Talk:List of scientific fields

The title "Natural Sciences
--Dr Salah eddeen Shaheen 09:01, 4 July 2006 (UTC)Talk:Fields of Science I am suggesting that the title "Natural Sciences" be deleted, and instead the title "Physical Sciences" be used. This way the ambiguity of the words nature and natural may be avoided. Science is a tool that humanity uses to discover the behaviour of nature. All sciences are based on natural observations and natural mental abilities. Thus all sciences have a touch of nature.<> hekioo kljflskaf dfj asdfkj sajf asdflkj;l f anjsldkfjs faspodi sfsdljff sdfjasdljfeianeliuca sori jasdlfj sdfjlkaniea anelicua soirai eliana rocks

What about astrochemistry, planetary geology. Just asking if these are valid.Raynethackery 08:33, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Law is a science?
You have GOT to be kidding me. Who on earth listed law as a science? Even a social science? Good heavens. There is NO way whatsoever law is a science, let me tell you. I speak as someone with extensive experience in legal matters, and 2 bachelors 3 masters and a phd in physics and applied mathematics. Law is NOT science !!--Filll 01:38, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
 * It could be a b-y foreigner :p. In many languages the word spelled as "science" does not mean the same as in modern English. DanielDemaret (talk) 18:48, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Mapping the sciences: scientific adjectives/name of the science(s)
Scientific adjectives is a sub-project of the WikiProject Conceptual Jungle, aiming at making an overview in a table of scientific adjectives and the various branches of (the) science(s) and qualify them by discussing them, improving the Wikipedia articles and make clear the interlinkages. Please feel free to add your contributions to the table. Best regards, Brz7 12:33, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Military Science
It should, I believe, be listed under social science, or listed in Applied Science under Social Science or Political Science rather than "Other". Akitora (talk) 10:53, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

Physical science
I removed Physical science layer because I think there is no need to add an extra layer here. -- Marcel Douwe Dekker (talk) 18:08, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Human science
Where is Human Science in all this? And the Humanities? Parts of the humanities is science, parts are not. 03:10, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

What fields within the Humanities do you suppose are sciences? Typically, even rigorous study of subfields within humanities are still subjective to social tastes. --M.lee.wise (talk) 19:12, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Intelligent Design Reverted
I recently added a Intelligent Design under the list of Biological sciences. This edit was subsequently reverted. I do not see the justification for this. I will place the topic back into the list.


 * And we will revert it again. ID is not a science. Alyeska (talk) 05:10, 25 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Intelligent Design is as much a science as astrology or alchemy. For an introduction to the controversy, read the New York Times op-ed by the eminent philosopher Daniel C. Dennett. To explore deeper, read Intelligent design.


 * Let the voice of reason prevail over the power of faith.-- Palaeovia talk 05:40, 25 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Where is 68.61.156.4 (who included Intelligent Design here) coming from? The answer is here: The section "Effect of God?" in Talk:Mount_Redoubt_(Alaska) -- Palaeovia talk 06:10, 25 March 2009 (UTC)


 * I feel ID is closer to science than other subjects listed here (such as Sociology, Education and Philosophy). I've placed the link back onto the list. (unsigned by 68.61.156.4)


 * This pointless edit war waged by 68.61.156.4 does not cast the proponents of Intelligent Design or Evangelical Christians in any favourable light.


 * The fact is that the preponderance of scientific opinions rejects the spurious claim of Intelligent Design to the status of an alternative theory to Evolution. The formulation of Intelligent Design is simply a sad episode of fundamentalist Christians trying to prevent schools in the US from teaching the well established theory of evolution, trying to turn the clock back to 1858.


 * There is no more eloquent debunkers of Intelligent Desisn as pseudo-science than Richard Dawkins. For any seeker of truth, his is a voice worth listening to. His website is a valuable repository of resources for combating ignorance.-- Palaeovia talk 00:53, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * It doesn't matter what you 'feel'. We need sources saying Intelligent Design is a science. And before you say something stupid, the bible doesn't talk about intelligent design at all let alone call anything a science Nil Einne (talk) 01:10, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * I doubt you've studied the Holy Bible (note that the B is capitalized) more than me, so I would thank you for not telling me what is in the bible or not. The fact remains that Jesus Christ had, on several occasions, discussed how science and technology lacked the full story. In this case, ID allows us to scientifically analyze the teaching of the bible, specifically how God created the universe. See [] for lots of research papers on the subject. This is a legitimate science, and I will add the link back on the page.


 * Those are not peer reviewed papers and they make multiple mistakes on very basic scientific principles. Alyeska (talk) 06:05, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Well firstly the bible isn't a reliable source on what's a science. Secondly Jesus never talked about intelligent design nor called it, or anything else, a science, so your point is moot. (I suggest you re-read the bible if you weren't aware of that since even I who I'll freely admit haven't read it much know that.) Also as I've mentioned on your talk page, if you add intelligent design again without achieving consensus I will ask for you to be blocked. You are welcome to discuss it here, but without any reliable sources indicating it as a science, this discussion is going no where. If you seriously believe ideacenter is a reliable source, you really need to (re-)read policy WP:RS Nil Einne (talk) 07:06, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * The bible IS a reliable source of science, because everything that is came from god, and his only son, our lord Jesus Christ. That includes all of your fancy science and math, which amounts to little. In my view, ID is the spiritual community's attempt to answer questions those in the classical scientific communtiy have failed to answer. ID is a science, and provides a much broaded, clearer and easier picture than your crazy evolution. I've place the link back into the list. Please do not revert.


 * Does the bible tell you how a Car works? Does it tell you how a plane flies through the air?  Does it tell you how the Internet is designed?  I thought not.  You cannot claim its authority over subjects it has no information on. Alyeska (talk) 13:54, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * But it does tell us how we came to be, from the image of God. Intelligent design puts more rigor into this subject and places it at the level of science. Obviously, the editors here have a bias against ID as a rule, so I will submit this page for mediation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.61.156.4 (talk) 20:36, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * So you admit that God is poorly designed? The human body is a collection of horrible design concepts that barely work to keep us alive.  Our vision is actually upside down.  We lack ball socket joints for our arms and legs.  We cannot see in infrared like other animals.  We have a poor sense of sight, smell, and hearing.  And if we are designed in "His" image, you are telling me that God himself is faulty.  You make the assumption that the Bible is correct.  What proof do you have?  How do you know that Thor isn't the god of Thunder?  What about Khrone, the Blood God?  I'm sure that Evil Buddha would like to whip your ass when you die.  You claim authority in the Bible when you cannot even prove the concepts in the bible.  It makes scientifically impossible claims.  You ignore the fact that PEOPLE wrote the book and that people tend to be lying assholes who will put their own opinions in there.  You go ahead and submit this page for mediation, you will fail miserably. Alyeska (talk) 02:37, 27 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Geez, why are you getting so angry? Clearly your frustration in not being able to answer fundamental questions with your science is spilling over to your editorial skills. No need to call people assholes or things like that. Also the Bible itself tells us that all those other fake gods aren't real, so it is self consistent. Also, who said that the human body is horribly designed? According to the bible, we are created in the image of god and so BY DEFINITION it is well designed. You need to learn some logic.


 * I didn't call you an asshole. Nice red herring.  The human body is poorly designed as I already mentioned.  Our body devours itself (cancer).  Our hearts are prone to stoppage simply by eating the food we require to live.  We have poorly designed joints giving our limbs very limited range of motion.  The human body is a collection of barely working ideas that just happen to work together for our purposes.  It is not well designed by any stretch of the definition.  A similarly weighted Chimpanzee has a minimum of 3 times the muscle strength over a human.  A dog has more then a million times better sense of smell.  An eagle has better vision.  No, we are not well designed.  By definition you are ignoring my arguments and repeating your dogma without actually thinking critically.  You say we are created in his image.  What you fail to realize is that this creates a contradiction.  We are poorly designed.  So that means God is poorly designed (ie, not perfect), or your statement that we are designed in his image is false.  Those are your only two choices.  There is no other alternative.  Either God is not perfect, or your book lied to you.  Alyeska (talk) 14:37, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I didn't say you called me an asshole, but you called the authors of the holy bible "lying assholes," which was not a very productive thing to say. Let's keep it civil. Again, you are misunderstanding the truth in the Bible. By definition, we are perfect for what ever purpose God has for us, since we are created in the image of god, and that god is himself perfect. These are two basic axioms of Christian science. We shouldn't be focusing on the validity of the foundational premises of a field, but rather whether or not the field is a science. ID and Christian science has rigorously applied the scientific method and has shown the notion of an intelligent designer is consistent with these axioms. Additionally, we all know deep in our hearts that Jesus's word is truth -- you are just purposefully denying these feelings we all have for some odd reason.


 * No, I said that the book was written by people and that people in general can be lying assholes. Important distinction.  Our bodies are flawed and if we are designed in someone elses image, they are also flawed.  You cannot handwave this argument into non-existence.  By your own logic God must be imperfect because we are imperfect.

As to ID, it is not a science and it has never rigorously applied the scientific method. No scientific studies have ever been conducted. Nothing submitted for publication. The creators of ID had even acknowledged its sole purpose is to introduce religion to the science class for the purpose of teaching Creationism. We have already posted plenty of information in this thread showing how ID isn't a science. The responsibility is yours to read it before making a further fool of yourself. Alyeska (talk) 15:08, 28 March 2009 (UTC)


 * LOL, you don't really understand this. We are perfect by definition. You probably don't understand what this means, which is fine, but you need to go to college or somewhere you can take a logic class and learn what by definition means. Back to the point, ID is self-consistent, built from basic axioms and uses rigorous methods to detail its findings, hence it is a science. I feel sorry for you, since you obviously need to find Jesus's love in the world.
 * per⋅fect, –adjective, 1. 	conforming absolutely to the description or definition of an ideal type:2. 	excellent or complete beyond practical or theoretical improvement:3. 	exactly fitting the need in a certain situation or for a certain purpose:4. 	entirely without any flaws, defects, or shortcomings:5. 	accurate, exact, or correct in every detail:
 * Sorry, but we are not perfect. We are not ideal.  We are not beyond practical or theoretical improvement.  We do not fit the exact needs of the situation.  We are not without flaws.  We are not exact or correct in every detail.  By definition we are not perfect.  You cannot butcher the English language to suit your own opinions.  Inteligent Design was created by the Discovery Institute.  The stated purpose of ID can be read in the Wedge Strategy.  ID is not a scientific concept.  It is a political concept.  There has been no research into Inteligent Design.  It has submitted no evidence or studies for review.  There are no rigorous methods, there are no detailed findings.  Absolutely none.  The Templeton Foundation funded the Discovery Institute (you know, the originators of the Inteligent Design concept) to conduct scientific studies into ID.  Discovery Institute conducted absolutely no studies and submitted no proposals.  They spent all of the money on Public Relations to fulfill their political agendas solely.  You would do well to read up on the subject you apparently have a great deal of interest in. Alyeska (talk) 19:28, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) All you need is a verifiable reference from a reliable source stating that ID is a science. That's all. ID may be rooted in the bible, but it is never mentioned there so there's no need for either side to argue over whether or not it's a reliable source. TheJazzDalek (talk) 20:49, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * But why is ID the only field in which a reliable source must be posted? I demand all fields listed on this page have at least one verifiable reference from a reliable source listed. It should be easy enough, so let's do it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.61.156.4 (talk) 20:54, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Go right ahead, it's only fair. I would caution you to avoid quickly deleting everything without a reference—ID's omission appears to have consensus here on the talk page; deleting biology (for example) because it's not referenced would surely cause an uproar and be disruptive (and point-y). I'm bowing out; I only ended up here doing recent change patrolling. It seems like there are enough "regulars" here to handle it. Good luck to everyone sorting this out. TheJazzDalek (talk) 21:05, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Biology is an established scientific body that has come about from thousands, if not millions, of peer reviewed articles and research conducted into it. ID has no peer review.  ID was created solely as a Public Relations concept by a political organization for the sole purpose of getting the Bible back into the science class room.  It violates the very concepts of what make science what it is.  ID comes to a conclusion and seeks evidence to support those facts while ignoring anything that they disagree with.  You don't care about what science is.  You reject it.  Any "reliable" source you find is going to be clearly biased as you have already aptly demonstrated a clear disregard for the scientific principle and the willfulness to claim that the Bible is a proper source of information regarding the volcanic eruption of Mount Redoubt. Alyeska (talk) 22:16, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Wow, you don't even know what you're talking about. If we were to measure the strength of a field by how many articles have been written on it, the word of our lord would out do any field, since it has been around for thousands of years. Just the fact that you can't accept that means you aren't educated enough to appreciate the need for ID to be on this list. LOL
 * How many peer reviewed scientific articles has God written? Can you count them? Alyeska (talk) 02:32, 27 March 2009 (UTC)


 * You are getting sidetracked again. We don't care how strong a field alleged is (and as you've already been informed, the bible doesn't discuss intelligent design at all, and also it's a very recent concept not one that has existed for thousands of years). What we care about is reliable sources stating that intelligent design is a science. We have plenty of articles on the bible and on religious concepts both christian and other, but that has nothing to do with whether intelligent design is a science Nil Einne (talk) 05:48, 27 March 2009 (UTC)


 * It's clear that you both have some very ignorant attitudes toward God's work. You can argue that all human research are the effect of Jesus Christ, as he works within all of us. Jesus works in mysterious ways, and ID and the whole field of Christian science attempts to clarify that through the scientific method. Also, my point I tried to make above was that ID should be the only field which has to provide reliable sources stating that it is a science. In fact, ID and Christian Science start of with a set of axioms, and build a consistent system upon those axioms. How is this different from mathematics. How many fields have reliable sources stating that field is a science -- not reliable sources which manipulates axioms and facts built within that field, rather sources which outright claim and show that the field is a science. I doubt there are any such papers stating "Chemistry is a science". ID has been asked several times to justify itself, so the irony is that there are probably lots of reliable sources, including the MAIN source our holy Bible) which make the case for ID -- lots more than these supposed "sciences". You guys just don't understand it and need more education. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.61.156.4 (talk • contribs)


 * "Mysterious Ways" is a direct contradiction with science. Science attempts to explain the world through rational and predictable knowledge that can be repeated and tested.  "Mysterious Ways" is untestable, unverifiable, unfalsifiable.  Complete contradiction to science itself.  You cannot have "Mysterious Ways" and Science in one.  Other fields of science are reliable because they are testable, verifiable, and falsifiable.  Religion cannot.  The other fields of science justify themselves every single day.  ID does not.  And you ignore the fact that ID was deliberately created by the Discovery Institute solely for the purpose of creating a Public Relations campaign against science in the classroom.  ID was not developed by scientists.  ID was created by a religious political organization for political motivations.  I suggest you read up on the Wedge strategy. Alyeska (talk) 14:28, 27 March 2009 (UTC)


 * This discussion is pointless since you are still repeating bullshit like claiming the bible says ID is a science even though it has been repeatedly pointed out to you that it does not. Also there are many, many sources which talk about chemistry in the context of science. E.g. probably nearly every university with a faculty of science covers chemistry under it. These sources      all talk about chemistry as a science in some way. Your claims then are once again proven utter nonsense and until and unless you come up with reliable sources stating ID as a science, I won't be responding any more Nil Einne (talk) 05:58, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

I am not going to discuss the ID part here. I just want to point out that "unsigned" has one point. Why is "education" and "management" listed under sciences in the artice? Under the heading "philosophy", it is spelled out which areas of philosophy are even relevant to science, which is good. However, neither philosophy, education nor management are generally accepted as belonging to what is english today is "science", although there are areas within each that are scientific. The article should either detail this under "education" and "management" or remove these from the article to avoid confusion. This would be a slight improvement of the article. DanielDemaret (talk) 07:33, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Philosophy a social science?
If there is no peer-reviewed citation to back this up, I would like this to be removed. As venerable a field phlosophy is, it is not broadly included among the social sciences. In addition, as I understand it, the "social sciences" are such specifically because they are empirical, which is not a defining characteristic of philosophy. Shoreranger (talk) 19:32, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

Linguistics
I don't know why linguistics isn't listed as a social science. While it was traditionally considered a humanity, today it is widely considered a social science, which is why it's often put under that in university organization. If psychology and anthropology are social sciences (in fact, linguistics has much overlap with psychology, and was traditionally held under the anthro departments of universities, as at UC Berkeley; in fact, this is a common practice today), then linguistics most definitely is. (I've often heard that "linguistics is the easiest hard science and the hardest soft science.")

Atmospheric Science and Geoscience
I moved atmospheric science from the environmental science section to the earth science section. Also, I deleted Geoscience from the environmental science list because geoscience is another name for earth science. --User:greenegrass 06:08, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Merger proposal
I agree with the suggestion. As the article stands it is clearly original research, with various editors deciding what should be listed as a 'field of science' and what should not be listed. This is why we have 'military history' but not ballistics, 'economic history' but not history itself, law, etc. Dougweller (talk) 13:04, 16 July 2009 (UTC)
 * YES, merging agreed --boarders paradise (talk) 02:14, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Computer Science as a Cognitive Science?
I understand from reading the Cognitive Science page that Artificial Intelligence is included as a part of Cognitive Sciences. However, the Computer Science page defines Computer Science as "the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation, and of practical techniques for their implementation and application in computer systems". I may be incorrect, but it seems like it is too general to include Computer Science under Cognitive Sciences. It might be more correct to put AI instead. Putting Computer Science under Cognitive Science seems akin to adding Physics because Magnetism is used in fMRI machines, which have applications in Neuroscience. I may be off base here, it just was a bit of a surprise to see Computer Science listed under Cognitive Sciences. Would anyone be opposed to me replacing Computer Science with Artificial Intelligence? Cavetroll33 (talk) 09:56, 13 July 2010 (UTC)


 * You are absolutely correct. In fact, cognitive science intersects AI, psychology, neuroscience, philosophy, linguistics, etc; it does not subsume any of them. My view is that all five sub-headings (computer sciences, psychology, neuroscience, philosophy, linguistics) of "cognitive science" should be deleted. Cognitive science is just a multi-disciplinary study of cognition, a traditional sub-field of psychology.-- Palaeovia talk 11:12, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

More references?
Does the page need more references or is it an arbitrary process for adding sciences? I would like to help reorganize it, but I'm not sure what the rules are on listing/removing fields. Pluemaster (talk) 00:52, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

Environmental Science belongs within Biological Sciences
How do the Environmental Sciences differ from the Earth Sciences? It seems to me that environmental sciences are earth sciences which interact with life studies. For example, Environmental Geology is just the study of geology as pertaining to humans and life.

I strongly suggest the Environmental Sciences section be distributed to the field of Life Sciences. If I do not soon see any arguments for such a substantial change, I will move them. --M.lee.wise (talk) 19:25, 11 January 2011 (UTC)