A systemic theory of scientific discovery: a conceptual review of field maturation and independent convergence

Abstract

This article develops a systemic theory of scientific discovery as a conceptual framework. Its central hypothesis is that a scientific idea is not explained by an isolated mind alone and is more likely to emerge when a field has reached a level of conceptual, technical, empirical, social, and institutional readiness. Such readiness is hypothesised to make some ideas thinkable, expressible, and stable. The article uses a conceptual narrative review, because the aim is to build and justify a theoretical construct. The argument is organised around two main ideas. The first is field maturation. A field becomes mature when problems, methods, tools, data, and communities form a structure that allows a new idea to be stated. The second is independent convergence. Different researchers, or different groups, may reach close results at a similar time because they work inside a shared system of problems and resources. The article relates these ideas to classic work on multiple discovery and to recent work in the meta-science of science, research teams, disruption, knowledge recombination, and conceptual review methods. The proposed framework examines emergence, convergence, stabilisation, and diffusion of scientific ideas as effects of a system of knowledge. The article ends with analytical propositions, scope conditions, candidate operationalisations, and research lines for future empirical testing.