This paper follows an interdisciplinary approach through at least three disciplines, i.e. logic, ontology and sociology (of expertise). Its aim is to provide a useful tool for the fields related to the study of expertise to demarcate the various scientific fields. In the process several issues are also addressed; issues such as causation and negation that are equally important for this discussion but current literature does not and maybe cannot cover.

The concept of “predatory” publishing, despite many studies of the phenomenon,
remains unclear. This paper visualizes this theme through an epistemological
perspective, and claims that conceptual limitations emerge from an impressionism of
idealization, the entrapment of cause and effect induced by a journalology-based
perspective, and entrenched fantasized extraction, imagination and divination of what
constitutes the truth, in essence, a path never followed by an epistēmōn. Reality, proof,
verification, recorded observations and their interpretations have been pivoted to fit
the theoretical flavor of the day, an entity one day being predatory, the next not.
Ephemeral judgements of predatory may have been built on boundless disregard for
common sense, and yet, these have led to some scientists’ apotheosis, almost
oblivious of the intangibility of “valid” or the infinitesimal continuum of “predatory”.
Maybe, fault-ridden authoritarian argumentative disabilities are at fault.

Is “science” the corresponding concept of its Greek progenitor, epistēmē? Traditionally, they were thought of as identical concepts. They are not, in more than one way, and the reader is called to evaluate them not based on their chronological order but on the specific systemic characteristics presented here.The crucial difference between the epistemonic (from epistēmē) method and the scientific method will also be presented.One of the main differences that will be discussed is related to logic, both as a concept and as a theory. What the authors present here is by no means a synthesis of past ideas; we do acknowledge that some similar ideas might have appeared in the past but never in the form presented here or within the system proposed in what follows. This work is not about who did not say whatever we propose or who might have some similar thoughts within some irrelevant context. All ideas here stem from original work done solely by us and the ensuing system is unique and of utmost important being also an external critique –the only trulyexternal critique –to the institution of modern science and to the grave inconsistencies “scientists” cannot (for whatever reason) notice in it anymore.

The paper starts with an ultra-compact deposition on the two ubiquitous complementary dual pairwise organized methodological procedures of episteme, i.e. the analytic method (analysis – synthesis)& the abstract process (abstraction – structure). Next, the authors examine some ground rules and concepts pervading causality and inference and their junctions, attempting to discriminate between information flow in empiricism and theoretical causality of proof; only then is a connection between them attempted and investigated. In the authors’ effort to establish a consistent theoretical outlook, if not approach, the technique of logical inversions is also used as a partial yet powerful guide elucidating how successful their attempts were. Apart from clarifying some opaque concepts in logic, in set theory and in the staple empiricism of science, this paper also sets the stage for questioning whether some grave flaws could be located in traditional, save ill-founded, notions in hardcore science, on occasion of the par excellence typical example of fundamental and never challenged approaches in physics. The fact that something has been accepted as holding does not at all mean that cracks may not be located in its epistemological makeup at some posterior time. And it is the text’s task here to ask some painful questions and try to set some realistic boundaries to things by aptly utilizing available irresistible standard «tricks» from logic and from the classical scientific method and from reverting to fruitful techniques and to telling examples, pushing hard for convincing answers.

Modelling consent is a process prior to any discussion about it, be it theoretical or practical. Here, after examining consent, I shall attempt to present a “logical generator” that produces all different cases of consent (and/or of non-consent), so that afterwards we may articulate a two-dimensional model which will enable us to coherently demonstrate all possible types of consent. The resulting model will be combined with Aristotle’s square of opposition, offering us even greater insight.  I shall claim that full(y) informed consent is an archetype, not realized in most cases; it is just one case out of hundreds more. I shall conclude with an educational model for consent, the principle of specificity, arguing that if we wish to both understanding consent and become more adept in exercising it, we need a targeted educational system – not just “better education” in general.

In this paper we attempt a good unearthing, sound tackling and effective pointing out of the critical key features permeating one of the two cornerstones supporting the total coordination and interplay underlying the complex epistemonic and scientific method: and that would be the constituent methodology concisely known under the cover name “analytic method”. In this attempt, however, it becomes evident very soon that the direct similarities, reciprocities and complementarities to the other cornerstone, concisely known as “abstractive method”, must also be laid out concurrently; the two share the same needs and behaviours, while they must also be mutually disambiguated and framed in inner consistencies and mutual contrast, to assert proper theoretical coverage, fruitful application and mutual impermeability overall. Thus, both of them end up being discussed in parallel. To that end, simple and intuitively appealing proposals are sought, expressed and projected, regarding their key attributes, range and boundaries, both generally and especially in between them; their defining points and most essential requirements are sought out and expressed, their functional standards are suggested and the stages of its application are prescribed, according to a shadowy yet rigorous gradual breakup and assembling procedure derived from elementary combinatorics and set theory. All this gets illustrated in the schematic stages to be pursued in two relevant enlightening analytic examples, chosen so as to also partake of a crucial share of an abstractive aspect. Two relevant issues are touched upon along the way in the vein of the present tone of quest, namely those concerning basic prerequisites of logic employed and the confusion and effective double-talk underlying the term “theory” (vs. “theories”) and the consequent term-induced ambiguity in the concepts. On the subject, analysis is the breakup of an “entity” into its “components” and synthesis is its retroactive operation, or “return”, from “components” to the “entity”. Similarly, “abstraction” is the course from an entity to a nesting of successive general categories, and “structure” is the other way around from more general categories towards smaller contained assemblages of entities, each uniformly exhibiting “partial manifestations” of the said categorical feature. The semantic context and its set-theoretical implications are of paramount importance here. What is definitively taken as a “unity”, in each case, is a matter of choice, and of mutual and binding agreement among the parties conducting the study and its discussion. Beyond that, figuratively speaking, the analytic method concerns “anatomical autopsies” digging into such unities constituting elements or members of sets, whereas the abstractive method concerns attributes connecting sets of such “unities” and their nested supersets and subsets. We close by sketching the stage-by-stage application as illustrated in two case-studies: one from Cultural Studies, regarding a model, focusing on the primitive ternary ritual of the performing arts [ΚΛΜ], discussed complete with some key side issues, and accompanied by considerations on the triple of the material arts [ΧΨΩ], and then one from Bioethics regarding all possible partial and combinatorial constituents in consent models.