[Deorum]

[ QUOTE ]
Theory has been defined as the opposite of practice.

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I don't want to hijack this thread, so please, nobody respond heavily to this.

This definition of theory has always bothered me, and I just wanted to get it off my chest after having been reminded of it here. I often hear somebody make an argument, to which somebody else will respon 'well, in theory that works, but not in reality.' This really irritates me. If something does not work in practice, it does not work in theory either. Rather, it means that there is something wrong with your theory. Something is being omitted or miscalculated.

For instance, if somebody says 'if everybody in the world did X, then Y would be the result' and another person replied, 'well, that works in theory, but not in reality' what they really mean is 'well, that works in your hypothetical but not in reality.' The words theory and hypothetical are not synonymous. A theory is an explanation of how different parts of a system work, and why those specific parts work the way they do. A hypothetical is a contrived system.