During the first half of the twentieth century, the mining industry in Britain was subject to recurrent disputes about the risk to miners' lungs from coal dust, moderated by governmental, industrial, medical and mining bodies. In this environment, precise measurements offered a way to present uncontested objective knowledge. By accessing primary source material from the National Archives, the South Wales Miners Library and the University of Bristol's Special Collections, I demonstrate the importance that the British Medical Research Council (MRC) attached to standardized instrumental measures as proof of objectivity, and explore the conflict between objective and subjective measures of health. Examination of the MRC's use of spirometry in their investigation of pneumoconiosis (miner's lung) from 1936 to 1945 will shed light on this conflict and illuminate the politics inherent in attempts to quantify disability and categorize standards of health.

中文翻译：

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“X 射线不会说谎”：医学研究委员会和呼吸障碍的测量，1936-1945

在 20 世纪上半叶，英国的采矿业经常受到关于煤尘对矿工肺部风险的争议，政府、工业、医疗和采矿机构对此进行了调解。在这种环境下，精确的测量提供了一种呈现无可争议的客观知识的方法。通过访问来自国家档案馆、南威尔士矿工图书馆和布里斯托大学特别馆藏的原始资料，我展示了英国医学研究委员会 (MRC) 重视标准化仪器测量作为客观性证明的重要性，并探讨了冲突客观和主观的健康指标之间。审查 MRC 在尘肺病（矿工）调查中使用肺活量测定法