Health and disease are vital principals in bioethics with far-reaching social and political implications. Concepts of health and disease are also connected in fascinating ways with issues about function and explanation in philosophy of the biomedical sciences, and theories of well-being in ethics. A focal problem in the philosophy of medicine and a concern in bioethics is interpreting the concepts health and disease. In the process of defining health and disease, three main philosophical models emerge. Naturalism, Normativism and Hybridism. In this essay I shall critically evaluate both Naturalism and Normativism and in conclusion state which approach is the better approach.
Naturalism, which is the most prominent philosophical model, aims to highlight what is biologically natural and normal for human beings. The definitions that naturalists create are based on scientific …show more content…
Psychological and physiological states are focus points in naturalism, i.e., whether a system is congruously and mundanely functioning. Normativists fixate on whether a psychological or physiological state is valued or disvalued. When discussing cases both approaches only tune into one aspect of health and disease, consequently neglecting everything that is not included in their definition of health and disease. The better approach in defining health and disease according to me is the naturalistic approach, because it fixates on the biological aspect of the human body. The naturalistic approach direct their studies toward the functioning of the human body and deviations from the mundane functioning. Whereas the normativism simply states that every undesirable state is a disease. Normativism fails, according to me, because what is undesirable for one person might be desirable for another and ergo no final conclusion on whether a state is diseased can be made because the terms desirable and undesirable has to first be accurately
Naturalism, which is the most prominent philosophical model, aims to highlight what is biologically natural and normal for human beings. The definitions that naturalists create are based on scientific …show more content…
Psychological and physiological states are focus points in naturalism, i.e., whether a system is congruously and mundanely functioning. Normativists fixate on whether a psychological or physiological state is valued or disvalued. When discussing cases both approaches only tune into one aspect of health and disease, consequently neglecting everything that is not included in their definition of health and disease. The better approach in defining health and disease according to me is the naturalistic approach, because it fixates on the biological aspect of the human body. The naturalistic approach direct their studies toward the functioning of the human body and deviations from the mundane functioning. Whereas the normativism simply states that every undesirable state is a disease. Normativism fails, according to me, because what is undesirable for one person might be desirable for another and ergo no final conclusion on whether a state is diseased can be made because the terms desirable and undesirable has to first be accurately