Prescientific system

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Prescientific systems are approaches to scientific fields such as medicine or astronomy that evolved before the natural sciences established their modern standards of methodological work and theoretical understanding. Support for the system was largely anecdotal, and objective testing procedures were often lacking.

"Prescientific" is a term that can be used to judge the historical significance of a phenomenon, whether it be a body of alleged knowledge, methodology, belief or practice. As such its usefulness as a term is limited to discussing the history of a phenomenon, and does not accurately describe the phenomenon's present day status.

1 Historical paths
2 Prescientific systems and ideas include
3 References
4 See also
5 External links

[edit] Historical paths

A prescientific phenomena can follow at least one of three paths leading to extremely different conclusions:

It can be scientifically validated and accepted, becoming a part of scientifically accepted fact. In medicine, such phenomena often start as traditional medicine, or "alternative" medicine, and end up becoming evidence based medicine (EBM).
It can be disproven and rejected after much experimentation shows negative results. Such phenomena are relegated to the history books as historic artifacts.
It can, in spite of a lack of scientific validation - and even in spite of clear rejection - be preserved and believed, thus becoming a current pseudoscientific phenomena. In medicine, such phenomena are often labeled quackery by the medical community and skeptics.