ABSTRACT
This chapter explores three of the most common ways philosophers have attempted to understand probabilistic claims. It examines three attempts to understanding probabilistic claims: frequency distribution, subjective probability, and propensity interpretation. The chapter discusses their philosophical foundations and the problems that confront them, especially in relation to how they should inform our decision-making. It also examines the problems with these three accounts are indicative of the fundamental challenges to their respective approaches. Like many empirical sciences, medicine converses in the language of probability. In 1995, the United Kingdom’s Committee on Safety of Medicines warned that the use of third-generation birth-control pills that contain gestodene or desogestrel have a risk for venous thromboembolism that is twice as high as that of earlier generations. To be sure, one of the reasons why needless screenings and tests are carried out stems from the culture of defensive medicine.
