What will be the next scientific theory to be abandoned by science?

I hadn't heard that behaviourist theory had been overturned. I'd read of Skinner and all as far back as the 1960s and it was controversial even then, but I was not aware that it was considered to be the sole factor in psychology.

Spontaneous generation? I would not have thought it was a scientific theory, since the instant it was tested back in the 1700s it failed, Perhaps it was an hypothesis. Yes, it was disproved before Louis Pasteur was born.

Steady state Universe? Again, that seems to have been more of an assumption than a theory. In the long run, it was not consistent with Newtonian physics, Perhaps nobody really thought about it very much.

Classical physics, Well there was a theory. and it still is, to a very large extent. You do not need Einstein's corrections to Newtonian calculations to plant a probe on the Moon or send a satellite to Saturn. I see classical physics in much the same light as the simple gas law PV=nRT. It is only in extreme cases of gravity, velocity, pressure or temperature that the very good approximations fail. Classical physics is still perfectly adequate for virtually all forms of technology apart from electronics and nuclear technology. Quantum and relativistic effects are not needed in design of buildings, bridges, cars, locomotives, aircraft and such. Nor can they be dragged in to "explain" supposed psi effects.

So what is going to fail in the future? Hang on while I get out my crystal ball, Given the notable failure of of any major scientific theories to fail in the past 50 or 60 years,it's difficult to make a prediction. Some minor theories in chemistry, of which most of us have never heard are likely to fall over. These apply to very specific reactions which do not appear to follow the expected or ordinary course. Some medical theories may fail, there is already argument about whether the saturated fats - atherosclerosis link is real.

I do not regard string or M theory as major theories, by the way. Big bang theory is likely to be modified but I'd lay odds that the major features will remain.

I'll go out a long way on a very thin and fragile limb here, but I suspect that some aspects of supposed psi effects will turn out to be real, thus disproving the "theory" that none of them are. This does not mean that I believe the whole gamut of ridiculous claims.

However back about 40 years ago the British writer Colin Wilson advanced the idea that there is a "faculty X" which is poorly developed in most people but possessed to a detectable extent in a very few, perhaps one in five million or even fewer. Wilson is very far from being a scientist, but he gave a few examples of this which appear to be well supported by witnesses. All of them seem to have been "telepathic" awareness of some thing or event at a distance at the time of the awareness. This did not include the ability to predict events, only to detect something that existed at the time. Since the well has been poisoned by superstition, sloppy work and fraud for centuries, detection of such effects in these very few people is going to take some doing. Dr. Sheldrake is not the one who will manage it though.

I would have to argue that if I were sufficiently prescient that I could make such a prediction, then I should either be a scientist or a psychic.

That said, at least science abandons propositions when shown to be untrue, unlike another branch of "knowledge."

It is possible that evolution could be abandoned or modified, but it won't be by the religious. Major theories have been abandoned or modified in the past.

That DNA is the controlling factor in a species. The discovery of the existence of the quantum computer being used by life forms will rewrite biology and pose a new puzzle for science. What is the language and how do we access it. Genetic memory will replace the concept of reincarnation and communications systems will have to be reengineered to stop our present radio transmissions from over writing the existing programing.

It will make possible the medical scanners as seen on Startrek and drugs will be come ancient medicine.

The speed of light is not the fastest things can travel. A new energy spectrum will be found that travels at the speed of c*pi to 1000 power @ 1/60th of a second.

I don't know what the science of tomorrow holds, but I do know that lesser explanations tend to lead to greater ones. Classical (Newtonian) physics is a great example. It doesn't fully describe our universe, but it still works really well at certain scales. See Isaac Asimov's "The Relativity of Wrong."

http://chem.tufts.edu/answersinscience/relativityo...

It is the very nature of science that its laws can be proven wrong. When they are they are abandoned. Science with undeniable truths would be sterile.

Why ask religious folk instead of in the science forum?

Scientific theories are not abandoned, they are disproved using scientific methodologies.