Editing Protoscience (section)

==History==
Protoscience as a research field with the characteristics of an undeveloped science appeared in the early 20th century.{{sfn|Jones|1910|p=94}}{{sfn|Hobhouse|1915|p=41}} In 1910, Jones described the field of [[political economy]] as it began the transition to the modern field of [[economics]]:
: I confess to a personal predilection for some term such as proto-science, pre-science, or nas-science, to give expression to what I conceive to be the true state of affairs, which I take to be this, that economics and kindred subjects are not sciences, but are on the way to become sciences.{{sfn|Jones|1910}}

[[Thomas Kuhn]] later provided a more precise description, protoscience as a field that generates testable conclusions, faces “incessant criticism and continually strive for a fresh start,” but currently, like [[art]] and [[philosophy]], appears to have failed to progress in a way similar to the progress seen in the established sciences.{{sfn|Kuhn|1970|p=244}}  He applies protoscience to the fields of [[natural philosophy]], [[medicine]] and the [[craft]]s in the past that ultimately became established sciences.{{sfn|Kuhn|1970|p=245}}  Philosophers later developed more precise criteria to identify protoscience using the <em>cognitive field</em> concept.{{sfn|Bunge|1983|pp=202–203}}{{sfn|Tuomela|1987|pp=89–90}}