Accidental Group

What is accidental group? How should it be defined?

This term has to denote all those groups that are somehow accidental (e.g. left handed Armenian smokers). The task is to understand what makes these groups accidental.

In the scientonomic context, this term was first used by Nicholas Overgaard in 2016. The term is currently accepted by Scientonomy community.

In Scientonomy, the accepted definition of the term is:

• A group that does not have a collective intentionality.

Scientonomic History

Acceptance Record

Here is the complete acceptance record of this question (it includes all the instances when the question was accepted as a legitimate topic for discussion by a community):

Community	Accepted From	Acceptance Indicators	Still Accepted	Accepted Until	Rejection Indicators
Scientonomy	19 May 2017	The question became accepted with the publication of Overgaard's A Taxonomy for Social Agents of Scientific Change.	Yes

All Theories

The following theories have attempted to answer this question:

Theory	Formulation	Formulated In
Accidental Group (Overgaard-2017)	A group that does not have a collective intentionality.	2017

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Accepted Theories

The following theories have been accepted as answers to this question:

Community	Theory	Accepted From	Accepted Until
Scientonomy	Accidental Group (Overgaard-2017)	2 February 2018

Suggested Modifications

Here is a list of modifications concerning this topic:

Modification	Community	Date Suggested	Summary	Verdict	Verdict Rationale	Date Assessed
Sciento-2017-0012	Scientonomy	19 May 2017	Accept a new taxonomy for group and its two sub-types - accidental group, and community.	Accepted	A consensus has emerged after a long discussion that the distinction and the respective definitions should be accepted. It was noted that "these formulations tend to be the starting point for so many of our discussions"c1 and that "despite all disagreements that this taxonomy causes, it is actually accepted by the community".c2 Yet, it was also indicated that whereas the definition of group as "two or more people that share a characteristic" is the best we have at the moment, it may be potentially necessary to pursue the idea of redefining it as "one or more people..." to allow for one-scientist communities.c3 Finally, while a question was raised whether there is any "value in defining accidental groups as something separate from groups",c4 it was eventually agreed that it is important to draw "a clear distinction between the two kinds of groups as accidental groups and communities".c5	2 February 2018

Current View

In Scientonomy, the accepted definition of the term is Accidental Group (Overgaard-2017).

Accidental Group (Overgaard-2017) states: "A group that does not have a collective intentionality."

This definition aims to discern between accidental groups, i.e. the ones that don't have a collective intentionality, and actual communities, i.e. groups that do have collective intentionality.

Related Topics

This topic is also related to the following topic(s):

• Group
• Community