Occult sciences

The idea of “occult sciences” developed in the sixteenth century. The term usually encompassed three practices—astrology, alchemy and natural magic—although sometimes various forms of divination were also included rather than being subsumed under natural magic. These were grouped together because, according to the historian of religion Wouter Hanegraaff, “each one of them engaged in a systematic investigation of nature and natural processes, in the context of theoretical frameworks that relied heavily on a belief in occult qualities, virtues or forces.” Although there are areas of overlap between these different occult sciences, they are separate and in some cases practitioners of one would reject the others as being illegitimate,
During the Enlightenment, the term “occult” increasingly came to be seen as intrinsically incompatible with the concept of “science”. From that point on, use of the term “occult science(s)” implied a conscious polemic against mainstream science.
In his 1871 book Primitive Culture, the anthropologist Edward Tylor used the term “occult science” as a synonym for “magic”.

Occult qualities

Occult qualities are properties that have no known rational explanation; in the Middle Ages, for example, magnetism was considered an occult quality. Aether (classical element) is another such element. Newton’s contemporaries severely criticized his theory that gravity was effected through “action at a distance”, as occult.