[tdehnel]

You can't even observe something without theories. For example:

- I need to observe here and not anywhere else

- I can reliably interpret my senses/the instrumentation is working correctly

- Objects of this type normally behave in X way, because of Y

- etc

Think of it a different way. You can come up with a theory without any observation whatsoever. Black holes, for example, were conjectured well before they were observed.

[s1artibartfast]

Well sure, that's the point that you're trying to make. I thought anything most people felt you were claiming you need a theory related to the novel Discovery or convention. That is to say how it might work and what the expected outcomes are. I can't go to the lab without a theory that my car can get me there. That doesn't mean I have a hypothesis for what will happen when I mix two substances in the lab.

Thinking that something will either happen or not happen if I mix those two substances is not a theory.

[tdehnel]

> Thinking that something will either happen or not happen if I mix those two substances is not a theory.

OK I'll bite. What is it then?

[mrguyorama]

Consider the story of an artificial sweetener being discovered by a chemist who didn't wash their hands properly and the bread they ate that night was sweet.

Are you suggesting this was only possible because they had a "theory" that bread is not sweet?

[tdehnel]

yes, that is one good example