its origin, but that she could not do her job without it.
Rabbi Joseph Polak - a Holocaust survivor and professor of health law - believes the book is a "moral enigma" because it is derived from "real evil, but can be used in the service of good".
Dr. Jonathan Ives, a bioethics from the University of Bristol, agrees the atlas is "amazingly detailed" but says it is tainted by its "horrific past. If we are using it and reaping the benefits, it implies we are somehow complicit but you could also argue that in not using it, the atlas would be lost.”
And indeed a moral dilemma it is. Is it something good born out of evil or is it all evil?
A grand day to ya all!
Catfoot Blog (616)
fairytale in itself – I’d apologize but it will not mean a thing. Nothing has changed. I’d still think that he’s an arsehole and I’ll probably apologize by conceding that he’s not the biggest arsehole that I have stumbled across and that I’m sorry for calling him that. Regardless, he will just become an even bigger arsehole in my opinion. Apparently we are allowed to have opinions… as long as we keep them to ourselves. 
– after expressing the opinion that half the members at CS are arseholes, I believe that I’ll gladly (and honestly) concede that half the members at CS are not arseholes. 
