There are few difficulties in making this distinction. I’ll cover a couple of them.
A conjecture, made by an expert, is pseudo-science. There was debate about Einstein and Hawking’s early theories, when they first presented them. No one else had worked out the math, so they couldn’t say. So, according to the definition of a rigorous theory, it wasn’t science yet. Today, we could say it WAS science all along, just not confirmed, but not at the time. That’s one of the things that pisses people off, an expert, a respected scholar, can do that, and on rare occasions, an amateur does and is right, but usually, they aren’t. So, no one bothers even trying to confirm it.
Another, and I thought Offler was going to say this, we don’t know what gravity is. We can predict it, simulate it, simulate not having it, measure it, but we can’t put it in a bottle or create an anti-gravity device. Same with germ theory. At first, we didn’t know what germs were, but one guy figured out you should wash your hands before doing surgery. Essentially, he was theorizing some invisible force. Someone who doesn’t understand science can’t understand how this is different from saying a universe exists therefore SOMEONE must have created it.
People figure out what a reasonable argument looks like, and they make one that looks reasonable to them. But then someone comes along and points out a flaw, or challenges a premise or their methods, or lack of data. They discover that science is actually hard work, so they try to discredit the entire concept.
Interesting. I think that along these lines, when it comes to pseudoscience versus science, I don't really have a problem with this blurred boundary specifically. It's when people maliciously promote falsehoods that is the colloquial, negative aspect of pseudoscience that we don't like.Good point. Reminds me of my climate science debates, the challenges and doubts themselves aren't so bad at all - it's the refusal to listen to how those challenges and doubts have been resolved that creates the monstrosities.