Talk:Demarcation problem

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 16 January 2019 and 24 April 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Alshalash1.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 19:15, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

"despite a broad agreement on the basics of the scientific method."

The opening of the article states "The debate continues after over two millennia of dialogue among philosophers of science and scientists in various fields, despite a broad agreement on the basics of the scientific method". This opening line struck me immediately as odd and so went and looked at the source which does not seem to back up this text.

The first source "Scientific Method in Practice. pp. 3–7" (which can be viewed here) in fact directly contradicts this saying: "The mere idea that there exists such things as general principles of scientific method is controversial". It then goes on to say "Many scientists have claimed there is no such thing as a scientific method" which likewise seems to contradict the idea that there is "broad agreement on the basics of the scientific method".

The only thing that could possibly be construed to support the idea of broad agreement is on page 5 where it mentions that the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) believes "Scientists share basic beliefs and attitudes about what they do and how they view their work". This could not possibly be used as a justification for the above line given that (1) this is not an authoritative source because A) it is merely a group of scientists with an opinion and B) it is not their area of expertise, as the demarcation problem is a philosophical problem, not a scientific one (2) It is a self-published opinion and (3) contradicts the opinion of the Cambridge-published author above.

The second source I could not seem to locate online unfortunately so it cannot be assessed. However the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (a peer-reviewed publication, in contrast to the AAAS) paints a contrasting picture, "it is emphasized that there is much more agreement on particular cases of demarcation than on the general criteria that such judgments should be based upon."

The "broad agreement on the basics of the scientific method" line therefore does not seem to have any basis in the truly reliable sources and should be amended as such.80.111.17.229 (talk) 15:06, 23 December 2020 (UTC)

diagnosing pseudoscience by getting rid of the demarcation problem

haven't read yet. Maybe will check later if it looks useful. 67.160.203.180 (talk) 05:27, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

Scientism

The distinction between science and scientism is also a kind of demarcation problem, especially as understood by the language of this article's opening. Over the coming months and years we should try to elaborate on this in this article (I'm now motivated to go over cited reliable sources for such info). For now I'm just going to add a link to the Scientism Wiki article into this article's 'See also' section. Tfdavisatsnetnet (talk)

missing history on scientific revolution as it applies to the character of science

This page includes content about ancient science like Aristotle, and contemporary philosophers commenting on the concept of science, and this is all well and good, but I think a competent treatment of this topic would include some coverage of the scientific revolution, which was pretty significant to the nature of science. Dingolover6969 (talk) 18:08, 22 June 2026 (UTC)

#The_demarcation_problem's_history_and_critics above notes that the Laudan, Larry (1983), "The Demise of the Demarcation Problem" source contains info about "Going on to the seventeenth century, he sees Galileo, Huygens, and Newton as continuing to insist on the certainty criterion, but pretty much giving up the insistence on first causes. That insistence on certainty was almost universal until the nineteenth century." Dingolover6969 (talk) 18:26, 22 June 2026 (UTC)