Hijacking Theory and Hypothesis

Somewhere along the line the word ‘theory’ got hijacked. These days theory is a term used to dismiss another person’s beliefs. I hear the expression, “it’s only a theory,” quite often, even people in the media seem to get confused about the word.

What does theory mean when it comes to science? It means a group of propositions believed to be true because they have been tested and verified, or deduced from other true propositions. We might at times call a theory a body of knowledge.

The beliefs in a theory have the delightful characteristics of explaining previous facts and events, and predicting future facts and events. The theory has been tested, verified, and not found wanting.

Some people confuse theory with hypothesis although hypothesis is a word that seems to have been hijacked too.

A hypothesis is a belief that has yet to be tested or verified. This is not to say that a hypothesis is framed at random. Good hypotheses have the virtue of fitting with known theory should they turn out to be true. There are reasonable heuristics one can apply when framing an hypothesis so that one can tell whether the hypothesis is worth testing.

Theory and hypothesis are not the equivalent of faith. For that we can be thankful. The distinction is often important in business as well as science.

What we know about viruses, their mutations, and the diseases they cause, is what is explained and predicted by The Theory of Evolution. That might be one of the reasons why we call it a theory.