THE FORENSIC MEDICINE AND THE FORENSIC PATHOLOGIST VIEWED THROUGH THE PRISM OF PHILOSOPHY

Abstract

Forensic medicine, by its special relationship with death,
suffering and violence is an area of medicine which can
generate recurring philosophical questions that are not
only limited to the field of medical ethics, in which it is
usually compartmentalized. Each of the main concepts of
forensic medicine feeds its own philosophical thought, as
we consider this discipline as medicine to the service of
justice, medicine of violence or medicine of dead people.
The forensic physician, meanwhile, is a physician aside,
both in search of knowledge, recognition and meaning.
The place of philosophical questioning by the forensic
physician deserves to be further developed, the search for
meaning needs to prevail over the other quests, especially
in critical historical situations. This search for meaning
can feed philosophies that help the forensic physician to
be animated by a spirit of both justice and truth without
which his work would lose its essential value. They can also be of a great help for him to develop a rigorous
professional ethics in which he may be forced to submit
his action to objective hierarchies of values and remain
independent of his momentary subjective interests. It
would be suitable to prefer philosophies accepting the
riddles of existence and refusing systems, a systematized
world leading to a dehumanized world.