Every scientific idea (whether in medicine, architecture, engineering, chemistry, or any other subject), when put into practice, is subject to small errors and uncertainties. Mathematics—through probability theory and statistical inference—helps precisely control and thereby contain these uncertainties. It must always be considered that in all practical cases, ‘the outcomes also depend on many other factors external to the theory’, whether they be initial and environmental conditions, experimental errors, or something else. All the uncertainties about these factors make the theory–observation relationship a probabilistic one. In the medical approach, there are two types of uncertainty that weigh the most on diagnoses: subjective uncertainty and casuality.
- = patients with bone degeneration of the temporomandibular joint.
