Three starred 'A's in science do not make a good doctor

• Published in: Pulse p. 46
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Briefing Media Ltd 27.03.1999
• Subjects: Medicine; Science; Subjectivity
• ISSN: 0048-6000

The centrality of science in medicine cannot be disputed. Contemporary medical practice has three characteristics: it is predicated on scientific positivism, processed by rational thinking and embraces clarity of output. The common sense intellectual view of science argues that scientific knowledge is real because we can see and touch it: it is reliable knowledge because it is objective. Any philosophy student will tell you that this view is based on a circularity: it is the inductivist view of science, which uses induction to prove induction. The current position of science in medicine is pretty difficult to justify historically. The conventional historical view of science sees a continuing, justifiable intellectual thread running through history from the time of the Greeks to the Enlightenment, reaching a watershed in 1891 with the publication of Koch's postulates, and accelerating through the 20th century assisted mainly by huge advances in technology. This is often referred to as the Whig view of history, and it is flawed in several ways.