Where Does It Hurt? Learning From the Parallels Between Medicine and Cognitive Translation & Interpreting Studies

In this chapter, we contend that cognitive translation and interpreting studies (CTIS) is an applied science because it employs the scientific method to study a socially defined object. We further argue that applied sciences share some traits, not only in their ways and goals, but also in their structure and the ways they evolve. We will thus compare CTIS in some respects to another applied science that we are all acquainted with, namely, medicine. We will draw parallels between these two fields with respect to their quest for legitimacy as both (applied) sciences and disciplines. We will also reflect on the epistemic nature of their respective bodies of knowledge, and we will discuss their takes on epistemic issues resulting from borrowing from other disciplines, dealing with fuzzy concepts, and addressing opposed theories and constructs that aim to explain the very same phenomena. We close by endorsing the need for epistemic pluralism in CTIS that, in turn, we warn, excludes epistemic approaches based on relativism.