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Crystal Leonard's picture

My opinions on scientific neutrality

I believe that it is unreasonable to expect complete neutrality from anyone, including physicians and scientists. The way our brains perceive anything is completely affected by assumptions we make about the world, which are based on the experiences of our past and on our culture. While it is noble to strive for neutrality, it is an impossible goal. In my opinion, society should accept this idea and find ways to work within this mindset. In the context of physician-patient interactions, I believe that physicians should determine which beliefs and opinions have been approved by whatever licensing body they belong to. The physician should then present as many of those beliefs and opinions as possible to the patient in a straightforward manner. In turn, the patient must realize that the views presented by the physician are not the only ones out there and that the physician is biased by their own opinions. It is the responsibility of the patient to decide, based on their own biases, whether they will accept the opinions presented by the physician. This argument also applies to science. The way that a scientist interprets their data will be affected by their own subconscious beliefs. It is not uncommon for two scientists to interpret the same data in completely different, but plausible, ways. So which one is correct? Generally the individual who's interpretation is supported by the experiments of other people is deemed to be "correct". However, the interpretation of data from the follow-up experiments is also subconsciously biased. Since there is no way to prove truth, anything that a scientist states as "fact" must be understood to be a belief that is accepted by the majority of scientists in that field based on their own values and biases. No matter how hard we, as scientists, try to objectively investigate the world around us, there will always be a subtle subjectivity.

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