POLS 2503 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Karl Popper, Falsifiability, Fallibilism
28 Sep 2017
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How to measure progress in science: theory, hypothesis, test and gather evidence, empirical validation. Building a knowledge base: search for empirical regularities, find theoretical explanations, test explanations, accumulate laws. What to do when laws contradict each other: Intellectual honesty is key; admit that not all laws are perfect and infallible. Karl popper aggressive falsifiability be rigorously skeptical: weed out theories via testing only theories that continuously withstand falsification can be considered true adopt logic of null hypothesis. The relationship between positivism and falsification: observation of empirical reality is the basis of falsification. If the observable world does not match with our predictions, we must abandon or revise the theory.
