View source for Demarcation problem

{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2020}}
{{short description|Philosophical question of how to distinguish between science and non-science}}

In [[philosophy of science]] and [[epistemology]], the '''demarcation problem''' is the question of how to distinguish between [[science]] and [[non-science]].<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Resnik |first=David B. |author-link=David B. Resnik |year=2000 |title=A pragmatic approach to the demarcation problem |journal=Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A |volume=31 |issue=2 |pages=249–267 |doi=10.1016/S0039-3681(00)00004-2|bibcode=2000SHPSA..31..249R }}</ref> It also examines the boundaries between science, [[pseudoscience]] and other products of human activity, like [[art]] and [[literature]] and [[belief]]s.<ref name="Laudan1983">{{citation |last=Laudan |first=Larry |title=Physics, Philosophy and Psychoanalysis: Essays in Honor of Adolf Grünbaum |volume=76 |pages=111–127 |year=1983 |editor1-last=Cohen |editor1-first=R.S. |series=Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science |chapter=The Demise of the Demarcation Problem |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AEvprSJzv2MC&pg=PA111 |location=Dordrecht |publisher=D. Reidel |isbn=90-277-1533-5 |author-link=Larry Laudan |editor2-last=Laudan |editor2-first=L.}}. Alternative source: [https://philarchive.org/archive/LAUTDO-4]</ref><ref name="Lakatos1999">{{cite book |first1=I. |last1=Lakatos |first2=P. |last2=Feyerabend |first3=M. |last3=Motterlini |year=1999 |title=For and Against Method: Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method and the Lakatos-Feyerabend Correspondence |publisher=University of Chicago Press |isbn=9780226467740 |lccn=99013581 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=osMnuvLZvPoC&pg=PA20 |page=20 |quote=The demarcation problem may be formulated in the following terms: what distinguishes science from pseudoscience? This is an extreme way of putting it, since the more general problem, called the ''Generalized Demarcation Problem,'' is really the problem of the appraisal of scientific theories, and attempts to answer the question: when is one theory better than another?}}</ref> The debate continues after more than two millennia of dialogue among philosophers of science and [[Scientist|scientists]] in various fields.<ref>{{cite book |last=Gauch | first=Hugh G. Jr. |title=Scientific Method in Practice |year=2003 |pages=3–7 |isbn=978-0-521-81689-2 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |editor-last=Cover |editor-first=J. A. |editor2-last=Curd |editor2-first=Martin |year=1998 |title=Philosophy of Science: The Central Issues |pages=1–82 |publisher=W.W. Norton |isbn=978-0-393-97175-0 }}</ref> The debate has consequences for what can be termed "scientific" in topics such as [[education]] and [[public policy]].<ref name="PigliucciBoudry"/>{{rp|26,35}}

==The ancients==
An early attempt at demarcation can be seen in the efforts of Greek [[natural philosopher]]s and medical practitioners to distinguish their methods and their accounts of nature from the mythological or mystical accounts of their predecessors and contemporaries.<ref>{{Citation | last = Lloyd | first = G. E. R. | author-link = G. E. R. Lloyd | year = 1983 | title = Science, Folklore and Ideology: Studies in the Life Sciences in Ancient Greece | publisher = Cambridge University Press | place = Cambridge | pages = 79–80 | isbn = 0-521-27307-2 | quote = Faced with ... competition from a variety of more or less exploitative rival healers, the doctors responsible for many or most of the Hippocratic treatises unite, at least, in their desire to turn the practice of healing into a τἐχνη.&nbsp;... [N]ot only do they reject interference in most cases from priests and prophets, they also criticise many current practices and assumptions. }}</ref>

{{quote|Aristotle described at length what was involved in having scientific knowledge of something. To be scientific, he said, one must deal with causes, one must use logical demonstration, and one must identify the universals which 'inhere' in the particulars of sense. But above all, to have science one must have ''[[Apodicticity|apodictic certainty]]''. It is the last feature which, for Aristotle, most clearly distinguished the scientific way of knowing.<ref name="Laudan1983"/>|[[Larry Laudan]], "The Demise of the Demarcation Problem" (1983)}}

[[G. E. R. Lloyd]] noted that there was a sense in which the groups engaged in various forms of inquiry into nature attempt to "legitimate their own positions",<ref>{{Citation | last = Lloyd | first = G. E. R. | author-link = G. E. R. Lloyd | year = 1983 | title = Science, Folklore and Ideology: Studies in the Life Sciences in Ancient Greece | publisher = Cambridge University Press | place = Cambridge | page = 215 | isbn = 0-521-27307-2 }}</ref> laying "claim to a new kind of wisdom&nbsp;... that purported to yield superior enlightenment, even superior practical effectiveness".<ref>{{Citation | last = Lloyd | first = G.E.R. | author-link = G. E. R. Lloyd | date = 1986 | title = The Revolutions of Wisdom: Studies in the Claims and Practice of Ancient Greek Science | series = Sather Classical Lectures | volume = 52 | publisher = University of California Press | place = Berkeley and Los Angeles | pages = 117–118 | isbn = 0-520-06742-8 }}</ref> Medical [[Writer|writers]] of the [[Hippocratic Corpus#Epistemology and the scientific status of medicine|Hippocratic tradition]] maintained that their discussions were based on demonstration of logical necessity, a theme developed by [[Aristotle]] in his ''[[Posterior Analytics]]''.<ref>{{Citation | last = Lloyd | first = G.E.R. | author-link = G. E. R. Lloyd | date = 1986 | title = The Revolutions of Wisdom: Studies in the Claims and Practice of Ancient Greek Science | series = Sather Classical Lectures | volume = 52 | publisher = University of California Press | place = Berkeley and Los Angeles | pages = 141–147 | isbn = 0-520-06742-8 }}</ref> One element of this polemic for [[science]] was an insistence on a clear and unequivocal presentation of arguments, rejecting the imagery, analogy, and myth of the old wisdom.<ref>{{Citation | last = Lloyd | first = G.E.R. | author-link = G. E. R. Lloyd | date = 1986 | title = The Revolutions of Wisdom: Studies in the Claims and Practice of Ancient Greek Science | series = Sather Classical Lectures | volume = 52 | publisher = University of California Press | place = Berkeley and Los Angeles | pages = 213–214 | isbn = 0-520-06742-8 }}</ref> Some of their claimed naturalistic explanations of phenomena have been found to be quite fanciful, with little reliance on actual observations.<ref>{{Citation | last = Lloyd | first = G.E.R. | author-link = G. E. R. Lloyd | date = 1979 | title = Magic Reason and Experience: Studies in the Origin and Development of Greek Science | publisher = Cambridge University Press | place = Cambridge | pages = [https://archive.org/details/magicreasonexper0000lloy/page/15 15–27] | isbn = 0-521-29641-2 | url = https://archive.org/details/magicreasonexper0000lloy/page/15 }}</ref>

[[Cicero]]'s ''[[De Divinatione]]'' implicitly used five criteria of scientific demarcation that are also used by modern philosophers of science.<ref>{{cite journal |doi=10.1016/j.shpsa.2020.04.002 |title=Cicero's demarcation of science: a report of shared criteria |journal=[[Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A]] |year=2020 |last1=Fernandez-Beanato |first1=Damian |volume=83 |pages=97–102 |pmid=32958286 |bibcode=2020SHPSA..83...97F |s2cid=216477897 }}</ref>

==Logical positivism==
{{Main|Logical positivism}}
[[Logical positivism]], formulated during the 1920s, is the idea that only statements about matters of fact or logical relations between concepts are meaningful. All other statements lack sense and are labelled "[[Metaphysics#Rejections of metaphysics|metaphysics]]" (see [[the verifiability theory of meaning]] also known as [[verificationism]]).

According to [[A. J. Ayer]], metaphysicians make statements which claim to have "knowledge of a reality which [transcends] the phenomenal world".<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Watling|first=John|date=January 1967|title=Classics of Analytical Philosophy. By Robert R. Ammerman. (McGraw-Hill. 1965. Pp. 413. Price £2 12s.)|journal=Philosophy|volume=42|issue=159|pages=95|doi=10.1017/s0031819100000954|s2cid=170790018 |issn=0031-8191}}</ref> Ayer, a member of the [[Vienna Circle]] and a noted English logical-positivist, argued that making any statements about the world beyond one's immediate sense-perception is impossible.<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal|title=Language, Truth, and Logic|last=Ayer|first=A.J.|journal=Nature |year=1936|volume=138 |issue=3498 |pages=13–29|doi=10.1038/138823a0 |bibcode=1936Natur.138..823G |s2cid=4121089 |doi-access=free }}</ref> This is because even metaphysicians' first premises will necessarily begin with observations made through sense-perception.<ref name=":0" />

Ayer implied that the demarcation occurs when statements become "factually significant".<ref name=":0" /> To be "factually significant", a statement must be verifiable.<ref name=":0" /> In order to be verifiable, the statement must be verifiable in the observable world, or facts that can be induced from "derived experience".<ref name=":0" /> This is referred to as the "verifiability" criterion.<ref name=":0" />

This distinction between science, which in the opinion of the Vienna Circle possessed empirically verifiable statements, and what they pejoratively termed "metaphysics", which lacked such statements, can be considered as representing another aspect of the demarcation problem.<ref>Grayling, AC., [https://books.google.com/books?id=kYUFhlIRZA4C&dq=demarcation+%22logical+positivism%22&pg=PT97 ''Wittgenstein: A Very Short Introduction''], Oxford University Press, 2001, pp. 67–68.</ref> Logical positivism is often discussed in the context of the demarcation between science and non-science or pseudoscience. However, "The verificationist proposals had the aim of solving a distinctly different demarcation problem, namely that between science and metaphysics."<ref name="sep-pseudo-science2">{{cite encyclopedia |first=Sven Ove |last=Hansson |editor-first=Edward N.|editor-last=Zalta |year=2008 |title=Science and Pseudo-Science |encyclopedia=The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy |edition=Fall 2008 |url=http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/pseudo-science#LogPos |at=4.1 The Logical Positivists}}</ref>

==Falsifiability==
{{Main|Falsifiability}}
[[Karl Popper]] considered demarcation as a major problem of the philosophy of science. Popper articulates the problem of demarcation as:

{{Quote|The problem of finding a criterion which would enable us to distinguish between the empirical sciences on the one hand, and mathematics and logic as well as 'metaphysical' systems on the other, I call the ''problem of demarcation''."<ref name="Popper 2005" />}}

[[Falsifiability]] is the demarcation criterion proposed by Popper as opposed to verificationism: "statements or systems of statements, in order to be ranked as scientific, must be capable of conflicting with possible, or conceivable observations."<ref name="sep-pseudo-science">{{cite encyclopedia |first=Sven Ove |last=Hansson |editor-first=Edward N.|editor-last=Zalta |year=2008 |title=Science and Pseudo-Science |encyclopedia=The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy |edition=Fall 2008 |url=http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/pseudo-science#KarPop |at=4.2 Falsificationism}}</ref> 

===Against verifiability===
Popper rejected solutions to the problem of demarcation that are grounded in [[inductive reasoning]], and so rejected logical-positivist responses to the problem of demarcation.<ref name="Popper 2005">{{Cite book|last=Popper|first=Karl|date=4 November 2005|title=The Logic of Scientific Discovery| publisher = Routledge | place = London | edition = 2nd | doi=10.4324/9780203994627|isbn=9780203994627}}</ref> He argued that logical-positivists want to create a demarcation between the metaphysical and the empirical because they believe that empirical claims are meaningful and metaphysical ones are not. Unlike the Vienna Circle, Popper stated that his proposal was not a criterion of "meaningfulness".

{{quote|Popper's demarcation criterion has been criticized both for excluding legitimate science&nbsp;... and for giving some pseudosciences the status of being scientific&nbsp;... According to Larry Laudan (1983, 121), it "has the untoward consequence of countenancing as 'scientific' every crank claim which makes ascertainably false assertions". Astrology, rightly taken by Popper as an unusually clear example of a pseudoscience, has in fact been tested and thoroughly refuted&nbsp;... Similarly, the major threats to the scientific status of psychoanalysis, another of his major targets, do not come from claims that it is untestable but from claims that it has been tested and failed the tests.<ref name="sep-pseudo-science"/>|[[Sven Ove Hansson]]|''The [[Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy]]'', "Science and Pseudo-Science"}}

Popper argued that the [[Humeanism|Humean]] [[induction problem]] shows that there is no way to make meaningful universal statements on the basis of any number of empirical observations.<ref>{{Cite book|title=An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding|first=David|last=Hume|isbn=9788027246601|oclc=1055285629|date=4 September 2018|publisher=Studium }}</ref> Therefore, empirical statements are no more "verifiable" than metaphysical statements.

This creates a problem for the demarcation the positivists wanted to define between the empirical and the metaphysical. By their very own "verifiability criterion", Popper argued, the empirical is subsumed into the metaphysical, and the demarcation between the two becomes non-existent.

===The solution of falsifiability===
In Popper's later work, he stated that falsifiability is both a necessary and sufficient criterion for demarcation. He described falsifiability as a property of "the logical structure of sentences and classes of sentences", so that a statement's scientific or non-scientific status does not change over time. This has been summarized as a statement being falsifiable "if and only if it logically contradicts some (empirical) sentence that describes a logically possible event that it would be logically possible to observe".<ref name="sep-pseudo-science" />

==Kuhnian postpositivism==
[[Thomas Kuhn]], an American historian and philosopher of science, is often associated with what has been termed [[postpositivism]] or [[postempiricism]]. In his 1962 book ''[[The Structure of Scientific Revolutions]]'', Kuhn divided the process of doing science into two different endeavors, which he termed [[normal science]] and [[extraordinary science]] (sometimes known as "revolutionary science"), the latter of which introduces a new "[[paradigm]]" that solves new problems while continuing to provide solutions to the problems solved by the preceding paradigm.<ref name="sep-pseudo-science"/>

{{quote|Finally, and this is for now my main point, a careful look at the scientific enterprise suggests that it is normal science, in which [[Karl Popper|Sir Karl]]'s sort of testing does not occur, rather than extraordinary science which most nearly distinguishes science from other enterprises. If a demarcation criterion exists (we must not, I think, seek a sharp or decisive one), it may lie just in that part of science which Sir Karl ignores.|[[Thomas S. Kuhn]], "Logic of Discovery or Psychology of Research?", in ''Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge'' (1970), edited by [[Imre Lakatos]] and [[Alan Musgrave]]}}

{{quote|Kuhn's view of demarcation is most clearly expressed in his comparison of astronomy with astrology. Since antiquity, astronomy has been a puzzle-solving activity and therefore a science. If an astronomer's prediction failed, then this was a puzzle that he could hope to solve for instance with more measurements or with adjustments of the theory. In contrast, the astrologer had no such puzzles since in that discipline "particular failures did not give rise to research puzzles, for no man, however skilled, could make use of them in a constructive attempt to revise the astrological tradition"&nbsp;... Therefore, according to Kuhn, astrology has never been a science.<ref name="sep-pseudo-science"/>|[[Sven Ove Hansson]]|"Science and Pseudo-Science", in the ''[[Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy]]''}}

Popper criticized Kuhn's demarcation criterion, saying that astrologers are engaged in puzzle solving, and that therefore Kuhn's criterion recognized astrology as a science. He stated that Kuhn's criterion results in a "major disaster&nbsp;... [the] replacement of a rational criterion of science by a sociological one".<ref name="sep-pseudo-science"/>

==Feyerabend and Lakatos==
Kuhn's work largely called into question Popper's demarcation, and emphasized the human, [[subjectivity|subjective]] quality of scientific change. [[Paul Feyerabend]] was concerned that the very question of demarcation was insidious: science itself had no need of a demarcation criterion, but instead some philosophers were seeking to justify a special position of authority from which science could dominate public discourse.<ref name="Taylor1996">{{cite book |first=C.A. |last=Taylor |year=1996 |title=Defining Science: A Rhetoric of Demarcation |series=Rhetoric of the Human Sciences Series |publisher=University of Wisconsin Press |isbn=9780299150341 |lccn=96000180 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NdkDiqh5ySYC&pg=PA41 |page=41}}</ref> Feyerabend argued that science is not in fact special in terms of either its logic or method, and no claim to special authority made by scientists can be sustained. He argued that, within the history of scientific practice, no rule or method can be found that has not been violated or circumvented at some point in order to advance scientific knowledge. Both [[Imre Lakatos]] and Feyerabend suggest that science is not an autonomous form of reasoning, but is inseparable from the larger body of human thought and inquiry.{{cn|date=December 2020}}

==Thagard==
[[Paul R. Thagard]] proposed another set of principles to try to overcome these difficulties, and argued that it is important for society to find a way of doing so. According to Thagard's method, a theory is not scientific if it satisfies two conditions:<ref>{{ Citation | last = Thagard | first = Paul R. | author-link = Paul Thagard | date = 1978 | title = Why Astrology is a Pseudoscience | journal = PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association | volume = 1978 | pages = 223–234 | doi = 10.1086/psaprocbienmeetp.1978.1.192639 | s2cid = 147050929 }}</ref>
# The theory has been less progressive than alternative theories over a long period of time, and has many unsolved problems; and...
# The community of practitioners makes little attempt to develop the theory towards solutions of the problems, shows no concern for attempts to evaluate the theory in relation to others, and is selective in considering confirmations and disconfirmations.

Thagard specified that sometimes theories will spend some time as merely "unpromising" before they truly deserve the title of pseudoscience. He cited astrology as an example: it was stagnant compared to advances in physics during the 17th century, and only later became "pseudoscience" in the advent of alternative explanations provided by psychology during the 19th century.

Thagard also stated that his criteria should not be interpreted so narrowly as to allow willful [[ignorance]] of alternative explanations, or so broadly as to discount our modern science compared to science of the future. His definition is a practical one, which generally seeks to distinguish pseudoscience as areas of inquiry which are stagnant and without active scientific investigation.

==Some historians' perspectives==
Many historians of science are concerned with the development of science from its primitive origins; consequently they define science in sufficiently broad terms to include early forms of natural knowledge. In the article on science in the [[Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition|eleventh edition]] of the ''Encyclopædia Britannica'', the scientist and historian [[William Cecil Dampier Whetham]] defined science as "ordered knowledge of natural phenomena and of the relations between them".<ref>{{cite EB1911|wstitle=Science |volume= 24 |short=x}}</ref> In his study of Greek science, [[Marshall Clagett]] defined science as "first, the orderly and systematic comprehension, description and/or explanation of natural phenomena and, secondly, the [mathematical and logical] tools necessary for the undertaking".<ref>{{Citation | last = Clagett | first = Marshall | author-link = Marshall Clagett | date = 1963 | title = Greek Science in Antiquity | publisher = Collier Books | location = New York | page = 4 }}</ref> A similar definition appeared more recently in [[David Pingree]]'s study of early science: "Science is a systematic explanation of perceived or imaginary phenomena, or else is based on such an explanation. Mathematics finds a place in science only as one of the symbolical languages in which scientific explanations may be expressed."<ref>{{Citation | last = Pingree | first = David | author-link = David Pingree | year = 1992 | title = Hellenophilia versus the History of Science | journal = Isis | volume = 83 | issue = 4 | pages = 554–563 | doi=10.1086/356288| bibcode = 1992Isis...83..554P | s2cid = 68570164 }}</ref> These definitions tend to emphasize the subject matter of science rather than its method and from these perspectives, the philosophical concern to establish a demarcation between science and non-science becomes "problematic, if not futile".<ref>{{Citation | last = McCluskey | first = Stephen C. | editor-last = Fountain | editor-first = John W. | editor2-last = Sinclair | editor2-first = Rolf M. | date = 2005 | title = Current Studies in Archaeoastronomy: Conversations Across Time and Space | chapter = Different Astronomies, Different Cultures and the Question of Cultural Relativism | publisher = Carolina Academic Press | location = Durham, NC | page = 71 | isbn = 0-89089-771-9 }}</ref>

==Laudan==
[[Larry Laudan]] concluded, after examining various historical attempts to establish a demarcation criterion, that "philosophy has failed to deliver the goods" in its attempts to distinguish science from non-science—to distinguish science from pseudoscience. None of the past attempts would be accepted by a majority of philosophers nor, in his opinion, should they be accepted by them or by anyone else. He stated that many well-founded beliefs are not scientific and, conversely, many scientific conjectures are not well-founded. He also stated that demarcation criteria were historically used as {{lang|fr|machines de guerre}} in polemical disputes between "scientists" and "pseudo-scientists". Advancing a number of examples from everyday practice of football and carpentry and non-scientific scholarship such as literary criticism and philosophy, he considered the question of whether a belief is well-founded or not to be more practically and philosophically significant than whether it is scientific or not. In his judgment, the demarcation between science and non-science was a pseudo-problem that would best be replaced by examining the distinction between reliable and unreliable knowledge, without bothering to ask whether that knowledge is scientific or not. He would consign phrases like "pseudo-science" or "unscientific" to the rhetoric of politicians or sociologists.<ref name="Laudan1983"/>

==After Laudan==
Others have disagreed with Laudan. Sebastian Lutz, for example, argued that demarcation does not have to be a single necessary and sufficient condition as Laudan implied.<ref name="Laudan1983"/> Rather, Laudan's reasoning at most establishes that there has to be one necessary criterion and one possibly different sufficient criterion.<ref>{{citation |last=Lutz |first=Sebastian |title=On an Allegedly Essential Feature of Criteria for the Demarcation of Science |journal=The Reasoner |pages=125–126 |volume=5 |number=8 |year=2011 |url=http://www.kent.ac.uk/secl/philosophy/jw/TheReasoner/vol5/TheReasoner-5(8).pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121109143743/http://www.kent.ac.uk/secl/philosophy/jw/TheReasoner/vol5/TheReasoner-5%288%29.pdf |archive-date=9 November 2012 }}</ref> 

Various typologies or taxonomies of sciences versus nonsciences, and reliable knowledge versus illusory knowledge, have been proposed.<ref>For example: {{cite book |last=Mahner |first=Martin |date=2007 |chapter=Demarcating science from non-science |editor-last=Kuipers |editor-first=Theo A. F. |title=General Philosophy of Science: Focal Issues |series=Handbook of the Philosophy of Science |location=Amsterdam |publisher=North-Holland |pages=515–575 |isbn=978-0444515483 |oclc=123374590 |doi=10.1016/B978-044451548-3/50011-2 }} See Figures 2, 3, and 4, which show various relationships of science, nonscience, illusory knowledge (parascience), ordinary knowledge, and reliable knowledge.</ref> [[Ian Hacking]], [[Massimo Pigliucci]], and others have noted that the sciences generally conform to [[Ludwig Wittgenstein]]'s concept of [[family resemblance]]s.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Irzik |first1=Gürol |last2=Nola |first2=Robert |date=July 2011 |title=A family resemblance approach to the nature of science for science education |journal=[[Science & Education]] |volume=20 |issue=7 |pages=591–607 |doi=10.1007/s11191-010-9293-4 |bibcode=2011Sc&Ed..20..591I |s2cid=18651223 |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/225424936 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Pigliucci |first=Massimo |author-link=Massimo Pigliucci |date=2013 |chapter=The demarcation problem: a (belated) response to Laudan |editor1-last=Pigliucci |editor1-first=Massimo |editor2-last=Boudry |editor2-first=Maarten |editor2-link=Maarten Boudry |title=Philosophy of Pseudoscience: Reconsidering the Demarcation Problem |location=Chicago |publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]] |pages=9–28 |isbn=9780226051796 |oclc=824088394 |doi=10.7208/chicago/9780226051826.003.0002 |chapter-url=https://philpapers.org/archive/PIGTDP }} See Figures 1.2 and 1.3.</ref>

Other critics have argued for multiple demarcation criteria,<ref>{{cite journal |doi=10.1007/s10838-020-09507-5 |title=The Multicriterial Approach to the Problem of Demarcation |journal=[[Journal for General Philosophy of Science]] |year=2020 |last1=Fernandez-Beanato |first1=Damian |volume=51 |issue=3 |pages=375–391 |doi-access=free }}</ref> some suggesting that there should be one set of criteria for the natural sciences, another set of criteria for the social sciences, and claims involving the supernatural could have a set of pseudoscientific criteria.<ref name="PigliucciBoudry">{{cite book |editor1-last=Pigliucci |editor1-first=Massimo |editor1-link=Massimo Pigliucci |editor2-last=Boudry |editor2-first=Maarten |editor2-link=Maarten Boudry |date=2013 |title=Philosophy of Pseudoscience: Reconsidering the Demarcation Problem |location=Chicago |publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]] |isbn=9780226051796 |oclc=824088394 |doi=10.7208/chicago/9780226051826.001.0001 }}</ref> [[Anthropologist]] Sean M. Rafferty of the [[University at Albany, SUNY]] in his text ''Misanthropology: Science, Pseudoscience, and the Study of Humanity'' contrasts science and pseudoscience within his discipline thusly:<blockquote>[E]ven for those subfields where there is a significant element of interpretation, those interpretations are still based on and constrained by physical evidence. And interpretations are always provisional, pending possible refutation by contradictory evidence&nbsp;... Pseudoscience, by comparison, is scornful of evidence. The pseudoscientist reaches a preferred conclusion in advance, then selects evidence, often removed from any relevant context, to lend supposed support for their conclusions. Often the preconceived conclusion is one that justifies some closely held identity or ideology. Contradictory evidence is waved away or ignored, and as a last resort, one can always claim conspiracy to keep pseudoscientific ideas suppressed.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Rafferty |first=Sean |title=Misanthropology: science, pseudoscience, and the study of humanity |date=2023 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-032-23177-8 |location=New York (N.Y.) |pages=2}}</ref></blockquote>

==Significance==
Concerning [[science education]], Michael D. Gordin wrote:
{{quote|Every student in public or private schools takes several years of science, but only a small fraction of them pursue careers in the sciences. We teach the rest of them so much science so that they will appreciate what it ''means'' to be scientific&nbsp;– and, hopefully, become scientifically literate and apply some of those lessons in their lives. For such students, the myth of a bright line of demarcation is essential.<ref name=Gordin>{{cite book |last=Gordin |first=Michael D. |date=2015 |chapter=Myth 27. That a clear line of demarcation has separated science from pseudoscience |editor1-last=Numbers |editor1-first=Ronald L. |editor1-link=Ronald L. Numbers |editor2-last=Kampourakis |editor2-first=Kostas |title=Newton's Apple and Other Myths About Science |location=Cambridge, MA |publisher=[[Harvard University Press]] |pages=219–225 |isbn=9780674967984 |oclc=906121832 |doi=10.4159/9780674089167-029}}</ref>{{rp|220}}}}
Discussions of the demarcation problem concern the [[rhetoric of science]] and promote [[critical thinking]], which is important for democracy.<ref name="PigliucciBoudry"/>{{rp|35}} For example, Gordin stated: "Demarcation remains essential for the enormously high political stakes of climate-change denial and other anti-regulatory fringe doctrines".<ref name=Gordin/>{{rp|225}}

Philosopher {{ill|Herbert Keuth|de}} noted:

{{quote|Perhaps the most important function of the demarcation between science and nonscience is to refuse political and religious authorities the right to pass binding judgments on the truth of certain statements of fact.<ref>{{cite book |last=Keuth |first=Herbert |chapter=What is demarcation for? |title=The Philosophy of Karl Popper |date=2004 |orig-year=Published in German 2000 |edition=1st English |location=Cambridge, UK; New York |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |pages=[https://books.google.com/books?id=wxzoBfQYhYAC&pg=PA50 50] |isbn=9780521548304 |oclc=54503549 }}</ref>}}

Concern for informed [[human nutrition]] resulted in the following note in 1942:

{{quote|If our boys and girls are to be exposed to the superficial and frequently ill-informed statements about science and medicine made over the radio and in the daily press, it is desirable, if not necessary, that some corrective in the form of accurate factual information be provided in the schools. Although this is not a plea that [[chemistry teacher]]s should at once introduce the study of [[protein]]s into their curricula, it is a suggestion that they should at least inform themselves and become prepared to answer questions and counteract the effects of [[misinformation]].<ref>Hubert Bradford Vickery (1942) "Liebig and the Proteins", [[Journal of Chemical Education]], quotation from page 79, {{doi|10.1021/ed019p73}}</ref>}}

The demarcation problem has been compared to the problem of differentiating [[fake news]] from real news, which became prominent during the [[2016 United States presidential election]].<ref>{{citation|last=LeVine |first=Michael V |title=Science has experience fighting fake news — and Facebook should take note |url=https://mic.com/articles/161376/science-has-experience-fighting-fake-news-and-facebook-should-take-note |year=2016 |journal=[[Mic (media company)|Mic]]}}</ref>

==See also==
{{Wikiquote}}
* [[Boundary-work]]
* [[Idealism]]
* [[Relativism]]
* [[Scientism]]
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==References==
{{Reflist|2}}

== External links ==
* {{IEP|pseudoscience-demarcation|Pseudoscience and the Demarcation Problem}}

{{Epistemology}}
{{Jurisprudence}}
{{Philosophy of science}}
{{Positivism}}
{{Science and technology studies}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Demarcation Problem}}
[[Category:Philosophy of science]]
[[Category:Science studies]]
[[Category:Religion and science]]
[[Category:Dichotomies]]
[[Category:Philosophical problems]]