protoscience
protoscience noun: an unscientific or pseudoscientific field of study which later becomes or spawns a science (e.g., astrology led to astronomy, alchemy led to chemistry, and, most generally, natural philosophy led to science).
Noun
protoscience (countable and uncountable, plural protosciences)
- An unscientific or pseudoscientific field of study which later becomes or spawns a science (e.g., astrology led to astronomy, alchemy led to chemistry, and, most generally, natural philosophy led to science).
- A field of study at the initial phase of the scientific method, involving information gathering and hypothesis formulation, but is not yet falsifiable, or if it is, its predictions have not yet been observed.
- However, observation alone is not "modern" science; simple observation leads to "proto-science." Proto-science accepts observations without question or verification.2008, Donald M. Hassler, Clyde Wilcox, New Boundaries in Political Science Fiction - Page 8
Synonyms of protoscience
Forms of protoscience
| plural | protosciences |
|---|---|
| alternative form | proto-science |
Origin of protoscience
From proto- + science.
Questions about protoscience
- What does protoscience mean?
- Protoscience means an unscientific or pseudoscientific field of study which later becomes or spawns a science (e.g., astrology led to astronomy, alchemy led to chemistry, and, most generally, natural philosophy led to science).
- What part of speech is protoscience?
- Protoscience is a noun.
- What is the plural of protoscience?
- The plural of protoscience is protosciences.
Words near protoscience in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: protoscience (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Cite this entry: “protoscience.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/protoscience. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.