On the classification of damaging factors in forensic medicine

Abstract

The article considers the disadvantages of modern forensic classifications of damaging factors. Attention is drawn to the fact that the mental damaging factor undoubtedly exists, but the assessment of its specific role in the formation of “damage” is the subject of forensic psychiatry, which is an independent medical discipline. The social factor mainly affects the behavior of an individual (population group), but its specific features are also not evaluated by methods and techniques of forensic medicine. There is a discrepancy between general and particular classifications — in particular, the forensic classification of explosions includes chemical, physical and nuclear explosions, with the latter's place in the composition of physical explosions. There is a violation of the continuity of classification — a typical error is a violation of hierarchy (the location in the same row of bacterial, viral, and antigenic or toxin damaging actions). It is concluded that due to the variability of the properties of damaging factors, we should not be talking about the classification of damaging factors (material bodies or phenomena), but about the classification of damaging properties of material bodies and phenomena.