The term black box theory is used in philosophy and in science. The term is important in philosophical contexts, because various philosophers have proposed black box theories for various fields. Probably the most prominent such theory is the so called black box theory of consciousness, which states that the mind is fully understood once the inputs and outputs are well defined, and generally couples this with a radical skepticism regarding the possibility of ever successfully describing the underlying structure, mechanism, and dynamics of the mind. In science studies, a more abstract notion of a black box refers to the result of the social process of blackboxing, which is, to cite Bruno Latour, "the way scientific and technical work is made invisible by its own success. When a machine runs efficiently, when a matter of fact is settled, one need focus only on its inputs and outputs and not on its internal complexity. Thus, paradoxically, the more science and technology succeed, the more opaque and obscure they become." (Latour: Pandora's Hope). See also: Black box (systems), Behaviorism, Philosophy of Mind
