Karl Popper: Critical Appraisals, edited with Graham Macdonald, 2004

JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY AND DEVELOPMENT, 2017

This paper extracts from Popper's assertion that he had turned his back on induction. Popper believed he had 'solved' the 'problem of induction' by providing a noninductive account of corroboration. Popper used the term 'corroboration' rather than 'confirmation' since he believed that the latter term is too closely allied to the notion of the inductive or probabilistic support that a theory can receive from evidence. However, Popper admitted to a “whiff of inductivism” in his later years with the assumption that science can progress towards greater verisimilitude. In spite of David Miller's restatement and defence of Popper's critical rationalism and Miller's repudiation both of ampliative inferences and all conceptions of confirming evidence, the “whiff of inductivism in Popper's science still stands. This paper acknowledges this unavoidable “whiff” of inductivism in Popper's hypotheticodeductive corroboration. By using Clark Glymour's bootstrap inferences to represent very severe testing of a theory, I aim to make clear that through some richer methodological processes we can further support Popper's idea of severity of testing inductively as well as show that the testing of hypotheses and the legitimate processes of scientific inquiry can be conducted through a plurality of methods.

1972

This paper considers objections to Popper's views on scientific method. It is argued that criticism of Popper's views, developed by Kuhn, Feyerabend, and Lakatos, are not too damaging, although they do require that Popper's views be modified some¬what. It is argued that a much more serious criticism is that Popper has failed to provide us with any reason for holding that the methodological rules he advocates give us a better hope of realizing the aims of science than any other set of rules. Con¬sequently, Popper cannot adequately explain why we should value scientific theories more than other sorts of theories ; which in turn means that Popper fails to solve adequately his fundamental problem, namely the problem of demarcation. It is sug¬gested that in order to get around this difficulty we need to take the search for explana¬tions as a fundamental aim of science.

Lettera Matematica International Edition, 2014

A scientific theory must be falsifiable, and scientific knowledge is always tentative, or conjectural. These are the main ideas of Popper’s Logic of Scientific Discovery. Since 1960 his writings contain some essential developments of these views and make some steps towards epistemological optimism. Although we cannot justify any claim that a scientific theory is true, the aim of science is the search of truth and we have no reason to be sceptical about the notion of getting nearer to the truth. Our knowledge can grow, and science can progress. Nevertheless, Popper’s theory of approximation to the truth is problematic and is still the subject of studies and discussions.

Falsificationism presents a normative theory of scientific methodology; Scientists put forward hypotheses or systems of theories and test them through experience via experimentation (Popper, 2002: 3). Falsifiability for Popper is the criterion for scientific statements to be classed as empirical, while falsification denotes the requirements necessary for a theory to be classed as falsified i.e. if we accept a statement that contradicts the statements of the theory (Popper, 2002: 66). Falsificationism thus identifies normative science and what the limits are to research, and the demarcating line between science and non-science (Ladyman, 2001: 62) (Popper, 2001a: 295). This essay will proceed as follows; (1) firstly, Popper’s Falsificationism’s strengths as a theory of scientific method will be explained and evaluated in comparison to (2) the impact of Kuhn’s theory of paradigm shifts, (3) Lakatos’ falsificationism (scientific research programmes), and (4) Feyerabends rejection of scientific method. Overall, (1) Popper’s theory falls victim to (2) Kuhn’s account, but the debate thus becomes between (3) Lakatos and the rejection of method via (4) Feyerabend, concluding with an interpretation of falsificationism as succumbing to Feyerabendian considerations

Journal for General Philosophy of Science - Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie, 1988

Basiss~itze spielen eine zentrale Rolle in Poppers "Logik der Forschung', denn sie erlauben die Unterscheidung zwischen empirischen und nichtempirischen Theorien: Eine Theorie ist empirisch genau dann, wenn sie aus falsifizierbaren Aussages~itzen besteht, und Aussages~itze (beliebiger Art) sind falsifizierbar genau dann, wenn sie mindestens einem Basissatz widersprechen. Popper setzt offensichtlich voraus, daig die Basiss~itze selbst empirisch und somit falsifizierbar sind. Jedenfalls behauptet er mehrmals ihre Falsifizierbarkeit. Wir beweisen in unserem Aufsatz, dag die Basiss/itze nicht falsifizierbar sind, und wir beweisen dies nicht nur fiir Poppersche Basiss~itze im engeren Sinn, sondern auch fiir Poppersche Basiss~itze im weiteren Sinn und schlieglich fiir Poppersche Basiss~itze im weitesten, mit den Vorstellungen Poppers gerade noch vertr~iglichen Sinn. Dies fiihrt zu dem paradoxen Ergebnis, dalg nach Poppers eigenen methodologischen Postulaten die Basis der empirischen Wissenschaften nicht selbst empirisch ist. Dariiber hinaus entwickeln wir ein ~ihnliches Paradoxon beziiglich Poppers Falsifizierbarkeitsschema f/ir Theorien. Zum Abschlutg unseres Aufsatzes betrachten wir einige Mtglichkeiten, die von uns entdeckten Paradoxa zu fiberwinden.

In his book, The Logic of Scientific Discovery, Karl Popper deals with the often called "demarcation problem", which consists in the question: what criterion (or criteria) differentiates scientific and unscientific knowledge? Popper answers by providing a logical criterion for demarcating proper scientific knowledge from pseudo-science: falsificationism.

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000

Karl Popper was a philosopher that criticized traditional views of how knowledge was purported to support scientific and philosophical hypotheses. This paper analyzes the influence Popper had on how knowledge is used to support science.

2002

Logical empiricism dominated philosophy of science during the first half of the twentieth century but came under attack during the 1950s. There were two main motivators of this attack: the failure of logical empiricism to solve its own problems, and a major increase in our knowledge of the history of science. The result was an extended attempt, during the last half of the century, to develop a new framework for research in philosophy of science. Although this quest has generally been abandoned, the present paper argues that there are some enduring lessons about science that we should learn from that work. 1954), but a general recognition that something was seriously wrong came only as the decade waned. Then it came with stunning speed. We can note six works with overlapping themes that appeared in a four-year period from several different intellectual backgrounds: , Polanyi (1958), Toulmin (1961, Kuhn (1962), and Putnam (1962). This led to a new body of research and the quest for a new philosophical framework that could replace logical empiricism as a guide to the problems and range of acceptable solutions in philosophy of science. As Gutting has noted (2009, p.151) it is now clear that this quest failed and several issues that were recently at the focus of discussion have largely disappeared from the active literature. Yet it would be unfortunate if this work faded completely from the memory of working philosophers of science because there are some important lessons about science and about of philosophy of science that we should have learned. I am going to describe these lesson from my own perspective as someone who lived and worked through this period. No doubt this attempt will be somewhat idiosyncratic; others will draw different lessons-or no lessons at all-from these endeavors. But, I will argue, the lessons I discuss here are important and should be incorporated into ongoing work. I will begin by focusing on the problem of theory choice-especially on the view that theory evaluation should be determined solely by logic and the evidence. This will lead us to several other issues.

History has produced numerous scientific theories and arguments in favor and in opposition to each theory. Arguably, one of the most notable series of debates between scientific philosophers was the one that existed between Thomas Kuhn and Karl Popper. This examination of the various theories Kuhn and Popper embraced and denounced will be the focus of this critique. Ultimately, I will reveal the parallel thinking that exists within their perspectives on the importance of the process of scientific discovery by exhibiting both men's intolerance for anything other than what they believed was true science. A Clash Between Two Philosophers: Although Kuhn (1962) and Popper (2002) never agreed on which scientific method was most effective, they both shared similar views that the scientific community, in their aim explain science, too often sought to control and prohibit thinking outside the framework of established scientific methods. They were authentic scientists in their passions for exploring the endless possibilities of reaching the truth in all methods of scientific discovery by refuting the inconsistencies they believed existed in various scientific theories and methods.