Article ID: CBB829234405

Science, politics and regulation: The trust-based approach to the demarcation problem (2021)

unapi

Drawing on literature on values in science and a case-study of UK cancer policy, this paper argues for a novel account of the demarcation project in terms of trustworthiness. The first part of the paper addresses the relationship between science, politics and demarcation. In 2010, the UK government decided to pay more for cancer drugs than for drugs for other diseases; in 2016, this Cancer Drugs Fund was reformed so as to lower the evidential standards for approving cancer drugs, rather than paying more for them. Are these two ways of treating cancer as “special” importantly different? This paper argues that, if we the argument from inductive risk seriously, they seem equivalent. This result provides further reason to doubt the notion of demarcating science from non-science. However, the second part of the paper complicates this story, arguing that considerations of epistemic trust might give us reasons to prefer epistemic communities centred around “broadly acceptable” standards, and which are “sociologically well-ordered”, regardless of inductive risk concerns. After developing these claims through the cancer case-study, the final section suggests how these concerns might motivate novel versions of the demarcation project.

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https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB829234405/

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Authors & Contributors
Hess, Volker
Vrangbæk, Karsten
Mount, Jeanine K.
Larsen, Jakob Bjerg
Kruse, Poul R.
Gaudillière, Jean-Paul
Concepts
Medicine and government
Legislative and administrative regulations
Pharmacy
Public policy
Pharmaceutical industry
Materia medica
Time Periods
20th century, late
19th century
20th century
21st century
20th century, early
Places
United States
United Kingdom
Germany
Great Britain
Denmark
Hong Kong
Institutions
United States. Food and Drug Administration (USFDA)
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