Professor Stephen John

I have research and teaching interests in a variety of topics at the intersection of philosophy of science, applied ethics, social epistemology, and political philosophy.

My main research to date has clustered around a series of concepts which raise both ethical and epistemological problems in public health policy and climate science: chance, certainty, categorisation and causation. 

My current research centres around two interlocking topics. First, I am interested in how recent work on "value-laden science" might affect familiar normative questions about the proper relationship between experts, publics and policymakers. Second, I am engaged in a comparative study of the ethical and epistemological challenges in two key areas of public health policy, vaccination and cancer screening. 

I am also affiliated with Cambridge University's Public Health Strategic Research Network, and with the Early Detection Programme at the Cambridge Cancer Centre, and serve on the National Statistician's Data Ethics Committee for the Office of National Statistics.

For more details, please see my webpage at PhilPapers or my Google Scholar page.

Selected publications

Weber's Elephant: Rethinking Science Advice The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science: 2025

Against Alignment: the value of non-democratic science European Journal for Philosophy of Science, 2025

Framing, Filtering and Fixing: the Ethics of Risk Communication Ratio, 2025

The ethics of risk-stratified cancer screening (co-authored with Becky Dennison and Juliet Usher-Smith), European Journal of Cancer, 2023

Death Sentences Philosophy of Medicine, 2022

"First, do no harm"? Non-maleficence, population health and the ethics of risk (co-authored with Joseph Wu) Social Theory and Practice, 2022

Costa, Cancer and Coronavirus: a contractualist guide to the ethics of lockdown (co-authored with Emma Curran) Journal of Medical Ethics 2022

Objectivity in Science, Cambridge University Press (2021)

Science, politics and regulation: The trust-based approach to the demarcation problem Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A, 2021

'Science, Truth and Dictatorship: wishful thinking or wishful speaking?', Studies in History and Philosophy of Science (2019)

'Scientific Deceit', Synthese (2019)

'Epistemic trust and the ethics of science communication: against transparency, openness, sincerity and honesty', Social Epistemology 2018

'Should we punish responsible drinkers? Prevention, paternalism and categorisation in public health policy', Public Health Ethics 2018

'The social epistemology of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change', Journal of Applied Philosophy 2017

'Inductive risk and the contexts of communication', Synthese 2015

'The Example of the IPCC Does Not Vindicate the Value-Free Ideal: A Reply to Gregor Betz', European Journal for Philosophy of Science 2015

'Efficiency, Responsibility and Disability: Philosophical Lessons from the Savings Argument for Pre-Natal Diagnosis', Politics, Philosophy and Economics 2015

'Risk, Contractualism and Rose's "Prevention Paradox"', Social Theory and Practice 2014

'Patient Preference Predictors, Apt Categorisation and Respect for Autonomy', Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 39 (2014): 169–177

'Cancer Screening, Risk Stratification and the Ethics of Apt Categorisation: A Case Study', Ethics in Public Health and Health Policy, edited by Daniel Strech, Irene Hirschberg and Georg Marckmann (Dordrecht: Springer, 2013): 141–152

'Why the Prevention Paradox is a Paradox, and Why We Should Solve It: A Philosophical View', Preventive Medicine 2011

'Expert Testimony and Epistemological Free-Riding: The MMR Controversy', The Philosophical Quarterly 2011

'Security, Knowledge and Well-Being', Journal of Moral Philosophy 2011

'In Defence of Bad Science and Irrational Policies: An Alternative Account of the Precautionary Principle', Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 2010

'Why "Health" is Not a Central Category for Public Health Policy', Journal of Applied Philosophy 26 (2009): 129–143