In the introduction to a talk I gave at the Mises Institute this year, I noted how, in the early part of the twentieth century, a convergence of interests between social progressivists and ideological empiricists led to the publication of the Flexner report and the subsequent enactment of licensing laws.
That historical context is further treated in an outstanding article by Alfred Tauber, who was professor of medicine and philosophy at Boston University School of Medicine.
In “The two faces of medical education: Flexner and Osler revisited,” Tauber contrasts the radically different views these two men held about the ethos of medicine and the proper approach to medical education. It is ironic that the victorious position would be the one pushed by Flexner who, as Murray Rothbard put it, was “an unemployed former owner of a prep school in Kentucky…sporting neither a medical degree nor any other advanced degree.”Continue reading “Flexner versus Osler”