The term "anomalistics" was coined by anthropologist Roger W. Wescott (1973 and 1980) and refers to the emerging interdisciplinary study of scientific anomalies (alleged extraordinary events unexplained by currently accepted scientific theory). The approach is today loosely represented by a number of independent organizations and publications, most notably: the Society for Scientific Exploration and its journal, founded by astrophysicist Peter Sturrock; science writer William Corliss's multi-volume The Sourcebook Project ; sociologist Marcello Truzzi's Center for Scientific Anomalies Research and its journal Zetetic Scholar ; editor Steve Moore's Fortean Studies, and science writers Patrick Huyghe's and Dennis Stacy's journal The Anomalist. Those who take this approach are called "anomalists."
Anomalistics has two central features. First, its concerns are purely scientific. It deals only with empirical claims of the extraordinary and is not concerned with alleged metaphysical, theological or supernatural phenomena. As such, it insists on the testability of claims (including both verifiability and falsifiability), seeks parsimonious explanations, places the burden of proof on the claimant, and expects evidence of a claim to be commensurate with its degree of extraordinariness (anomalousness). Though it recognizes that unexplained phenomena exist, it does not presume these are unexplainable but seeks to discover old or to develop new appropriate scientific explanations.
As a scientific enterprise, anomalistics is normatively skeptical and demands inquiry prior to judgement, but skepticism means doubt rather than denial (which is itself a claim, a negative one, for which science also demands proof). Though claims without adequate evidence are usually unproved, this is not confused with evidence of disproof. As methodologists have noted, an absence of evidence does not constitute evidence of absence. Since science must remain an open system capable of modification with new evidence, anomalistics seeks to keep the door ajar even for the most radical claimants willing to engage in scientific discourse. This approach recognizes the need to avoid both the Type I error - thinking something special is happening when it really is not - and the Type II error - thinking nothing special is happening when something special, perhaps rare, actually occurs (Truzzi, 1979a and 1981). While recognizing that a legitimate anomaly may constitute a crisis for conventional theories in science, anomalistics also sees them as an opportunity for progressive change in science. Thus, anomalies are viewed not as nuisances but as welcome discoveries that may lead to the expansion of our scientific understanding (Truzzi, 1979b).
The second key feature of anomalistics is that it is interdisciplinary. It is so in two ways.
Anomalists search for patterns in the acceptance and rejection of new scientific ideas, and this may involve the history, sociology, and psychology of science as well as the scientific fields themselves.
Anomalistics may best be understood by comparing it with some of the alternative approaches to anomalies. These would include three major organized groups: proponents, mystery mongers, and scoffers. Proponents of anomaly claims range from those involved with the occult and mystical to those who seek scientific legitimacy and are what I have termed protoscientific (Truzzi, 1972). Anomalistics is primarily concerned with the claims of protoscientists, for they seek entry into the scientific community and agree to play by the rules of scientific method. Perhaps the most advanced of the protosciences is parapsychology since it, unlike cryptozoology or ufology has obtained an affiliation with the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Protoscientific proponents are concerned with specific areas of anomalies and usually champion their significance for a single science (e.g., parapsychologists see themselves as revisionists of psychology), whereas anomalists may be interested in the same specific anomaly but frame it in a broader context and recognize that the anomaly examined may ultimately best be explained by another branch of science (for example, the data of parapsychology may turn out to be understood best in terms of quantum physics rather than psychology). Anomalistics attempts an integrative overview of all the protosciences and their relations with the accepted sciences.
Going further than the proponents, some who claim anomalies can correctly be described as mystery mongers. Many students of anomalies, such as those associated with Fortean groups (followers of the writer Charles Fort who catalogued what he called the "damned facts" that science dogmatically ignores) fit into this category. These claimants enjoy calling attention to what seem to be unexplained phenomena that show the limitations of science. Their writings give the distinct impression that even if a radically new scientific explanation could be found for these phenomena, it would produce disappointment rather than celebration. At their most extreme, their attitude is fundamentally anti-scientific, for such mystery mongers want to embarrass rather than advance science. Unlike anomalists, who see anomalies as a wake-up call that tells us of a need for new, improved and more comprehensive scientific theories, mystery mongers seek the extraordinary for its own sake. The mystery monger mainly wants to be entertained by nature's "freak show" which stands outside the main entrance to science's central "circus."
In diametric opposition to the mystery mongers, who love things unexplained, there are the scoffers who seem to loath a mystery. Though many in this category who dismiss and ridicule anomaly claims call themselves "skeptics," they often are really "pseudo-skeptics" because they deny rather than doubt anomaly claims (Truzzi, 1987b). While taking a skeptical view towards anomaly claims, they seem less inclined to take the same critical stance towards orthodox theories. For example, they may attack alternative methods in medicine (e.g., for a lack of double-blind studies) while ignoring that similar criticisms can be levelled against much conventional medicine (e.g., these scoffers rarely complain about the absence of double-blind tests for the results of surgery).
Many claims of anomalies are bunk and deserve proper debunking, so anomalists may engage in legitimate debunking. However, those I term scoffers often make judgements without full inquiry, and they may be more interested in discrediting an anomaly claim than in dispassionately investigating it (Hyman, 1980). Since scoffers sometimes manage to discredit anomaly claims (e.g., through ridicule or ad hominem attacks) without presenting any solid disproof, such activities really constitute pseudo-debunking.
A characteristic of many scoffers is their pejorative characterization of proponents as "promoters" and sometimes even the most protoscientific anomaly claimants are labelled as "pseudoscientists" or practitioners of "pathological science." In their most extreme form., scoffers represent a form of quasi-religious Scientism that treats minority or deviant viewpoints in science as heresies (Truzzi, 1996).