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|Description=It is Scientonomy currently accepted in scientonomy that accepts three distinct stances which an epistemic agent can may take three distinct stances towards a theory: acceptance, use, and pursuit.While these three stances are essential for understanding the process of scientific change, the current framework fails to capture an Sarwar and Fraser [[CiteRef::Sarwar and Fraser (2018)]] argue that there is another important epistemic stance that epistemic agents take which may be taken towards theories, which the current framework precludes: scientificity. It is a historical fact We see from the history of science that epistemic agents view some theories as scientific and others some as unscientific. For example, ; general relativity is currently considered scientific by the contemporary scientific community [[CiteRef::Hartle (Hartle, 20052006)]], while the theory of phlogiston theory is considered unscientific [[CiteRef::Wisniak (Wisniak, 2005)]]. One suggested subspecies It is generally understood that there exist pseudoscientific theories, which are a subclass of unscientific theories that is often considered in the literature is pseudoscientific theories [[CiteRef::Hanson (Hanson, 2017)]]. Furthermore, it is also possible for an agent may not to have any take a definitive stance concerning regarding the scientificity of a theory. In such cases, we can say that the scientificity of that theory is undefined for that agent. Consider the current status academic discipline of marketing. There , for instance; there is clearly no consensus in the scientific community about the scientific status of marketing. Some view it as an amalgamation of theories from other scientific disciplines (which they , and there are arguments for and against the claim render it scientific), while others contend that it does not have marketing is a scientific identity and it merely applies other theories discipline [[CiteRef::Brown (Brown, 1996; )]][[CiteRef::Anderson, (1983)]].

It is argued in (Sarwar & Fraser, 2018) that If scientificity is a distinct epistemic stance, it must have a definition, but it is unclear how it should be precisely defined. Consider the following definition (suggested to us by Paul Patton in a private correspondence)hypothetical formulation: “a theory is said to be scientific if it is taken to deal with a legitimate topic of scientific inquiry”. At first, this definition seems This may appear to be a plausible starting point. After all, now that questions have been recently accepted into the scientonomic ontology of epistemic elements, and it strikes might strike one as intuitive that any scientific theory that claims to be scientific must, at the very least, try attempt to answer a scientific question that is itself considered scientific. However, this definition won’t do as it has at least four drawbacksfails for several reasons.

To begin withFirst, it uses defers the content of the definition to the concept definition of “a legitimate topic of scientific inquiry”, which itself is circularly dependent on the concept of scientificity. In order to understand what makes an inquiry scientifically legitimate, one must understand what scientificity This iscircular, and in order to understand what scientificity is, one must know what scientifically legitimate inquiry is. Clearly, so this definition does little to clarify the notion of scientificity. SecondFurthermore, the phrase “legitimate topic of scientific inquiry” is itself undefined in the scientonomic context. The only time something similar according to this phrase occurs in scientonomic literature is in Rawleigh’s definition of question acceptance: “a question is said to be accepted if it is taken as a legitimate topic of inquiry” (Rawleigh, 2018, p. 10). However, Rawleigh is cautious enough not to include “scientific” in his definition. Consequently, although we do have an accepted definition of question acceptance, we currently lack any notion of question scientificity. Thus, if we were to define the notion of theory scientificity by means of question scientificity, we would be relying on a yet undefined concept Sarwar and would be pushing the task further back, without introducing much clarity to the definiendum. FurthermoreFraser, "dealing with a “legitimate `legitimate topic of scientific inquiry” inquiry' may be a necessary condition for the scientificity of a theory, but it cannot be a sufficient condition. It is possible that a theory may attempt to answer scientific questions, but the answers it provides may not be considered scientific" [[CiteRef:Sarwar and Fraser (2018)]]. Take, for exampleThus, resorting to the question “what determines /answer part of the variation scientonomic framework in human temperament?” which is currently considered scientific in mainstream personality psychology. Naturally, the very fact that a certain theory attempts to answer this question is not sufficient to render theory scientific. After all, one could give astrological or phrenological explanations for the differences in human temperaments. This would be a case of a theory providing unscientific answers to a scientific question. Thus, attempting to answer a legitimate topic of scientific inquiry way is not sufficient for a theory to be considered scientific. Finally, Sarwar and Fraser go further and claim that "it is reasonable to suspect that any attempt to define theory scientificity in terms of its relation to questions will inevitably be problematic for the same reasons listed above. It is always possible to construct ad hoc, non-scientific theories that answer a given question. We could, for instance, answer the question of the shape of the Earth by something as nonsensical as “the Earth is donut-shaped”. If the scientificity of a theory were to be determined by the qualities of the questions being answered, then any nonsense could potentially qualify as scientific" [[CiteRef::Sarwar and Fraser (2018)]]. Therefore, the The content of questions cannot determine scientific theories from unscientific theories. Although this was only a single attempt appears to formulate be a definition of fruitless avenue for defining scientificity, it . This highlights many of the complexities complexity that arise when one tackles this problemattempts to define scientificity concretely. It As such, a definition is therefore an important, though complex open question as to how one might properly formulate the notion of scientificityrequired.