astronomy

Jeremy Howick

Jeremy Howick is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Jeremy Howick rather than just read about it. In short: Jeremy Howick () is a Canadian-born, British clinical epidemiologist and philosopher of science. He is a professor and director of University of Leicester's Stoneygate Centre for Empathic Healthcare.

Key takeaways

Jeremy Howick belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Jeremy Howick to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Jeremy Howick from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Jeremy Howick () is a Canadian-born, British clinical epidemiologist and philosopher of science. He is a professor and director of University of Leicester's Stoneygate Centre for Empathic Healthcare. He researches evidence-based medicine, clinical empathy and the philosophy of medicine, including the use of placebos in clinical practice and clinical trials. In 2016, he received the Dawkins & Strutt grant from the British Medical Association to study pain treatment. He is a member of the Sigma Xi research honours society.

Early life and education Howick, a native of Montreal, Canada, is a graduate of Westmount High School. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Engineering from the Dartmouth College, and graduate degrees from The London School of Economics and the University of Oxford. His PhD in Philosophy of medicine at the London School of Economics was conducted under the supervision of Nancy Cartwright and John Worrall, with a thesis entitled Philosophical essentials in evidence-based medicine: Evaluating the epistemological role of double blinding and placebo controls, published in 2008. He is the Director of the Oxford Empathy Programme at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Oxford. As a freshman at Dartmouth College, Howick learned to row. He subsequently competed in internationals for Canada at the 1994 World Championships, and won a silver medal at the 1994 Commonwealth Games. He also competed in The Boat Race 1996 representing Oxford.

Career Howick has worked at the University of Oxford, including at the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine since 2007. Together with Muir Gray, he founded the Oxford Empathy Programme, and the Oxford Philosophy and Medicine Network. His main post is at the University of Leicester where he is the director of the Stoneygate Centre for Excellence in Empathic Healthcare. Howick designed a trial of placebo treatments for back pain for a BBC Horizon documentary. Howick's research combines Philosophy of medicine with medical research (especially Evidence-based medicine. Howick's book, The Philosophy of Evidence-Based Medicine is a critical defense of the Evidence-based medicine Hierarchy of evidence.

References

Further reading Gavin Francis, "What Do You Expect?" (review of Kathryn T. Hall, Placebos, MIT Press, 2022; 201 pp; and Jeremy Howick, The Power of Placebos: How the Science of Placebos and Nocebose Can Improve Health Care, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2023; 304 pp.), The New York Review of Books, vol. LXXII, no. 11 (26 June 2025), pp. 30–32. "[O]ur culture has become so medicalized and reductionistic that warm and empathetic care, with its immense proven benefits for the way that a patient feels and heals, has been deprioritized to an optional extra rather than a core element of medicine. A rebalancing is in order: doctors need more time with their patients and, yes, more use of honest placebos – because they work." (p. 32.)

External links Official website Find an Expert: Dr Jeremy Howick Jeremy Howick publications indexed by Google Scholar

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Jeremy Howick

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Jeremy Howick claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Jeremy Howick before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Jeremy Howick ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Jeremy Howick

In research: Jeremy Howick appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Jeremy Howick in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Jeremy Howick is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 21st-century British philosophers, Academics of the University of Leicester, Academics of the University of Oxford, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Jeremy Howick outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Jeremy Howick in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Jeremy Howick means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Jeremy Howick out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Jeremy Howick in simple terms?

Jeremy Howick () is a Canadian-born, British clinical epidemiologist and philosopher of science. He is a professor and director of University of Leicester's Stoneygate Centre for Empathic Healthcare.

Why does Jeremy Howick matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Jeremy Howick?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Jeremy Howick.