On Dr. Dunnigan's commentary linking chrysotile asbestos with mesothelioma

Our plain-English summary of On Dr. Dunnigan's commentary linking chrysotile asbestos with mesothelioma, by M.R. Becklake (American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 1988).

The study

• Author: M.R. Becklake
• Journal: American Journal of Industrial Medicine
• Published: 1988;14(2):239-40
• Type of article: Letter
• Cited by: 5 articles, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher
• In J-M's library: Johns-Manville's company medical library held a copy (J-M no. 000188).

Summary of the article

In this letter to the editor, the author responded to the debate raised by Dr. J. Dunnigan's 1988 commentary in the same journal on linking chrysotile asbestos with mesothelioma. The letter presented no new data. The author argued that the debate illustrated the problem of translating scientific evidence, with its fragility and uncertainty, into legal decisions that do not reflect this uncertainty. She stated that science proceeds not by proof but by refutation and suggestion of hypotheses. She added that medical diagnosis, particularly judgments about causality, follows the same steps, using epidemiologic studies of communities to formulate probabilities about the individual case. A pronouncement on an individual case was therefore described as a hypothesis, the best available to explain the facts. The author noted that court records seldom reflect this uncertainty, that expert witnesses who try to convey it are ill received, and that the tentative nature of answers is lost in the record. She held that this degrades science in the public mind, especially when environmental issues and diseases with long incubation periods, such as cancer, are debated in courts before the evidence for causality is complete. She concluded that the public is capable of understanding the scientific approach and could be invited to encourage, enhance, and share its potential rather than mock its fragility.

PubMed has no abstract for this study, and the article doesn't print one. We wrote this summary from the full article with the help of AI. It is not the authors' wording.

In plain English

This was a letter to the editor responding to a 1988 commentary by J. Dunnigan titled "Linking chrysotile asbestos with mesothelioma." It reported no new research or data, and it did not discuss the evidence on chrysotile or mesothelioma itself. Instead, the author wrote about how scientific evidence is used in court. The author argued that science proceeds not by proof but by refuting hypotheses and suggesting new ones. The author also argued that a medical judgment about the cause of one person's disease is a hypothesis, "the best to explain the facts about the case, no more, no less." The author wrote that court records seldom reflect this uncertainty and that the tentative nature of experts' answers is lost in the record. In the author's view, failing to reflect this uncertainty does a serious disservice to science in the public mind, and the public is capable of understanding the imprecision of scientific language. The author closed by asking whether the public could be invited to encourage and share the potential of science rather than mock its fragility.

We wrote this plain-English summary from the full article with the help of AI, and a second AI model checked each sentence against the article. It is not the authors' wording; the abstract and the article are their own account.

What the study did and found

• Design: Letter to the editor (opinion piece responding to another author's commentary; no study was conducted)
• Exposure: Not studied. The letter responds to a commentary about chrysotile asbestos and mesothelioma, but it does not discuss fiber types or exposure evidence.
• Main results:
  • Argument, not a study finding: science proceeds by refuting hypotheses and suggesting new ones, not by proof.
  • Argument, not a study finding: a pronouncement on the cause in an individual case is a hypothesis, the best available explanation of the facts.
  • Argument, not a study finding: court records seldom reflect scientific uncertainty, and the tentative nature of an expert's answer is lost in the record.
  • Argument, not a study finding: failing to reflect this uncertainty in court does a serious disservice to science.
  • Opinion, not a study finding: the author considered the public capable of understanding the scientific process and the imprecision of scientific language.
• The authors' conclusion: The author asked whether the public, instead of mocking the fragility of scientific evidence, could be invited to encourage, enhance and share the potential of the scientific approach.

Topics

The National Library of Medicine indexes this study under subjects our site covers: Asbestosis, Chrysotile, Mesothelioma.

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: Chrysotile, Mesothelioma, Expert Witness.

Related studies

• Response to Dr. Dunnigan's commentary. The role of chrysotile in the pathogenesis of mesothelioma — J.M. Craighead (1988)
• Reply to Dr. Dunnigan. Chrysotile as a mesothelial carcinogen in man — A. Churg (1988)
• Linking chrysotile asbestos with mesothelioma — J. Dunnigan (1988)
• Linking chrysotile asbestos with mesothelioma — G.K. Sluis-Cremer (1988)
• Commentary: the 1968 BOHS Chrysotile Asbestos Standard — T.L. Ogden, British Occupational Hygiene Society (2003)
• Obfuscation: a reply to Dr. Dunnigan — D.E. Lilienfeld (1988)

Browse more research in American Journal of Industrial Medicine, or return to medical research.