Case Report: What—or who—killed Frank Ramsey? Some reflections on cause of death and the nature of medical reasoning [version 2; peer review: 4 approved]
Philosopher Frank Ramsey died in 1930 aged only 26. There has been much speculation about the nature of his final illness and the sequence of events which led to his death. To prepare this case report, we traced Ramsey’s medical records and combined them with an extensive and unique dataset of conte...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Wellcome
2023-11-01
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| Series: | Wellcome Open Research |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://wellcomeopenresearch.org/articles/7-158/v2 |
| _version_ | 1827700012474171392 |
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| author | C David Naylor Cheryl Misak Graham Foster Mark Tonelli Trisha Greenhalgh |
| author_facet | C David Naylor Cheryl Misak Graham Foster Mark Tonelli Trisha Greenhalgh |
| author_sort | C David Naylor |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Philosopher Frank Ramsey died in 1930 aged only 26. There has been much speculation about the nature of his final illness and the sequence of events which led to his death. To prepare this case report, we traced Ramsey’s medical records and combined them with an extensive and unique dataset of contemporaneous sources. We use these to evaluate three possible explanations for Ramsey’s illness and its unexpectedly fatal trajectory—infectious (Weil’s disease), autoimmune (primary sclerosing cholangitis) and obstructive (gallstones). We explore how uncertainty surrounding each of these possibilities might have influenced Ramsey’s doctors’ thoughts and actions, including their ill-fated decision to perform the emergency operation that appears to have precipitated his final decline. We then reflect on the unfinished opus on which Ramsey was working when he died—on the nature of truth and how humans reason under conditions of uncertainty. We end with some thoughts linking Ramsey’s death to his philosophy. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-10T14:02:27Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-de316561d9224adab1977b0f8bce3a9d |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2398-502X |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-10T14:02:27Z |
| publishDate | 2023-11-01 |
| publisher | Wellcome |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Wellcome Open Research |
| spelling | doaj.art-de316561d9224adab1977b0f8bce3a9d2023-11-21T01:00:01ZengWellcomeWellcome Open Research2398-502X2023-11-01722085Case Report: What—or who—killed Frank Ramsey? Some reflections on cause of death and the nature of medical reasoning [version 2; peer review: 4 approved]C David Naylor0Cheryl Misak1Graham Foster2Mark Tonelli3Trisha Greenhalgh4https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2369-8088University of Toronto, Toronto, CanadaUniversity of Toronto, Toronto, CanadaQueen Mary, University of London, London, UKUniversity of Washington, Seattle, Seattle, USAUniversity of Oxford, Oxford, UKPhilosopher Frank Ramsey died in 1930 aged only 26. There has been much speculation about the nature of his final illness and the sequence of events which led to his death. To prepare this case report, we traced Ramsey’s medical records and combined them with an extensive and unique dataset of contemporaneous sources. We use these to evaluate three possible explanations for Ramsey’s illness and its unexpectedly fatal trajectory—infectious (Weil’s disease), autoimmune (primary sclerosing cholangitis) and obstructive (gallstones). We explore how uncertainty surrounding each of these possibilities might have influenced Ramsey’s doctors’ thoughts and actions, including their ill-fated decision to perform the emergency operation that appears to have precipitated his final decline. We then reflect on the unfinished opus on which Ramsey was working when he died—on the nature of truth and how humans reason under conditions of uncertainty. We end with some thoughts linking Ramsey’s death to his philosophy.https://wellcomeopenresearch.org/articles/7-158/v2Weil's disease gallstones primary sclerosing cholangitis uncertainty Frank Ramseyeng |
| spellingShingle | C David Naylor Cheryl Misak Graham Foster Mark Tonelli Trisha Greenhalgh Case Report: What—or who—killed Frank Ramsey? Some reflections on cause of death and the nature of medical reasoning [version 2; peer review: 4 approved] Wellcome Open Research Weil's disease gallstones primary sclerosing cholangitis uncertainty Frank Ramsey eng |
| title | Case Report: What—or who—killed Frank Ramsey? Some reflections on cause of death and the nature of medical reasoning [version 2; peer review: 4 approved] |
| title_full | Case Report: What—or who—killed Frank Ramsey? Some reflections on cause of death and the nature of medical reasoning [version 2; peer review: 4 approved] |
| title_fullStr | Case Report: What—or who—killed Frank Ramsey? Some reflections on cause of death and the nature of medical reasoning [version 2; peer review: 4 approved] |
| title_full_unstemmed | Case Report: What—or who—killed Frank Ramsey? Some reflections on cause of death and the nature of medical reasoning [version 2; peer review: 4 approved] |
| title_short | Case Report: What—or who—killed Frank Ramsey? Some reflections on cause of death and the nature of medical reasoning [version 2; peer review: 4 approved] |
| title_sort | case report what or who killed frank ramsey some reflections on cause of death and the nature of medical reasoning version 2 peer review 4 approved |
| topic | Weil's disease gallstones primary sclerosing cholangitis uncertainty Frank Ramsey eng |
| url | https://wellcomeopenresearch.org/articles/7-158/v2 |
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