Another vote for “Emerging”.
It acknowledges that the science is based on an existing body of science, and suggests that the existent science may move in a new direction.
Exploratory would be another.
Theoretical might apply to some.
I dislike “theoretical” in this connection.
Lay folks use “theoretical” to mean “An idea as yet unproven that may never be”. e.g. see the creationist objection that evolution is “just a theory”. In other words, a theory is a mere belief, a social construct that can be argued against on social grounds.
Meantime, professionals use “theory” in a very different meaning: “Something which makes testable predictions about the real world that does test successfully with all the evidence to date.” In other words, a theory is a (provisional) truth. A derivative truth, but a truth nonetheless. Which will remain true unless and until it is falsified by evidence and nothing but evidence.
Using the word “theoretical” to apply to partly-proven legit science at the edge of our current knowledge is embracing the former, defective, meaning of the term. IMO we/you don’t want to encourage that.
esoterica
Science.
I think this falls under “hypothesis”.
This is why I included the words “for some”.
I was thinking “Manhattan Project”.
I suspect some/much pharmacological research falls under “theoretical” - using accepted science to postulate future discoveries.
That was what a friend suggested also, but I’m thinking more along the lines of hypotheses that have been tested and have received some validation empirically, but not enough validation to be generally accepted. For example, the psychological effects of infrasound. There’s some interesting work suggesting that infrasound can produce sensations commonly associated with hauntings and what not, and I’d say those findings are more than hypothetical, but I wouldn’t call it a settled question.
Tentative does sound good. Good idea, Andy.
[QUOTE=Tim Minchin]
By definition , alternative medicine has either not been proved to work or been proved not to work. Do you know what they call alternative medicine that’s been proved to work? Medicine.
[/QUOTE]
…
CMC fnord!
“Para” like in parapsychology.
I think science needs to come up with a term for phenomenon where there is just no good established and proven scientific reason for why.
Presearch
There’s a large distinction between things we haven’t bothered to collect the details on yet, and Big Questions that are currently open or subject to competing as yet unproven explanations.
Both of these are different from trumped up woo-based “Scientists baffled” stuff like parapsychology.
Do you have an actual example of something that actually exists and there’s “just no good established and proven scientific reason for why”?
Then we can sensibly discuss which of the three categories these example(s) fall into.
I don’t like a lot of these ideas here. Theoretical seems bad because that seems to ride more on the common usage of theory rather than the scientific/mathematical usage of the word. Cutting edge to me seems less applicable to things like string theory. It seems more like applications of new technologies, like someone doing work with LHC or the recent confirmed gravitational waves from LIGO would be something I think is aptly called cutting edge. Speculative I like a little better, but really, all science is speculation, even things that are currently well supported theories may one day be overturned by new observations, just as previously well established theories have been.
Conjecture seems like the best word to me. It’s something many scientists suspect to be true and no one has found any contradictions for yet (or at least not to any large degree of which I’ve heard), but don’t have sufficient evidence to prove it either. I’d say String Theory is aptly called a conjecture and that might change as more predictions and experiments to test those are made.
Something like Flat Earth or Vaccinations cause Autism are clearly not since they make testable predictions and there’s strong evidence against it. Obviously, there’s still some people who disagree with that evidence, but then it’s best described as controversial since the discussion is about the legitimacy of the tests and the results. Though, I think fringe science is also (perhaps even more) applicable since, at least in these examples, it’s relatively few people pushing for it.
I’d leave something like Intelligent Design and ESP as pseudoscience or non-science because they don’t make scientifically testable predictions, and when tests are designed, the argument isn’t about the results of those tests, but about the design itself.