期刊
JOURNAL OF MEDICINE AND PHILOSOPHY
卷 42, 期 4, 页码 405-423出版社
OXFORD UNIV PRESS INC
DOI: 10.1093/jmp/jhx010
关键词
definition; disease; dysfunction; threshold problem; vagueness
资金
- Australian Research Council [FT130100346]
- Australian Research Council [FT130100346] Funding Source: Australian Research Council
Biological dysfunction is regarded, in many accounts, as necessary and perhaps sufficient for disease. But although disease is conceptualized as all-or-nothing, biological functions often differ by degree. A tension is created by attempting to use a continuous variable as the basis for a categorical definition, raising questions about how we are to pinpoint the boundary between health and disease. This is the line-drawing problem. In this paper, we show how the line-drawing problem arises within dysfunction-requiring accounts of disease, such as those of Christopher Boorse and Jerome Wakefield. We then provide several detailed examples to establish that biological dysfunction cannot provide a boundary. We examine potential ways of resolving the line-drawing problem, either by dropping one of the claims that generates it, or by appealing to additional criteria. We argue that two of these options are plausible, and that each of these can be applied with regard to different diseases.
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