On the History of Disease-Concepts: The Case of Pleurisy

Wilson, Adrian

doi:10.1177/007327530003800302

Cited by 36 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 10 publications

(5 reference statements)

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“…As I already stated in the Section Epistemic challenges of retrospective diagnosis, I fully agree with Wilson [19], Cunningham [20], and Arrizabalaga [43] for that matter, that medical diagnoses are fundamentally a social construction, and a disease or a disease concept does not exist independently from the act of diagnosing in a particular historical time and place. In this sense, I respectfully disagree with Mitchell [44], who contrasts between historical diagnosis as “social diagnosis” on one hand, and contemporary diagnosis as “biological diagnosis” on the other.…”

Section: The Relevance To the Ongoing Debate Among Historians And Palsupporting

confidence: 62%

“…Diagnostic categories are a man-made construction, and not the product of nature itself or “biological entities” as Leven asserts (See Wilson [19]). As Cunningham [20] states, a disease or a disease concept does not exist independent from the act of diagnosing.…”

Section: Epistemic Challenges Of Retrospective Diagnosismentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This debate is commonly called among those historians as the “Cunningham debate” [15,20]. On one hand, there are historians who deny the possibility of retrospective diagnosis altogether, such as Wilson [19] and Cunningham [20], because medical diagnosis is essentially a social construction of the time and place in history, which cannot be transferred to a different historical time. On the other hand, there are those who accept the thesis that historical diagnoses are a social construction [43] or “social diagnosis” [44], but do not deny the possibility of retrospective diagnosis altogether, insofar as the investigators take necessary steps to avoid anachronistic pitfalls when interpreting historical sources.…”

Section: The Relevance To the Ongoing Debate Among Historians And Palmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Retrospective diagnosis of a famous historical figure: ontological, epistemic, and ethical considerations

Muramoto

2014

Philos Ethics Humanit Med

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The aim of this essay is to elaborate philosophical and ethical underpinnings of posthumous diagnosis of famous historical figures based on literary and artistic products, or commonly called retrospective diagnosis. It discusses ontological and epistemic challenges raised in the humanities and social sciences, and attempts to systematically reply to their criticisms from the viewpoint of clinical medicine, philosophy of medicine, particularly the ontology of disease and the epistemology of diagnosis, and medical ethics. The ontological challenge focuses on the doubt about the persistence of a disease over historical time, whereas the epistemic challenge disputes the inaccessibility of scientific verification of a diagnosis in the past. I argue that the critics are in error in conflating the taxonomy of disease (nosology) and the act of diagnosing a patient. Medical diagnosis is fundamentally a hypothesis-construction and an explanatory device that can be generated under various degrees of uncertainty and limited amount of information. It is not an apodictic judgment (true or false) as the critics presuppose, but a probabilistic (Bayesian) judgment with varying degrees of plausibility under uncertainty. In order to avoid this confusion, I propose that retrospective diagnosis of a historical figure be syndromic without identifying underlying disease, unless there is justifiable reason for such specification. Moreover it should be evaluated not only from the viewpoint of medical science but also in a larger context of the scholarship of the humanities and social sciences by its overall plausibility and consistency. On the other hand, I will endorse their concerns regarding the ethics and professionalism of retrospective diagnosis, and call for the need for situating such a diagnosis in an interdisciplinary scope and the context of the scholarship of the historical figure. I will then enumerate several important caveats for interdisciplinary retrospective diagnosis using an example of the retrospective diagnosis of Socrates for his life-long intermittent neurologic symptoms. Finally, I will situate the present argument in a larger context of the major debate among the historians of medicine and paleopathologists, and discuss the similarities and differences.

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Section: The Relevance To the Ongoing Debate Among Historians And Palsupporting

confidence: 62%

Section: Epistemic Challenges Of Retrospective Diagnosismentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: The Relevance To the Ongoing Debate Among Historians And Palmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Retrospective diagnosis of a famous historical figure: ontological, epistemic, and ethical considerations

Muramoto

2014

Philos Ethics Humanit Med

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“…82 Thus diseases are denied any meaningful history, as they are deemed essentially unchanging and always equivalent to the current concept or idea. Hacking is ambivalent about such 'retroactive' processes.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Concepts, Diagnosis and the History of Medicine: Historicising Ian Hacking and Munchausen Syndrome

Millard¹

2016

Soc Hist Med

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Summary. Concepts used by historians are as historical as the diagnoses or categories that are studied. The example of Munchausen syndrome (deceptive presentation of illness in order to adopt the 'sick role') is used to explore this. Like most psychiatric diagnoses, Munchausen syndrome is not thought applicable across time by social historians of medicine. It is historically specific, drawing upon twentieth-century anthropology and sociology to explain motivation through desire for the 'sick role'. Ian Hacking's concepts of 'making up people' and 'looping effects' are regularly utilised outside of the context in which they are formed. However, this context is precisely the same anthropological and sociological insight used to explain Munchausen syndrome. It remains correct to resist the projection of Munchausen syndrome into the past. However, it seems inconsistent to use Hacking's concepts to describe identity formation before the twentieth century as they are given meaning by an identical context.

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“…Ο υπεζωκότας ως διακριτή ανατομική οντότητα ήταν άγνωστος για πολλούς αιώνες 10,11 . Πρωτοαναφέρθηκε στην επιστήμη από τον Αριστοτέλη (384-322 π.Χ.)…”

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Προγνωστικός ρόλος της C-reactive protein στις μη-πυώδεις παραπνευμονικές συλλογές

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On the History of Disease-Concepts: The Case of Pleurisy

Cited by 36 publications

References 10 publications

Retrospective diagnosis of a famous historical figure: ontological, epistemic, and ethical considerations

Retrospective diagnosis of a famous historical figure: ontological, epistemic, and ethical considerations

Concepts, Diagnosis and the History of Medicine: Historicising Ian Hacking and Munchausen Syndrome

Προγνωστικός ρόλος της C-reactive protein στις μη-πυώδεις παραπνευμονικές συλλογές

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