Orthodontic classifications: Mystique or reality?

Abstract

F or years those who have attempted to create systems for orthodontic classifications have been shackled by the bonds of the E. H. Angle paradigm.’ The two-dimensional constraints of the most widely used and accepted orthodontic classification preclude advancement in this field. Therefore, orthodontics may be called a “science art” and/or a “transscience.“’ These terms are interpreted broadly in this article in an attempt to focus on the problem of classification and to create an awareness of the necessity to link the etiology of malocclusion accurately with a rational plan of therapy. The future of orthodontics becomes dimensionless if past biases are eliminated and today’s problems are resolved under an evolved or synthetic philosophy. Orthodontics has borrowed heavily from other disciplines, such as physical anthropology, anatomy, and metallurgical sciences. By doing so, it has utilized considerable data and adapted it, rightly or wrongly, to orthodontics. “We have acquired notions and compiled precious materials which will later have their place and be of importance.“3 However, the compiled data cannot properly explain biologic phenomena if they are acquired erroneously or if the interpretations are directed to other seemingly related or unrelated processes. In this sense, orthodontics must function under the nineteenth century philosophy that a discipline deserves its name only when it establishes quantitative relations between phenomena. However, biologic entities have not been reduced to an exact science. They often appear identical but are the results of different determinants. Further, biologic observations may be asymmetric, comprised of numerous components, each with its unique potential for growth. Pasteur stated: “The universe is a big dissymmetrical whole. I am inclined to believe that lift such as it is manifested to us must be a function of the dissymmetry of the universe and of the consequences which it entails. Life is dominated by dissym-