Vere, J. and Gibson, B.J. orcid.org/0000-0003-1413-4950 (2019) Evidence based medicine as science. Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice, 25 (6). pp. 997-1002. ISSN 1356-1294
Abstract
Evidence based medicine has claimed to be science on a number of occasions but it is not clear that this status is deserved. Within philosophy of science four main theories about the nature of science are historically recognised: inductivism, falsificationism, Kuhnian paradigms and research programmes. If evidence based medicine is science knowledge claims should be derived using a process that corresponds to one of these theories. This paper analyses whether this is the case. In the first section, different theories about the nature of science are introduced. In the second section, the claim that evidence based medicine is science is reinterpreted as the claim that knowledge claims derived from randomised controlled trails and meta-analyses are science. In the third section the knowledge claims valued within evidence based medicine are considered from the perspective of inductivism, falsificationism, Kuhnian paradigms and research programmes. In the final section possible counter arguments are considered. It is argued that the knowledge claims valued by evidence based medicine are not justified using inductivism, falsificationism, Kuhnian paradigms or research programmes. If these are the main criteria for evaluating if something is science or not, evidence based medicine does not meet these criteria.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. This is an author produced version of a paper subsequently published in Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. |
Keywords: | Evidence based medicine; Kuhnian paradigm; research programme; inductivism; falsificationism; epistemology |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health (Sheffield) > School of Clinical Dentistry (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 03 Dec 2018 11:19 |
Last Modified: | 02 Nov 2021 12:09 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Wiley |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1111/jep.13090 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:139019 |