Talk:History of pseudoscience

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 20 August 2019 and 2 December 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Rallen15.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 23:38, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Difficult topic
This sounds like a fairly difficult topic to handle, in part because there is no clear definition of what is "pseudoscience" even with modern investigations, and trying to apply such a term backwards over time seems like a difficult and ahistorical approach (was Kepler's desire for a harmony of the heavens pseudoscience?). How are you intending on approaching this? --Fastfission 23:56, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * Hmm...I'm not sure we've really found the best title...what I would think about putting here are things that have happened on the "wrong" branches of scientific progress. That is, after the mainstream scientific community has decided to settle on X, and some minority or non-scientific community adopts Y and carries that forward.  (Kuhn would call it pre-paradigm thought, or something.)  Kepler's belief in his theory of perfect harmonic shapes pre-dates the scientific consensus on elliptical orbits, and since he was actually a central figure in creating that consensus, I would consider his work on that question part of the mainline history.  Though I've not entirely convinced myself that this should really be a unified article, much less one as part of a series on the history of science, but we'll see. -- Beland 03:42, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * How on earth would you do a history of the "wrong" branches of science when that state of "wrongness" is itself historically contingent? That's what I'm getting at, here. We would label much of Kepler to be pseudoscientific in origins; history causes us to strip out the parts which don't work with our modern understandings. Are you talking only about sciences which were considered "wrong" in their time or those which are considered "wrong" in our time? (if the latter, the list contains every discredited theory ever used! if the former, then you are including many things we now view as just fine!) This would be a difficult theoretical problem to task out in writing a book on the subject, much less a Wikipedia article. --Fastfission 01:13, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Merge with pseudoscience?
Does this article need to be separate? I would suggest merging it with pseudoscience. Hgilbert 21:33, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

"History of..." pages are common on wikipedia. This page holds potential. We could start with a timeline of when pseudosciences were created, when the became vogue, and so on. 71.63.183.199 (talk) 08:09, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Proposed Deletion
This article contains very little content, while what content it does have seems to contain original research, is of poor historiographic quality, and obviously written from a Eurocentric/Imperialist POV. ("it was the Christian initiative that helped maintain a civilization recovery plan"???) Furthermore, pseudoscience is an ahistorical concept. To talk about a history of pseudoscience is a contradiction in terms, judging previous intellectual moments by present-day scientific standards. Many historians of science today would reject such a clear-cut demarcation. Where do such taxonomies such as "good," "questionable," and "faulty" sciences come from?

I would put this writing under the category of "pseudohistory." Fokion (talk) 21:49, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Status of this article
As a historian and skeptic I am appalled at the level of ignorance and pseudohistory attested in this article. It contradicts itself on numerous occasions (for example when it says that pseudoscience can only appear after the scientific revolution, and then begins the history of the subject after the fall of Rome). Furthermore, it makes a series of absurd statements and is horribly biased. Look at this line: "it was the Christian initiative that helped maintain a civilization recovery plan". What?! Never heard of the Dark Ages? The whole point of the medieval period is that after the fall of Rome, there was no "civilization recovery plan"!

This article is a disgrace to Wikipedia. It should be completely rewritten. Stefan Kruithof (talk) 09:35, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

Complete rewrite
The exceedingly poor quality of the article led me to completely delete all its contents and rewrite it. I think this is a big improvement, but much remains to be done. Stefan Kruithof (talk) 15:23, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

Inclusion of pseudohistory and pseudoarchaeology
To what an extent should we include pseudohistory and pseudoarchaeology into this article? Conspiracy theories, such as about the JFK assassination and the 9/11 attacks, are examples of pseudohistory. Holocaust denial too. Should these be included?

So far I have only included the pseudoarchaeological theory of ancient astronauts. Stefan Kruithof (talk) 13:03, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

this article is still a bullshit
martian channels as an example of 'pseudoscientific idea'? seriously, if something was later disproved it doesn't make it to be pseudoscience. it was a serious theory at that moment when they didn't know the real martian conditions and it was falsifiable. pseudoscience it's not disproved scientific theories, it's when the scientific method is used incorrectly to justify some dubious theory. to put martian channels in one list with spiritualism is a shame.

also speaking of ancient astronauts, while it never was a serious scientific theory, i don't think it belongs to pseudoscience list either since it doesn't break the limits of scientific method, it's a possible and falsifiable explanation of some facts, it isn't taken seriously because there are simpler explanations of those facts and the occam's razor tells us to choose the simplest possible explanation for practical purposes, still it's something which should be considered as a possibility. i don't think that any bold idea is pseudoscientific by itself, otherwise science can fall to dogmatism, but ideas like that can be used by pseudoscience just well as by real science. i.e. ufology is a pseudoscience while ancient astronauts is just a bold idea which still fits scientific frame. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.143.58.108 (talk) 03:20, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

The whole concept of pseudoscience should be scrapped
This article trashes together disparate subjects that are not really related. To presuppose that you can just arbitrarily label a subject on your own whim as a pseudoscience is ludicrous. Take the example of the Martian Canals. I am an astronomer and I have seen the Martian Canals with my own eyes. This is not a pseudoscience, but rather a very interesting optical phenomena. What causes it is unknown, but it is not pseudoscience. It is just that at times of very still air Mars will appear to crisscrossed by many small lines. people have misinterpreted what the lines are and Shiaparelli called them canali, which actually means channels. Sir Percival Lowell then called canals made by intelligent beings.I feel this article is misleading and generally false and should be removed.

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