Experimental philosophy of medicine and the concepts of health and disease

Veit, Walter

doi:10.1007/s11017-021-09550-3

Cited by 8 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 69 publications

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“…Empirical work on theoretical goals is increasingly being carried out in the field of experimental philosophy (x-phi) and experimental bioethics (bio-xphi) [19,20,[60][61][62][63][64]. Drawing on x-phi and bio-xphi literature, there are pleas to use of empirical methods to inform our understanding of concepts like health and disease [65,66].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Acceptable objectives of empirical research in bioethics: a qualitative exploration of researchers’ views

2022

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Background This is the first qualitative study to investigate how researchers, who do empirical work in bioethics, relate to objectives of empirical research in bioethics (ERiB). We explore reasons that make some objectives more acceptable, while others are deemed less acceptable. Methods Using qualitative exploratory study design, we interviewed bioethics researchers, who were selected to represent different types of scholars working in the field. The interview data of 25 participants were analyzed in this paper using thematic analysis. Results From the eight objectives presented to the study participants, understanding the context of a bioethical issue and identifying ethical issues in practice received unanimous agreement. Participants also supported other objectives of ERiB but with varying degrees of agreement. The most contested objectives were striving to draw normative recommendations and developing and justifying moral principles. The is-ought gap was not considered an obstacle to ERiB, but rather a warning sign to critically reflect on the normative implications of empirical results. Conclusions Our results show that the most contested objectives are also the more ambitious ones, whereas the least contested ones focus on producing empirical results. The potential of empirical research to be useful for bioethics was mostly based on the reasoning pattern that empirical data can provide a testing ground for elements of normative theory. Even though empirical research can inform many parts of bioethical inquiry, normative expertise is recommended to guide ERiB. The acceptability of ambitious objectives for ERiB boils down to finding firm ground for the integration of empirical facts in normative inquiry.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Acceptable objectives of empirical research in bioethics: a qualitative exploration of researchers’ views

2022

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“…Despite the discussion of naturalist views by philosophers of medicine, their assessment is largely negative, and most within the field now maintain that health reflects personal evaluations or the values of society at large; a consensus that health is primarily a normative concept, rather than ‘only’ an objective biological property of organisms (Veit, 2021b , 2021c ). 3…”

Section: Health and Consciousnessmentioning

confidence: 99%

“… 12 For critical discussions of this kind of agential thinking common to evolutionary biology, see Okasha ( 2018 ), Veit ( 2021a , 2021b , 2021c ). …”

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confidence: 99%

Health, consciousness, and the evolution of subjects

Veit

2022

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The goal of this programmatic paper is to highlight a close connection between the core problem in the philosophy of medicine, i.e. the concept of health, and the core problem of the philosophy of mind, i.e. the concept of consciousness. I show when we look at these phenomena together, taking the evolutionary perspective of modern state-based behavioural and life-history theory used as the teleonomic tool to Darwinize the agent- and subject-side of organisms, we will be in a better position to make sense of them both as natural phenomena.

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“…Examples of the promises of experimental philosophy of medicine can be found in four of the five contributions to the special issue [35][36][37][38]. These articles highlight the diversity of approaches (and their strengths) that can fare under the flag of experimental philosophy, some of which are empirical but not experimental in the strict sense.…”

Section: Imagining Experimental Philosophy Of Medicinementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Relatedly, we believe that before engaging in such a study, the relevance of the research question to existing philosophical debates or positions should be made very clear if the study's findings are to have an impact on the field. In this issue, the contribution by Walter Veit describes a way in which experimental methods can advance the debate between naturalists and normativists on the concepts of health and disease, a debate that has dominated the field of philosophy of medicine for decades [38]. Apart from investigating claims about medical concepts, experimental philosophy can also contribute to answering normative questions in medicine.…”

Section: Imagining Experimental Philosophy Of Medicinementioning

confidence: 99%