Theory of Falsification

and its evolution

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 Domain of this talk
 Epistemology:
Branch of philosophy concerned with the nature and scope of knowledge

 Ontology :
Study of conceptions of reality and the nature of being

 Is science based on faith?

 What is the scientific method?
Philosophy of Science  How are new discoveries treated?
 Is everything reducible to physics and
mathematics?
 Is everything reducible to a few rules?
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 The Middle Ages
 5th century -16th century
 Medieval and Dark Ages
First Crusade 1095-1099
Second Crusade 1147–1149
116 years of war from 1337 – 1453 Between France & England

Islamic Golden Age

Islamic al-Andalus passed much of this on to Europe
The replacement of Roman numerals with the decimal
positional number system and the invention of algebra allowed
more advanced mathematics. Saint Augustine

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 Heliocentrism & Church
Western Christian biblical references:
Psalm 93:1, Psalm 96:10, and 1 Chronicles 16:30 include text stating that
"the world is firmly established, it cannot be moved."
In the same tradition, Psalm 104:5 says,
"the LORD set the earth on its foundations; it can never be moved.“
Further, Ecclesiastes 1:5 states that
"And the sun rises and sets and returns to its place, etc."[74]

Thomas Aikenhead (c. 1678 - 8 January 1697) was a

Galileo (1564 – 1642) Scottish student from Edinburgh, who was prosecuted
and executed on a charge of blasphemy
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 Logical Induction

 Observation
Bacon (1561-1626)
 Repetition
 Induction(1)
 Induction is dominant mode of inquiry
Hypothesis
 Truth observed through empirical study and  Deduction or generalization
experimentation
Consequence or prediction
 Rational and unbiased examination of nature
 Testing
 Induction(2)

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 Laws of motion
"Gravity explains the motions of the planets, but it cannot
explain who set the planets in motion. God governs all
things and knows all that is or can be done."[17]
Newton may have rejected the church's doctrine of the Trinity.
Newton refashioned the world governed by an
interventionist God into a world crafted by a God that
designs along rational and universal principles.[24] These
principles were available for all people to discover, allowed
people to pursue their own aims fruitfully in this life, not Sir Isaac Newton (1643 – 1727)
the next, and to perfect themselves with their own rational
powers.[25]

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 Epistemology
Knowledge is justified true belief
The Gettier problem

The justification for the belief must be infallible.

Specific theories of knowledge acquisition:

1. Empiricism : all hypotheses and theories must be tested against
observations of the natural world, rather than resting solely on a priori reasoning
, intuition, or revelation.

2. Rationalism : knowledge is primarily acquired by intuition. Any view

appealing to reason as a source of knowledge or justification

3. Constructivism : scientific knowledge is constructed by scientist

and not discover from the world through strict scientific method
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18th Century Epistemologist
Rationalism

Descartes Spinoza Leibniz Wolff

It is our ideas
which give form
to reality, not
Locke Berkeley Hume reality which
gives form to our Kant
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Empiricism ideas.
 Logical Problem of Induction
Deductive logic (drastically Inductive logic
oversimplified): All copper we have tested conducts
All A are B. electricity.
X is an A. X is a piece of copper yet to be tested.
Therefore X is B. Therefore X will conduct electricity.

All A observed so far are B.   [i.e. All A are B]

X is an A not yet observed.     [i.e. X is not an A]
Therefore X is B.       [X is B.]
What does it take to confirm a universal generalization?

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 Logical Positivism
Vienna Circle included Rudolf Carnap, Otto Neurath, Viktor Kraft,
Hans Hahn, and Herbert Feigl.

 The principal objective of the members of the Circle was to unify

the sciences, which carried with it, in their view, the need to
eliminate metaphysics once and for all by showing that
metaphysical propositions are meaningless.

Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889 –1951)

Rudolf Carnap (1891-1970) Bertrand Russell (1872–1970)
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus

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 Goodman’s Riddle:
Grue and Bleen
Henry Nelson Goodman (1906-1998)
 When there is more than one inductive conclusion that is consistent with
our observations, which one should we chose?
 Grue: Observed before or at t and green or observed after t and blue.
 Let t be midnight, Decmber 31 2009.
 Then all observed emeralds are grue / green.
 Should we infer by simple induction that all emeralds are grue or green?

Bleen: X is examined before the year 2000 and found to be blue, or X is not examined until after the
year 2000 and found to be green
Green: X is green if examined before the year 2000 and found to be grue, or X is not examined until
after the year 2000 and found to be bleen.

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 you can never justify any scientific theory, but you can falsify it

The Falsification Thesis

He published his first book, Logik der Forschung (
The Logic of Scientific Discovery), in 1934. Here, he criticised
psychologism, naturalism, inductionism, and logical positivism, and put
forth his theory of potential falsifiability as the criterion demarcating Sir Karl Raimund Popper (1902 –1994)
science from non-science.
Scientific theories are never truly verified. Moreover, to be always verified is not a
virtue in a scientific theory
Verification and falsification are asymmetrical:
 No accumulation of confirming instances is sufficient to verify a universal
generalization.
 But only one disconfirming instance suffices to refute a universal generalization.
 Scientific theories are distinguished by the fact that they are capable of being
refuted. They are falsifiable.

 Murderer of Freud and Marx Ideas

 Problem with Darwinian Evolution

Charles Robert Darwin (1809 –1882)

12/07/21 Karl Heinrich Marx (1818 –1883) Sigismund Freud (1856 –1939) 12
 Empirical Test of
General Relativity

Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

Einstein’s General Relativity: If it had failed Light from a star passing

its famous test of 1919, no one would have near the Sun should be
taken it seriously. deflected. The evidence is
the displacement of the
But it passed the test, and Newton’s theory of star’s apparent position.
gravitation was refuted.

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 Falsification of
Darwinian Evolution
Human DNA should be more similar
Popper said that natural selection "is not a testable scientific theory but a to great apes than other mammals. If
metaphysical research program". this is not the case, then common
descent is falsified.
However, Popper later said "I have changed my mind about the testability
and logical status of the theory of natural selection, and I am glad to have the
opportunity to make a recantation."

Richard Dawkins said that "If there were a single

hippo or rabbit in the Precambrian, that would
completely blow evolution out of the water. None
have ever been found.

"Darwin's own most important contribution to the theory of evolution, his theory of
natural selection, is difficult to test." However, "[t]here are some tests, even some
experimental tests; and in some cases, such as the famous phenomenon known as
'industrial melanism', we can observe natural selection happening under our very
eyes, as it were. Nevertheless, really severe tests of the theory of natural selection
are hard to come by, much more so than tests of otherwise comparable theories in
physics or chemistry."
The model of cultural evolution known as memetics is as of yet unfalsifiable

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 Popperian Cosmology
World 1: the world of physical objects and events, including biological entities
World 2: the world of mental objects and events
World 3: the world of the products of the human mind

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 Critical Rationalism
Critical Rationalism: Scientific theories, and any other claims
to knowledge, can and should be rationally criticized, and (if
they have empirical content) can and should be subjected to
tests which may falsify them.
Fallibilism
Critical Rationalism is the acceptance of human fallibility

Evolutionary Epistemology
The mere fact that a theory has survived the most rigorous
empirical tests available does not, in the calculus of
probability, predict its ability to survive future testing
Evolutionary epistemologists argue that units of knowledge
themselves, particularly scientific theories, evolve according to
selection
12/07/21 Brian Skyrms 16
 Gm1m 2
F
r2
Is it really falsifiable

Newtonian Gravitation Theory: Predicts that every acceleration of
every body can be traced to an interaction with some other body,
according to their masses and the distance between them.
What to do when we observe an acceleration that has no visible source? Is the theory refuted?

No: The theory demands that the missing mass be found.

Max Planck in his Scientific Autobiography and Other Papers, stated

"A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and
making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually
die and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it."

This view contradicts that forwarded by Karl Popper

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 Duhem-Quine Thesis
In the first half of the 19th century, astronomers were observing the path of the planet
Uranus to see if it conformed to the path predicted by Newton's law of gravitation;
It didn't.
Possible Explanations:
 Telescopic observations were wrong because of some unknown factor Pierre Duhem (1861 – 1916)
 Newton's laws were in error
 God was causing the perturbation in order to show the hubris of modern science

 Eventually accepted that an unknown planet (Neptune) was

affecting the path of Uranus

Theory-Laden: interpretation of observation is dependent on theory

underdetermination of theories
Dark Matter

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 Reductionism
Complex system is nothing
but the sum of its parts
Descartes argued the world was like a machine, its
pieces like clockwork mechanisms, and that the
machine could be understood by taking its pieces
apart, studying them, and then putting them back
together to see the larger picture. Daniel Dennett

behavioral sciences should become "genuine"

scientific disciplines by being based on genetic
biology, and on the systematic study of culture
(cf. Dawkins's concept of memes)
Steven Arthur Pinker
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 Paradigm Shifts
Thomas Kuhn on Scientific Revolutions (cf. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 1962.)

Kuhn argues that scientific advancement is not evolutionary, but rather is a "series of peaceful interludes punctuated by
intellectually violent revolutions", and in those revolutions "one conceptual world view is replaced by another".

Paradigm: Kuhn’s idea that a scientific theory is not just a set of theoretical principles. It is an entire world-view

Examples of paradigm shifts in science

The transition from a Ptolemaic cosmology to a Copernican one.
The unification of classical physics by Newton into a coherent mechanical worldview.
The transition between the Maxwellian Electromagnetic worldview and the Einsteinian Relativistic worldview.
The transition between the worldview of Newtonian physics and the Einsteinian Relativistic worldview.
The development of Quantum mechanics, which overthrew classical mechanics.
The development of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection, which overturned Lamarckian theories of
evolution by inheritance of acquired characteristics.
The acceptance of Plate tectonics as the explanation for large-scale geologic changes.

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 Multiple Realizability
Contrary to the famous claim of type-identity theory, it was
not true that "pain is identical to C-fibre firing."

Against Type-Identity
Hilary Whitehall Putnam
functional isomorphism = "Two systems are functionally
isomorphic if there is a correspondence between the states of one
and the states of the other that preserves functional relations."
Functionalism is a theory of the mind in contemporary philosophy, developed
largely as an alternative to both the identity theory of mind and behaviorism. Its
core idea is that mental states (beliefs, desires, being in pain, etc.) are
constituted solely by their functional role — that is, their causal relations to other
mental states, sensory inputs, and behavioral outputs.

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 Radical Translation /
Indeterminacy of Translation
Imagine you come across a new tribe in the Brazilian jungle, and the task is to interpret their
language: to find out word-meanings and rules of grammar.
This situation is entirely different from second-language learning. There are no familiar-
sounding words, no teacher who speaks both languages, etc.
 Walking along one day on the newly-discovered coast of Australia, Captain Cook saw an extraordinary
animal leaping through the bush.
   "What's that?" he asked one of the aborigines accompanying him.
   "Uh - gangurru." he replied - or something like that. Captain Cook duly noted down the name of the peculiar beast
as 'Kangaroo'.
Some time later, Cook had the opportunity to compare notes with Captain King, and mentioned the kangaroo.
   "No, no, Cook", said King, "the word for that animal is 'meenuah' - I've checked it carefully.
   "So what does 'kangaroo' mean?"
"Well, I think," said King "it probably means something like 'I don't know'...”

12/07/21 Source: http://www.consciousentities.com/gavagai.htm I don’t know 22

 Duhem–Quine Thesis

Two Dogmas of Empiricism

1. Belief in an analytic/synthetic distinction
2. Reductionism (every meaningful statement is equivalent to a statement about experience)

Analyticity and Circularity

 "a statement is analytic if it is true by virtue of meanings and independent of
fact"
 No unmarried man is married (true by definition )
 No bachelor is married. (transformed into logical truths by substituting Cats are animals
synonyms)
 Necessarily all and only bachelors are unmarried men
evidence confirms or
disconfirms not just a
Quine’s Holism specific hypothesis, but a
whole theory
Quantum Logic
we do not, or should not, regard any sentence as "immune from revision,"
since there may be circumstances in which the best way to revise our
overall theory is to give up some sentence which had previously seemed
unshakeable--even "definitions."
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Holism
The totality of our so-called knowledge or
beliefs ... is a man-made fabric which
impinges on experience only along the
edges ... A conflict with experience at the
periphery occasions readjustments in the
interior of the field ... But the total field is so
undetermined by its boundary conditions,
experience, that there is much latitude of
choice as to what statements to re-evaluate
in the light of any single contrary
experience ... If this view is right, it is
misleading to speak of the empirical content
Math of an individual statement ...

logic

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 Claims (Lessons) from this talk
 Truth is almost unattainable
 Theory of Meaning and linguistic plays an
important role in our knowledge
 Metaphysics as part of our knowledge is
interconnected with other branches of
knowledge and therefore is (not) falsifiable
 Depending on your lifestyle philosophy can
have pragmatic consequences for you

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