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The word theory has many distinct meanings in different fields of knowledge, depending on their methodologies and the context of discussion. Broadly speaking we can say that a theory is some kind of belief or claim that (supposedly) explains, asserts, or consolidates some class of claims. Additionally, in contrast with a theorem the statement of the theory is generally accepted only in some tentative fashion as opposed to regarding it as having been conclusively established. This may merely indicate, as it does in the sciences, that the theory was arrived at using potentially faulty inferences (scientific induction) as opposed to the necessary inferences used in mathematical proofs. In these cases the term theory does not suggest a low confidence in the claim and many uses of the term in the sciences require just the opposite. However, In common usage, the word theory is often used to signify a conjecture, an opinion, a speculation, or a hypothesis. In this usage, a theory is just a claim with the additional suggestion that the claim isn't sufficiently justified to be more than a theory. The word derives from Greek ?e???a theoria (Jerome), Greek "contemplation, speculation", from ?e???? "spectator", ??a thea "a view" + ???? horan "to see", literally "looking at a show".[1] A second possible etymology traces the word back to t? ?e??? to theion "divine things" instead of thea, reflecting the concept of contemplating the divine organisation (Cosmos) of the nature. It is attested in English since 1592.[2] In science the word theory is not a synonym of "fact". For example, it is a fact that an apple dropped on earth has been observed to fall towards the center of the planet but we invoke theories of gravity to explain this occurence. However, even inside the sciences the word theory picks out several different concepts dependent on the context. In casual speech scientsts don't use the term theory particularly precisce fashion, allowing historical accidents to determine whether a given body of scientific work is called a theory, law, principle or something else. For instance Einstein's relativity is usually called "the theory of relativity" while Newton's theory of gravity often is called "the law of gravity." In this kind of casual use by scientists the word theory can be used flexibly to refer to whatever kind of explanation or prediction is being examined. It is for this instance that a scientific theory is a claim based on a body of evidence. This is in considerable contrast to the more philosophical context where a scientific theory is understood to be a testable model capable of predicting future occurrences or observations and capable of being tested through experiment or otherwise verified through empirical observation. As with most things in philosophy there is considerable debate as to whether this is really the correct concept to use in describing scientific research. For instance many definitions also add the constrain that a theory describes the natural world, though it is often unclear whether this is a definition of natural world or a constraint on what can be a theory. Note that this concept specifically does not require that a theory be particularly well supported or have any justification whatsoever. A major concern in this philosophical context is the problem of demarcation, i.e., distingushing those ideas that are properly studied by the sciences and those that are not. Intuitively one might suppose that it doesn't matter where a suggestion came from, when it was made, or if it was ever well supported by the evidence to whether it's the sort of thing that scientists ought to consider (e.g. test or dismiss as already testexd). Unsurprisingly, therefore, this concept of a scientific theory tends to apply equally to justified and unjustified predictions [3]. In other words the term theory is used so that it encompasses what might be commonly called a hypothesis.
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