What is the difference between science and astrology and other pseudosciences. Karl Popper

    What is science? What knowledge is considered to be real scientific knowledge, and which does not fit into the scientific paradigm? Can astrology, theology, psychoanalysis be considered sciences?

    Pseudoscience or pseudoscience is often referred to as statements, knowledge, beliefs and practices that impersonate scientific ones, but are not really such, since they were not obtained using the scientific method . However, there is “borderline” knowledge that either 1) is obtained by the scientific method, but is considered pseudoscience; 2) obtained as a result of reasoning in the absence of observable and measurable observations (that is, an unscientific method), but at the same time they proved their scientific value.

    How to distinguish between these two classes of knowledge?

    The philosopher Karl Popper, a mathematician and physicist by training, investigated this topic most fully in his work. The subject of science and pseudoscience is devoted to his books The Logic of Scientific Research (1935), Assumptions and Denials: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge (1963) and Objective Knowledge: An Evolutionary Approach (1972).

    Karl Popper has been involved in the concept of the growth of scientific knowledge since the 1920s. From the middle of the last century to the present, he is considered the most influential thinker who formulated the most complete and convincing concept of the growth of scientific knowledge and the logical theory of the scientific method.

    Popper's immediate goal was to construct a logical theory of the scientific method, by which he refers to the empirical method. The logic of Popper's science is fundamentally different from the psychological, empirical description of scientific activity, and the apparatus of mathematical logic is an important means of its construction .

    From the very beginning, Karl Popper considered the main task to clearly articulate the differences between science and pseudoscience. As a criterion, Popper proposed the principle of falsifiability, that is, the fundamental refutability of any knowledge that claims to be scientific.

    This principle of Popper's philosophy was significantly different from the then prevailing concept of logical empiricism or neopositivism. Proponents of this concept believed that the principle of verification and confirmation of the theory are inherent in scientific knowledge in the first place.

    The principle of falsifiability


    In its logical content, the concept of falsification is very simple, even trivial. According to the canons of traditional logic, we know that from a conditional statement

    if a, then b

    implies that falsity b with logical necessity implies falsity a .

    The problem is that if b is true, we cannot say anything about the truth or falsity of a .

    Karl Popper made this simple logical rule a basic principle for assessing scientific knowledge, the main methodological rule for distinguishing real science from pseudoscience. According to the definition of the principle of falsifiability, only those theories can be considered scientific, which in principle can be refuted, that is, which are able to prove their falsity.

    While the consequences of a true statement can only be true statements, among the consequences of a false statement can be both true and false. Each scientific theory is a conjecture that will be refuted sooner or later. Therefore, each theory, strictly speaking, is false . Thus, among the consequences of any scientific theory there will be both true and false statements.

    All the many consequences of Popper's theory are called its logical content. The true consequences of a theory form its true content; the rest will be false content. Comparing the two theories, we can find that the true content of one is greater than the true content of the other theory or the false content of one is less than the false content of the other. For example, if an experiment shows that the prediction of one theory is true where the prediction of another theory is false, then this means that the first theory has true content where the second theory has false content. If the false content of the first theory does not exceed the false content of the second, then the first theory is more believable than the second. The most plausible will be a theory that provides complete and comprehensive knowledge of the world.

    Popper himself recognized some relativity of the principle of falsifiability, because in such a global interpretation the principle of falsification itself does not lend itself to falsification.

    Nevertheless, this basic principle is considered the most concise and clear definition for the demarcation of science and pseudoscience.

    In fact, Popper's philosophy opposed the principles of logical empiricism, although the proponents of both concepts are undoubtedly on the same side in the war against pseudoscience. But even Popper himself later repeatedly repeated that it was he who “killed logical positivism”.

    The scientific meaning of the concept of "truth"


    In his early works, Karl Popper explained why there is no place in the logic of scientific research for the concept of “truth,” which is obscure and metaphysical. He focused on the analysis of the logical structure of the critical attitude - the critical method of scientific knowledge, the so-called fallibilism, that is, the doctrine of the error of human knowledge. The place of metaphysical “truth” is occupied by the theory of plausibility of scientific theories. So, in the book “The Logic of Scientific Research”, Karl Popper does not use the concept of “truth” at all. But in later work, he acknowledged that in the methodology of science there is still a place for the concept of “truth” as the correspondence of theory with facts.

    In the traditional concept, which comes from ancient philosophy, truth is in principle unattainable by virtue of its presumptive and therefore ultimately false character. Moreover, even if we accidentally stumble upon it, Popper says, we will never know about it.

    Popper also opposed such an extreme in understanding the nature of the scientific method as a priori, when scientific theories are considered only as a tool for predictions and therefore supposedly have no cognitive value in themselves.

    According to the theory of truth and believability, the development of knowledge is not a transition from one true knowledge to another, but a transition from one problem to another, deeper problems.

    The main logical and methodological rule according to Popper is as follows:

    “We do not know - we can only speculate”


    In other words, the development of scientific knowledge is based on the mechanism of trial and error - assumptions (conjectures) and rebuttals.



    After the peak of popularity in the 60-70s, Popper's ideas somewhat lost their influence, and the scientist himself retired. Subsequently, a number of philosophers showed the incorrectness of determining credibility by Popper, especially in the case of comparing the credibility of two false theories. Nevertheless, the concept of credibility still continues to attract the attention of philosophers and logicians and, as we have already noted, is the most concise and clear definition for the demarcation of science and pseudoscience.

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