Once upon a paradigm an inquiry into the state of medical knowledge

Abstract

Scientific knowledge does not grow by slow evolution, but by revolutionary transformation of its major paradigms. This paper describes the development of modern medical knowledge, with its emphasis on experimental science and technology, together with the limitations of its understanding. These limitations are grouped into five major anomalies (ecological, technological, economic, pastoral) which are significant enough to create a crisis in modern medical knowledge. The latter is unable to accommodate these and must undergo radical change of its major paradigms to develop into a new fundamental interpretation.