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'''"Smoking gun"''' is a evidentiary trace (or subcollection of traces) that unambiguously descriminates one [[hypothesis]] from among a set of currently available rival hypotheses as providing "[[Inference to the Best Explanation|the best explanation]]" of the traces thus far observed.<ref name="Cleland">{{Cite journal
| author=Cleland, C.E.
| title=Methodological and Epistemic Differences between Historical Science and Experimental Science
| journal=Philosophy of Science
| volume=69
| month=September | year=2002 | pages=474–496
| format=PDF
| url=http://spot.colorado.edu/~cleland/articles/Cleland.PS.Pdf
| accessdate = 25.1.2012
}}</ref> It is always possible that future [[scientific observation|observations]] or theoretical developments will depose a smiking gun and that another hypothesis (new or old) will attain status of the best explanation. Some of the factors that go into transforming a trace(s) into a smoking gun for a particular hypothesis may be sociological or psychological, especially in the field of [[historical science]] where direct observation is not possible and testing of hypothesis producing supporting evidence is obscure. A search for a smoking gun may also turn up evidence against a target hypothesis.
Some historical scientists use the term "smoking gun" very losely and rampantly in their informal and popular works to degree that it became a subject of criticism by James Powell who refers to it as to the "tiresome methafor of 'smoking gun'".<ref>{{cite |title=Night Comes to the Cretaceous |author=James Powell |publisher=Harcourt Brace |place=San Diego |year=1998 |pages=115 |isbn=978-01560-07030 |url=http://books.google.com/books?hl=no&id=eVG8lX8XnWoC |quote=One could describe this result using the tiresome metaphor of "smoking gun"...}}</ref>
==References==
<references/>
==See also==
*[[Experimental science]]
*[[Historical science]]
*[[Inference to the Best Explanation]]
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Methodology of Science]]
| author=Cleland, C.E.
| title=Methodological and Epistemic Differences between Historical Science and Experimental Science
| journal=Philosophy of Science
| volume=69
| month=September | year=2002 | pages=474–496
| format=PDF
| url=http://spot.colorado.edu/~cleland/articles/Cleland.PS.Pdf
| accessdate = 25.1.2012
}}</ref> It is always possible that future [[scientific observation|observations]] or theoretical developments will depose a smiking gun and that another hypothesis (new or old) will attain status of the best explanation. Some of the factors that go into transforming a trace(s) into a smoking gun for a particular hypothesis may be sociological or psychological, especially in the field of [[historical science]] where direct observation is not possible and testing of hypothesis producing supporting evidence is obscure. A search for a smoking gun may also turn up evidence against a target hypothesis.
Some historical scientists use the term "smoking gun" very losely and rampantly in their informal and popular works to degree that it became a subject of criticism by James Powell who refers to it as to the "tiresome methafor of 'smoking gun'".<ref>{{cite |title=Night Comes to the Cretaceous |author=James Powell |publisher=Harcourt Brace |place=San Diego |year=1998 |pages=115 |isbn=978-01560-07030 |url=http://books.google.com/books?hl=no&id=eVG8lX8XnWoC |quote=One could describe this result using the tiresome metaphor of "smoking gun"...}}</ref>
==References==
<references/>
==See also==
*[[Experimental science]]
*[[Historical science]]
*[[Inference to the Best Explanation]]
[[Category:Science]]
[[Category:Methodology of Science]]