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Theory Rejection theorem (Barseghyan-Pandey-2023) (view source)

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|Resource=Pandey (2023)
|Prehistory=
|History=Initially, the theory rejection theorem was accepted as deducible from the conjunction of [[The First Law (Barseghyan-2015)|the first law]] for theories and [[Rory Harder|Harder]]'s original [[The Zeroth Law (Harder-2015 formulation makes a restrictive claim )|zeroth law]]. After the replacement of Harder's zeroth law with [[Compatibility Corollary (Fraser-Sarwar-2018)|the compatibility corollary]], suggested by [[Patrick Fraser|Fraser]] and [[Ameer Sarwar|Sarwar]], it became accepted that the theory rejection theorem is a theory can be replaced only by another theorydeductive consequence of the first law for theories and the compatibility corollary.[[CiteRef::Fraser and Sarwar (2018)|pp. 72-74]]
Barseghyan's original 2015 formulation makes a restrictive claim that a theory can be replaced only by another theory. In 2023, Pandey suggested a correction to the theorem by allowing theories to be replaced by epistemic elements of ''all'' types, which is more in tune with the first law from which the theorem presumably follows.
|Page Status=Stub
|Editor Notes=
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{{Theory Example
|Title=Plenism
|Description=Barseghyan considers the case of ''plenism,'' "the view that there can be no empty space (i.e. no space absolutely devoid of matter)", as a key historical illustration of the '''Theory Rejection theorem''' in [[Barseghyan (2015)]].
 
<blockquote> Within the system of the Aristotelian-medieval natural philosophy, ''plenism'' was one of many theorems. Yet, when the Aristotelian natural philosophy was replaced by that of Descartes, ''plenism'' remained in the mosaic, for it was a theorem in the Cartesian system too. To appreciate this we have to consider the Aristotelian-medieval law of violent motion, which states that an object moves only if the applied force is greater than the resistance of the medium. In that case, according to the law, the velocity will be proportional to the force and inversely proportional to resistance. Otherwise the object won’t move; its velocity will be zero ...
 
Taken as an axiom, this law has many interesting consequences. It follows from this law, that if there were no resistance the velocity of the object would be infinite. But this is absurd since nothing can move infinitely fast (for that would mean being at two places simultaneously). Therefore, there should always be some resistance, i.e. something that fills up the medium. Thus, we arrive at the conception of plenism ...
 
There weren’t many elements of the Aristotelian-medieval mosaic that maintained their state within the Cartesian mosaic. The conception of plenism was among the few that survived through the transition. In the Cartesian system, plenism followed directly from the assumption that extension is the attribute of matter and that no attribute can exist independently from the substance in which it inheres ...
 
In short, when the axioms of a theory are replaced by another theory, some of the theorems may nevertheless manage to stay in the mosaic, provided that they are compatible with the newly accepted theory. This is essentially what the theory rejection theorem tells us. Thus, if someday our currently accepted general relativity gets replaced by some new theory, the theories that followed from general relativity, such as the theory of black holes, may nevertheless manage to remain in the mosaic.[[CiteRef::Barseghyan (2015)|p. 168-170]] </blockquote>
|Example Type=Historical
}}
{{Theory Example
|Title=Theology
|Description=The rejection of ''theology proper'' (the study of God, his being, his attributes, and his works) from the scientific mosaic is a historical illustration of the ''Theory Rejection theorem'' and how accepted theories in one field may become rejected due to theories in other fields. In essence, theological propositions were rejected, but were not replaced with more theological propositions. It is difficult to track the exact dynamics of theology's "exile," but it is possible that these propositions were rejected and replaced with the thesis of ''agnosticism'', or that they were rejected due to the acceptance of ''evolutionary biology''. The "exile," as Barseghyan terms it, could have also been a very gradual process, and that the rejection of theological propositions came about for different reasons in different mosaics. Despite the difficulties in tracking down the exact dynamics of the gradual rejection of theology from the scientific mosaic, Barseghyan summarizes the evidence as such: "what must be appreciated here is that a theory can be replaced in the mosaic by theories pertaining to other fields of inquiry".[[CiteRef::Barseghyan (2015)|p. 172]]
|Example Type=Historical
}}
{{Theory Example
|Title=Astrology
|Description=Another example of the theory rejection theorem, specifically explaining that theories may not only be rejected because of the acceptance of new theories in their respective theories, is the case of ''natural astrology'' presented in [[Barseghyan (2015)]].
 
<blockquote>The exile of astrology from the mosaic is yet another example. It is well known that astrology was once a respected scientific discipline and its theories were part of the mosaic. Of course, not all of the astrology was accepted; it was the so-called ''natural astrology'' – the theory of celestial influences on physical phenomena of the terrestrial region – that was part of the Aristotelian-medieval mosaic. ... Although, for now, we cannot reconstruct all the details or even the approximate decade when the exile of natural astrology took place, one thing is clear: when the once-accepted theory of natural astrology became rejected, it wasn’t replaced by another theory of natural astrology.[[CiteRef::Barseghyan (2015)|p. 172]]</blockquote>
|Example Type=Historical
}}
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