KARL RAIMUND POPPER

welcome popper                        

  ' la vita è scettica '

dal greco  skepsis  . . .  ricerca

 

facebook.com/popperphilosopher

vienna 20 luglio 1902

londra 17 settembre 1994

.

Einstein once said 'My pencil is cleverer than I am' - What he meant of course was that by putting things down in writing and by calculating them on paper, he could often get results beyond what he had anticipated. We may say that by using pencil and paper he plugged himself into the third world of objective knowledge. He thus made his subjective ideas objective. And once these ideas were made objective, he could link them with other objective ideas, and thus reach remote and unintended consequences far transcending his starting point.
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rationality is not a property of men, nor a fact about men. It is a task for men to achieve.
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arguments may be understood or grasped. and understanding or grasping is a world 2 affair: our bodies can grasp a stone or a stick but they cannot grasp or understand an argument knoledge and the body-mind problem - in defence of  interaction.
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The main point, however, is that the myth of the framework is simply mistaken. Admittedly, a discussion between people who hold identical, or almost identical, views is bound to proceed more easily than a discussion between people who hold strongly opposed, or vastly different, views. But only in the latter case is the discussion likely to produce something interesting. The discussion will be difficult, but all that is needed is patience, time, and good will on both sides. And even if no agreement is reached, both sides will emerge from the discussion wiser than they entered it. By 'good will' I mean here the admission, to start with, that we may be wrong, and that we may learn something from the other fellow.
knowledge and the body-mind problem
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a cento anni dalla nascita   1902 - 1994
Tutta la mia concezione del metodo scientifico si può riassumere
dicendo che esso consiste di questi tre passi


1   

inciampiamo in qualche problema

 
2

tentiamo di risolverlo ad esempio proponendo qualche nuova teoria

 
3

impariamo dai nostri errori specialmente da quelli che si sono resi presenti dalla discussione critica dei nostri tentativi di risoluzione

O per dirla in tre parole  problemi - teorie - critiche
Credo che in queste tre parole si possa riassumere tutto quanto il modo di procedere della
scienza razionale 
 

leo lestingi  -  GDM

erewhon.ticonuno.it

 

 

 

La nostra conoscenza può essere solo finita

mentre la nostra ignoranza

deve essere necessariamente infinita

The more we learn about the world, and the deeper our learning, the more conscious, specific, and articulate

will be our knowledge of what we do not know; our knowledge of our ignorance.

For this indeed, is the main source of our ignorance - the fact that our knowledge can be only finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.

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La vera ignoranza non è la mancanza di conoscenza

ma il rifiuto di acquisirla

true ignorance is not the absence of knowledge but the refusal to acquire it

 

POPPER

È una società in cui la politica fa proprio l'atteggiamento razionale della scienza 

si abbandona l'idea di un mondo perfetto, e si passa alla realizzazione di interventi  sempre parziali e limitati, intesi come tentativi sempre fallibili di risolvere problemi  particolari della società.

Problema della politica deve essere, allora, quello di garantire il controllo di chi governa,  e questo è possibile attraverso istituzioni democratiche. Nella società aperta di Popper quindi è importante la connessione tra scienza e Stato per garantire la democrazia, e la scienza è sentita, anche per questo motivo, come un bene irrinunciabile.

Razionalismo e Popper

In generale, il razionalismo è l'atteggiamento che si fonda sui  procedimenti della ragione per determinare credenze o tecniche in un dato campo.

Con Popper viene abbandonata l'idea della razionalità come ricerca della certezza  e come tentativo di giustificare le teorie. Per Popper, al contrario, l'atteggiamento  razionale si basa sulla critica delle teorie. Egli cerca, infatti, di individuare possibili  errori, problemi interni, ossia la 'fallibilità' delle teorie. 
Per Popper la base empirica non ha più un valore assoluto, quindi la conoscenza  scientifica non è più fondata sulla roccia, ma è come una palafitta sulla palude.

Nonostante ciò in lui è riscontrabile un residuo empirista poiché egli sembra  ammettere la possibilità di un linguaggio osservativo neutro. I fatti sono ancora  importanti in quanto sono in grado di confutare una teoria e, inoltre, occorre  ammettere l'esistenza di un linguaggio comune entro cui formulare le argomentazioni. 

linguaggioglobale.com

 

VERITÀ
Lo status della verità, in senso oggettivo, come corrispondenza ai fatti, può paragonarsi a quello di una cima montuosa, normalmente avvolta fra le nuvole.
Uno scalatore può, non soltanto avere difficoltà a raggiungerla, ma anche non accorgersene quando vi giunge, poiché può non riuscire a distinguere, nelle nuvole, fra la vetta principale e un picco secondario.

nonsoloscuola.net

 

I am utterly opposed to those who fear truth

who think it was a sin to eat from the tree of knowledge
unended quest

 

 

letter to donald  t. campbell 1988 - ingrandisci

  fb/kp

 

 

 

falsificabilità    -  tedesco Fälschungsmöglichkeit 

una teoria per essere controllabile e perciò scientifica

 deve essere falsificabile

 

 

fallibilismo

Popper sostiene il carattere fallibile della conoscenza umana e la sua possibilità di progredire attraverso la critica: per questo aspetto la sua concezione è denominata fallibilismo . Egli interpreta l'aggettivo critico come sinonimo di razionale; dai primi pensatori greci, i cosiddetti presocratici, la civiltà occidentale avrebbe ereditato, a suo avviso, la tradizione razionalistica , la quale consiste nella discussione critica delle teorie via via avanzate per risolvere i problemi, nell'intento della ricerca della verità.
Popper ritiene che sia stato merito di Tarski l'aver dimostrato la possibilità di definire la verità come corrispondenza con la realtà . Il fallibilismo di Popper si differenzia da due concezioni alternative della conoscenza umana.

www.filosofico.net/popper7.htm

 

 

provare e riprovare

La scienza moderna non è quella che crede che il Nuovo abbia sempre ragione. Al contrario si fonda sul principio del 'fallibilismo'
Ma la scienza moderna non è quella che crede che il Nuovo abbia sempre ragione. Al contrario, si fonda sul principio del 'fallibilismo' (già enunciato da Peirce, ripreso da Popper e da tanti altri teorici, e messo in pratica dai pratici) per cui la scienza procede correggendo continuamente se stessa, falsificando le sue ipotesi, per 'trial and error' (tentativo ed errore), ammettendo i propri sbagli e considerando che un esperimento andato a male non sia un fallimento, ma valga tanto quanto un esperimento andato bene, perché prova che una certa via che si stava battendo era sbagliata e bisogna o correggere o addirittura ricominciare da capo. Che è poi quello che sosteneva secoli fa l'Accademia del Cimento, il cui motto era 'provando e riprovando' - e 'riprovare' non significava provare di nuovo, che sarebbe il meno, ma respingere (nel senso della riprovazione) quello che non poteva essere sostenuto alla luce della ragionevolezza e dell'esperienza.   

http://espresso.repubblica.it

 

 



falsifiability   -  falliblism
A doctrine which maintains that our scientific knowledge claims are invariably vulnerable and may be false. Scientific theories cannot be asserted as true catagorically, but can only be maintained as having some probability of being true. Popper insisted that we must acknowledge an innability to attain the final definitive truth in the theoretical concerns of natural science and must be prepared to accept that accepted beliefs may turn out to be false.


Logical Positivism
Sometimes called logical ( or linguistic) empiricism. Originating in Vienna with thinkers such as Carnap, Feigl, Neurath, Schlick and Waisman propogating positivist ideas  the views have attracted other thinkers such as A.J. Ayer, C.W. Morris, Arne Naess and Ernest Nagel.
Central to the doctrine is the priciple of verification, the notion that individual sentences gain their meaning by some specification of the actual steps we take for determining their truth or falsity. As expressed by A.J. Ayer sentences are meaningful :-

 -       if they can be assessed either by an appeal directly to some foundational form of self-experience.

sentences are said to be synthetically true or false.
-       or by an appeal to the meaning of the words and the grammatical structure that constitutes them

sentences are said to be analytically true or false.
If sentences cannot meet either of these conditions (the verifiable test) they are said to be meaningless and neither true nor false. Many positivists class metaphysical, religous, aesthetic and ethical claims as meaningless.

For example an ethical claim would have meaning only in so far as it purported to say something empirical. Consider the sentence X IS GOOD. If what is meant is that I LIKE X then the sentence X IS GOOD is meaningful because it makes a claim that can be verified by studying the behaviour of the speaker. Thus if the speaker embraces X then it is true but withdraws from it then it is false. However posivists would argue that the sentence X IS GOOD is
only meaningful in the terms expressed earlier as like and dislike and shows their commitment to the fact-value distinction. With this commitment to the fact-value commitment logical posivists were strongly drawn to science with the view that philosophy was synonomous with the philosophy of sciencewhich in turn was synonymous with the study of the logic of science.
idmon.freeserve.co.uk

I was, and still am, an empiricist of sorts, though certainly not a naive empiricist, who believes that all knowledge stems from our perception or sense data.  My empiricism consisted in the view that, though all experience was theory-impregnated, it was experience which in the end could decide the fate of a theory, by knocking it out; and also in the view that only such theories which in principle were capable of being thus refuted merited to be counted among the theories of empirical science.
replies to my critics - the philosophy of karl popper  - fb/kp

 

THUS ETHICAL PRINCIPLES FORM THE BASIS OF SCIENCE
The principles that form the basis of every rational discussion, that is, of every discussion undertaken in the search for truth, are in the main ethical principles. I should like to state three such principles.
1. The principle of fallibility: perhaps I am wrong and perhaps you are right. But we could easily both be wrong.
2. The principle of rational discussion: we want to try, as impersonally as possible, to weight up our reasons for and against a theory; a theory that is definite and criticizable.
3. The principle of approximation to the truth: we can nearly always come closer to the truth in a discussion which avoids personal attacks. It can help us to achieve a better understanding; even in those cases where we do not reach an agreement.

It is worth noting that these three principles are both epistemological and ethical principles. For they imply, among other things, toleration: if I hope to learn from you, and if I want to learn in the interest of truth, then I have not only to tolerate you but also to recognize you as a potential equal; the potential unity and willingness to discuss matters rationally. Of importance also is the principle that we can learn much from a discussion, even when it does not lead to disagreement: a discussion can help us by shredding light upon some of our errors.
Thus ethical principles form the basis of science. The idea of truth as the fundamental regulative principle – the principle that guides our search – can be regarded as an ethical principle. The search for truth and the idea of approximation to the truth are also ethical principles; as are the ideas of intellectual integrity and of fallibility, which lead us to a self-critical attitude and to toleration.
in search of a better world -
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All men and all women are philosophers

If they are not conscious of having philosophical problems, they have, at any rate, philosophical prejudices. Most of these are theories which they take for granted: they have absorbed them from their intellectual environment or from tradition.
Since few of these theories are consciously held, they are prejudices in the sense that they are held without critical examination, even though they may be of great importance for the practical actions of people, and for their whole life.
It is an apology for the existence of professional philosophy that men are needed to examine critically these widespread and influential theories.
Theories like these are the insecure starting point of all science and of all philosophy. All philosophy must start from the dubious and often pernicious views of uncritical common sense. Its aim is to reach enlightened, critical common sense: to reach a view nearer to the truth; and with a less pernicious influence on human life.

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But the approach to truth is not easy

There is only one way towards it, the way through error. Only through our errors can we learn; and only he will learn who is ready to appreciate and even to cherish the errors of others as stepping stones towards truth, and who searches for his own errors: who tries to find them, since only when he has become aware of them can he free himself from them.
The idea of our self-emancipation through knowledge is therefore not the same as the idea of our mastery over nature. The former is, rather, the idea of a spiritual self-liberation from error, from superstition and from false idols. It is the idea of one's own spiritual self-emancipation and growth, through one's own criticism of one's own ideas – though the help of others will always be needed.

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It might do us good to remember from time to time that, while differing widely in the various little bits we know, in our infinite ignorance we are all equal.

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In science, a mistake we make - an error

consists essentially in our regarding as true a theory that is not true. (Much more rarely, it consists in our taking a theory to be false, although it is true.) To combat the mistake, the error, means therefore to search for objective truth and to do everything possible to discover and eliminate falsehoods. This is the task of scientific activity. Hence we can say: our aim as scientists is objective truth; more truth, more interesting truth, more intelligible truth. We cannot reasonably aim at certainty. Once we realize that human knowledge is fallible, we realize also that we can never be completely certain that we have not made a mistake. This might also be put as follows:
There are uncertain truths - even true statements that we take to be false  - but there are no uncertain certainties.
Since we can never know anything for sure, it is simply not worth searching for certainty; but it is well worth searching for truth; and we do this chiefly by searching for mistakes, so that we can correct them.
Science, scientific knowledge, is therefore always hypothetical: it is conjectural knowledge. And the method of science is the critical method: the method of the search for and the elimination of errors in the service of truth.

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Knowledge consists in the search for truth

the search for objectively true, explanatory theories .   It is not the search for certainty .   To err is human .    All human knowledge is fallible and therefore uncertain .
...

The question is not 'Who should rule' or 'Who is to have the power?' but 'How much power should be granted to the government?' or perhaps more precisely 'How can we develop our political institutions in such a manner that even incompetent and dishonest rulers cannot do too much harm?' In other words, the fundamental problem of political theory is the problem of checks and balances, of institutions by which political power, its arbitrariness and its abuse can be controlled and tamed.
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Or take a different example of a philosophical prejudice

There is the prejudice that a man’s opinions are always determined by his self-interest. This doctrine (which may be described as a degenerate form of Hume’s doctrine that reason is, and ought to be, the slave of the passions) is not as a rule applied to oneself (this was done by Hume, who taught modesty and skepticism with respect to our powers of reason, his own included), but it is as a rule only applied to the other fellow—whose opinion differs from our own. It prevents us from listening patiently, and from taking seriously opinions which are opposed to our own, because we explain them by the other fellow’s interests. But this makes rational discussion impossible. It leads to a deterioration of our natural curiosity, our interest in finding out the truth about things. In place of the important question “What is the truth about this matter?” it puts the less important question “What is your self-interest, what are your motives?” It prevents us from learning from people whose opinions differ from our own, and it leads to a dissolution of the unity of mankind, a unity that is based on our common rationality.
in search of a better world - how i see philosophy

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by 'fallibilism' I mean here the view, or the acceptance of the fact, that we may err, and that the quest for certainty (or even the quest for high probability) is a mistaken quest.     But this does not imply that the quest for truth is mistaken.     On the contrary, the idea of error implies that of truth as the standard of which we may fall short.     It implies that, though we may seek for truth, and though we may even find truth (as I believe we do in very many cases), we can never be quite certain that we have found it.     There is always a possibility of error; though in the case of some logical and mathematical proofs, this possibility may be considered slight.
the open society and its enemies - addenda

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determinismo / indeterminismo
Il determinismo è, sostanzialmente, la teoria per la quale tutto ciò che accade nel mondo, si svolge come in un ideale meccanismo ad orologeria. Contrariamente a ciò, io credo che gli sviluppi degli eventi nel mondo non siano predeterminati. I miei argomenti principali sono, in sostanza, le invenzioni umane. Mi pare abbastanza chiaro che nella nebulosa primitiva – bilioni di anni fa – un auto o un aereo o cose del genere non erano già predeterminate o precostituite, ma che esse sono venute nel mondo  fisico solo ad opera dello spirito umano.

NUVOLE E OROLOGI

personalmente, ritengo che la dottrina dell'indeterminismo sia vera e che il determinismo sia privo di qualsiasi fondamento.
karl popper - introduzione
Giovandosi pure della relatività einsteiniana, Popper sostiene che vi è asimmetria fra passato e futuro: il primo non ammette cambiamenti, il secondo si presenta aperto alla mutevolezza. Il terzo argomento usato dal Nostro contro il determinismo si fonda sull’impossibilità di prevedere scientificamente la crescita della nostra conoscenza e, dunque, le acquisizioni che potremo ottenere in futuro. Pertanto, secondo Popper, è più saggio e opportuno fidarsi delle nuvole che degli orologi !
maurizio schoepflin - ilfglio.it - 2018
Nel corso della sua lunga vita Karl Popper ha più volte avuto modo di sintetizzare, in brevi e icastiche frasi, le sue convinzioni teoriche più profonde. In una di queste ha affermato: «Io sono, in primo luogo, indeterminista, in secondo luogo, realista, in terzo luogo, razionalista». Per presentare le tesi dei difensori del determinismo e quelle proprie degli indeterministi, è ricorso a una efficace metafora: quella delle nuvole e degli orologi. «Per l'uomo comune una nuvola è imprevedibile e indeterminata: le variazioni del tempo sono proverbiali. Un orologio invece è prevedibile e in verità un orologio perfetto si pone come il paradigma di un sistema materiale meccanico e deterministico».
amazon

 

 

conjectures and refutations

La teoria sobre el mètode científic

de Popper, basada en la seva concepció de la ciència com a sistema de conjectures i refutacions, segons la qual una hipòtesi o teoria científica és un enunciat universal, la veritat del qual no pot demostrar-se, perquè cap sèrie finita d'observacions -cap procediment inductiu- pot establir la confirmació d'una hipòtesi, però la falsedat de la qual sí que pot determinar-se, mitjançant la refutació o falsació d'aquesta. Imre Lakatos, filòsof hongarès, seguidor de les idees de Popper, distingeix entre un falsacionisme dogmàtic i un falsacionisme metodològic.
pensament.com

How can we admit   that our knowledge is a human--an all too human--affair, without at the same time implying that it is all individual whim and arbitrariness ?
Yet this problem had been seen and solved long ago; first, it appears, by Xenophanes, and then by Democritus, and by Socrates (the Socrates of the Apology rather than of the Meno). The solution lies in the realization that all of us may and often do err, singly and collectively, but that this very idea of error and human fallibility involves another one--the idea of objective truth: the standard which we may fall short of. Thus the doctrine of fallibility should not be regarded as part of a pessimistic epistemology. This doctrine implies that we may seek for truth, for objective truth, though more often than not we may miss it by a wide margin. And it implies that if we respect truth, we must search for it by persistently searching for our errors: by indefatigable rational criticism, and self-criticism.
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the liberal does not dream   of a perfect consensus of opinion; he only hopes for the mutual fertilization of opinions, and the consequent growth of ideas.    even when we solve a problem to universal satisfaction, we create, in solving it, many new problems over which we are bound to disagree.    this is not to be regretted.
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Nation-states do not exist

simply because the so-called 'nations’ or 'peoples' of which the nationalists dream do not exist. There are no, or hardly any, homogenous ethnic groups long settled in countries with natural borders. Ethnic and linguistic groups (dialects often amount to linguistic barriers) are closely intermingled everywhere.

the history of our time : an optimist's view - 1956

LA GUERRA DELLE IDEE

The war of ideas is a Greek invention.

It is one of the most important inventions ever made.   Indeed, the possibility of fighting with with words and ideas instead of fighting with swords is the very basis of our civilization, and especially of all its legal and parliamentary institutions.
fb/popper

UTOPIA AND VIOLENCE

We can see here that the problem of the true and the false rationalisms  - Utopianism - is part of a larger problem. Ultimately it is the problem of a sane attitude towards our own existence and its limitations–that very problem of which so much is made now by those who call themselves  Existentialists  the expounders of a new theology without God.    There is, I believe, a neurotic and even an hysterical element in this exaggerated emphasis upon the fundamental loneliness of man in a godless world, and upon the resulting tension between the self and the world. I have little doubt that this hysteria is closely akin to Utopian romanticism, and also to the ethic of hero-worship, to an ethic that can comprehend life only in terms of ‘dominate or prostrate yourself’. And I do not doubt that this hysteria is the secret of its strong appeal .

chapter 18 - utopia and violence of conjectures and refutations

There is no scientific way of choosing between two ends. Some people, for example, love and venerate violence. For them a life without violence would be shallow and trivial. Many others, of whom I am one, hate violence. This is a quarrel about ends. It cannot be decided by science. This does not mean that the attempt to argue against violence is necessarily a waste of time. It only means that you may not be able to argue with the admirer of violence. He has a way of answering an argument with a bullet if he is not kept under control by the threat of counter-violence .

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Work for the elimination of concrete evils rather than for the realization of abstract goods. Do not aim at establishing happiness by political means. Rather aim at the elimination of concrete miseries. Or, in more practical terms: fight for the elimination of poverty by direct means--for example, by making sure that everybody has a minimum income. Or fight against epidemics and disease by erecting hospitals and schools of medicine. Fight illiteracy as you fight criminality. But do all this by direct means. Choose what you consider the most urgent evil of the society in which you live, and try patiently to convince people that we can get rid of it.
But do not try to realize these aims indirectly by designing and working for a distant ideal of a society which is wholly good. However deeply you may feel indebted to its inspiring vision, do not think that you are obliged to work for its realization, or that it is your mission to open the eyes of others to its beauty.    Do not allow your dreams of a beautiful world to lure you away from the claims of men who suffer here and now.   Our fellow men have a claim to our help; no generation must be sacrificed for the sake of future generations, for the sake of an ideal of happiness that may never be realized. In brief, it is my thesis that human misery is the most urgent problem of a rational public policy and that happiness is not such a problem. The attainment of happiness should be left to our private endeavours .
fb/kp - conjectures and refutations

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What we should do, I suggest, is to give up the idea of ultimate sources of knowledge, and admit that all knowledge is human; that it is mixed with our errors, our prejudices, our dreams, and our hopes; that all we can do is to grope for truth even though it be beyond our reach. We may admit that our groping is often inspired, but we must be on our guard against the belief, however deeply felt, that our inspiration carries any authority, divine or otherwise. If we thus admit that there is no authority beyond the reach of criticism to be found within the whole province of our knowledge, however far it may have penetrated into the unknown, then we can retain, without danger, the idea that truth is beyond human authority .   And we must retain it .   For without this idea there can be no objective standards of inquiry; no criticism of our conjectures; no groping for the unknown; no quest for knowledge .
c
onjectures and refutations

It is often asserted that discussion is only possible between people who have a common language and accept common basic assumptions. I think that this is a mistake.   All that is needed is a readiness to learn from one's partner in the discussion which includes a genuine wish to understand what he intends to say.   If this readiness is there, the discussion will be the more fruitful the more the partner's backgrounds differ .
the growth of scientific knowledge 1963

The more we learn about the world, and the deeper our learning, the more conscious, specific, and articulate will be our knowledge of what we do not know; our knowledge of our ignorance. For this indeed, is the main source of our ignorance - the fact that our knowledge can be only finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.

...

What we should do, I suggest, is to give up the idea of ultimate sources of knowledge, and admit that all knowledge is human; that it is mixed with our errors, our prejudices, our dreams, and our hopes; that all we can do is to grope for truth even though it be beyond our reach  .

...

From the point of view here developed all laws, all theories, remain essentially tentative, or conjectural, or hypothetical, even when we feel unable to doubt them any longer. Before a theory has been refuted we can never know in what way it may have to be modified. That the sun will always rise and set within twenty-four hours is still proverbial as a law 'established by induction beyond reasonable doubt'. It is odd that this example is still in use, though it may have served well enough in the days of Aristotle and Pytheas of Massalia - the great traveller who for centuries was called a liar because of his tales of Thule, the land of the frozen sea and the midnight sun .

.
The belief that science proceeds from observation to theory is still so widely and so firmly held that my denial of it is often met with incredulity. I have even been suspected of being insincere- of denying what nobody in his senses would doubt.
But in fact the belief that we can start with pure observation alone, without anything in the nature of a theory is absurd; as may be illustrated by the story of the man who dedicated his life to natural science, wrote down everything he could observe, and bequeathed his priceless collection of observations to the Royal Society to be used as evidence. This story should show us that though beetles may profitably be collected, observations may not.

Twenty-five years ago I tried to bring home the same point to a group of physics students in Vienna by beginning a lecture with the following instructions : 'Take pencil and paper; carefully observe, and write down what you have observed!' They asked, of course, what I wanted them to observe. Clearly the instruction, 'Observe!' is absurd. (It is not even idiomatic, unless the object of the transitive verb can be taken as understood.)
Observation is always selective. It needs a chosen object, a definite task, an interest, a point of view, a problem. And its description presupposes a descriptive language, with property words; it presupposes similarity and classification, which in their turn presuppose interests, points of view, and problems.
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i think - like you by the way - that theory cannot be fabricated out of the results of observation, but that it can only be invented.
albert einstein - 1935 - in a letter to KP

 

 

 

l'intelligenza è utile per la sopravvivenza

se ci permette di estinguere una cattiva idea

prima che la cattiva idea estingua noi

 

 

the natural sciences are represented by the left hand side of the triangle

The natural sciences are represented by the left hand side of the triangle, where data sentences are compared with theory sentences. If dissonance occurs between the two,

Popper's falsification principle (1972) will give priority to the data sentence, so that for consonance to happen the theory will have to be modified. Scientific criticism, at the right hand side of the triangle, confronts data sentences with value sentences. In the case of dissonance, the validity of both sentences may be subjected to discussion. Irrational arguments are then likely to be involved.

Constructivism, at the base of the triangle, implies comparing theory sentences with value sentences, to determine to which extent the foreseen world is also the preferred world. This is also an area where irrationality is involved. In the case of dissonance, both sentences are given the same priority, that is, it may be necessary to change both.

newmedia.no

I think there is only one way to do science – or to do philosophy for that matter

to meet a problem, to see its beauty and fall in love with it; to get married to it, and to live with it happily, till death do ye part - unless you should meet another and even more fascinating problem, or unless indeed you should obtain a solution. But even if you do obtain a solution you may then discover to your delight, the existence of a whole family of enchanting though perhaps difficult problem children for whose welfare you may work, with a purpose to the end of your days.

Karl Popper

 

se le leggi fisiche di questo

mondo sono indipendenti da noi

noi non siamo liberi

se siamo liberi allora
le leggi fisiche

non sono indipendenti

 

 

 

 

POPPER E LA TRADIZIONE ANTIMETAFISICA
Popper rovescia l’impianto ‘realista’ su cui per secoli si è basata la ricerca scientifica: non è sufficiente verificare in ‘n casi’ che una teoria sia suffragata dall’evidenza empirica se i casi possibili sono anche solamente ‘n+1’, poiché basta quell’unico caso, se difforme, a confutare l’intera teoria. La natura deve invece essere interrogata al contrario, cercando sistematicamente non la ‘verifica’ di una teoria quanto piuttosto la sua ‘falsificazione’. Condizione di ciò è che la teoria sia ‘falsificabile’, ovvero che i suoi enunciati siano almeno potenzialmente confutabili e il compito della ricerca consiste proprio nel trovare i limiti e i punti di crisi della teoria e non solo nel corroborarla. Per questo Popper giudica non scientifiche alcune accreditate teorie, quali la psicanalisi e il marxismo poiché non contengono elementi di falsificabilità o meglio non permettono ai critici di lasciarsi confutare in quanto tendono a interpretare eventi anche in contraddizione tra loro quali prove a sostegno in ogni caso valide.
Più tardi, nel prosieguo della propria carriera, Popper riconoscerà motivi di utilità alle inclinazioni metafisiche del pensiero, specie in Congetture e confutazioni (1972), ricollegandosi alla funzione regolativa assegnata da Kant alle idee metafisiche (Io, Mondo, Dio) nella sezione Dialettica trascendentale della Critica della Ragion Pura: pur essendo gli assunti metafisici non falsificabili e, pertanto, sempre non scientifici, essi costituiscono lo stimolo alla ricerca e un orientamento per l’indagine sulla natura.

roberto lolli - filosofia e storia - liceo scientifico Roiti - ferrara - aetnanet.org

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I do not believe in the current theory that in order to make an argument fruitful, the arguers must have a great deal in common.
On the contrary, I believe that the more different their backgrounds, the more fruitful the argument. There is not even a need for a common language to begin with: had there been no tower of Babel, we should have had to build one.     Diversity makes critical argument fruitful.     The only things which the partners in an argument must share are the wish to know, and the readiness to learn from the other fellow, by severely criticizing his views--in the strongest possible version that can be given to his views--and hearing what he has to say in reply.

fb/kp - realism and the aim of science

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Il problema della pace perpetua nel mondo

secondo gli storicisti i fatti accidentali anche quando si verificano non influenzano comunque la direzione fondamentale della storia.
Vero. Ma contro questo determinismo si potrebbe obiettare che gli eventi accidentali sono talvolta complessi e importanti, anche se, naturalmente, il loro peso è maggiore nelle società più piccole.
Cosa intendo infatti per "eventi accidentali"? Ad esempio, quel che capitò nella guerra del Peloponneso tra Atene e Sparta, un episodio storico le cui conseguenze avvertiamo ancora oggi, poiché l'esito di quella guerra cambiò il destino della democrazia in Grecia. Ebbene, l'andamento della guerra del Peloponneso risentì certamente dell'accidentale scoppio della peste in Atene. Durante l'assedio la peste uccise Pericle, il faro politico ateniese, sicché, da quel momento, la città rimase senza una guida davvero forte. A questo proposito, vorrei ricordare un libro molto interessante: Ratti, pidocchi e storia, che, attraverso la storia del tifo, illustra quale forza tremenda le malattie abbiano sempre avuto sul corso degli avvenimenti.

david miller - unita - tellusfolio
 

Ora sappiamo quali sono le priorità fondamentali che lei vorrebbe stessero in testa all’agenda politica. Si tratta di punti – la pace, l’arresto dell’esplosione demografica, l’educazione alla nonviolenza – che richiedono la cooperazione di tutti senza distinzioni di parte. Queste indicazioni secondo lei sono di destra o di sinistra?
Né di destra né di sinistra.

Quelle priorità indicano qualcosa che potrebbe prendere il posto della distinzione destra-sinistra. Vale a dire che noi dobbiamo pensare a quali fatti sono necessari per realizzare quegli obiettivi (…) Dovremmo insomma soppiantare questo orribile sistema dei partiti, in base al quale la gente che sta in questo momento nei nostri Parlamenti è prima di tutto dipendente da un partito, e solo in seconda istanza sta per usare il proprio cervello per il bene della popolazione che rappresenta. La mia opinione è che questo sistema deve essere sostituito e che noi dobbiamo tornare, se possibile, ad uno Stato in cui gli eletti vadano in Parlamento e dicano: io sono il vostro rappresentante e non appartengo a nessun partito.
notizie.radicali.it -  intervista

 

 

I remained a socialist for several years

even after my rejection of Marxism  and if there could be such a thing as socialism combined with individual liberty, I would be a socialist still.     For nothing could be better than living a modest, simple and free life in an egalitarian society.     It took some time before I recognized this as no more than a beautiful dream;    that freedom is more important than equality;     that the attempt to realize equality endangers freedom;     and that if freedom is lost there will not even be equality among the unfree.
unended quest - facebook/popper

 

 

Karl Raimund Popper

appartiene a quella schiera di autori con i quali - dopo averli studiati -

si impara a convivere e per i quali non si può fare a meno

di provare una profonda riconoscenza intellettuale
ludovico martello - politicamagazine.info

 

 


To this I can only say: I have spectacles, and I am cleaning my spectacles now. But spectacles have a function, and they function only when you put them on, to look through them at the world. It is the same with language. That is to say, one shouldn't waste one's life in spectacle-cleaning or in talking about language, or in trying to get a clear view of our language, or of 'our conceptual scheme'. The fundamental thing about human languages is that they can and should be used to describe something; and this something is, somehow, the world. To be constantly and almost exclusively interested in the medium - in spectacle-cleaning - is a result of a philosophical mistake. This philosophical mistake can quite easily be traced in Wittgenstein. Wittgenstein was originally impressed by the fact that the medium may impose limitations on us, or that it may actually deceive us, and he was also impressed, upon further analysis, by the fact that we can't really do anything about the medium. By a kind of recoil from his earlier views he then said that all we can really do is to list the various usages (of a word, for example), to try to see the differences, and to understand them - somehow. The real issue as I see it is different: do we have a philosophy of language which explains to us the functions of language, and which helps us to understand the significance of human language (which is more than a game)? Do you have a philosophy of language in this sense? I think I have. I don't know whether Russell had one, and I don't want to speak about myself. All I want to do here is to defend Russell's views as well as I can, for I think there's a very great deal in them. I suggest that behind this kind of preoccupation which he was trying to combat, there is fundamentally a mistaken philosophical doctrine, a mistaken epistemological doctrine. And I also suggest that if it goes on, it may well lead to a thing one can describe as scholasticism (though I wish not to be found wanting in respect for the distinguished schoolmen of the Middle Ages).
interview with bryan magee on BBC-radio - modern british philosophy

fb/kp

 

 

 

 

 

Appendix IV -  Misreading Popper : The Top Ten Errors
1  . The Popper Legend. He was a kind of positivist and the falsifiability criterion is about meaning.
2  . "Falsification cannot be decisive" advanced as a criticism of Popper, often with a mention of the Duhem problem.
3  . Failure to draw the distinction between falsifiability (a matter of logical form) and falsification (a practical matter).
4  . "Scientists don't practice falsification".
5  . Science would have come to a stop under the influence of falsificationism.
6  . Popper's approach was static, unhistorical , obsessed with the right "method" and took no account of the social context of science.
7  . The theory of conjectural knowledge cannot deliver justified beliefs (which we need) and we cannot get away from the need for induction.
8  . Another argument against conjectural knowledge: the instrumentalist argument from technology.
9  . The failure of Popper's theory of verisimilitude undermined his whole program.
10. Critical rationalism and positivism provide no platform to criticise and reform the social and political status quo - Habermas
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by rafe champion - a guide to the logic of scientific discovery  - 
fb/kp - 2013

This guide, the first in the Popular Popper series, provides an introduction to  "The Logic of Scientific Discovery" -  a book which changed the direction of the philosophy of science in the 20th century.  The guide proposes that Popper's ideas are best understood as a number of "turns" which he introduced. These include the  "conjectural" turn to acknowledge that even our best scientific theories may be false  and the "conventional"  or  "rules of the game" turn to account for the social nature of science and allow for the revival of metaphysics within any scientific research program.   It also lists the most common misunderstandings of Popper which have confused students of philosophy and diminished his standing in academic circles .

amazon

In point of fact, no conclusive disproof of a theory can ever be produced; for it is always possible to say that the experimental results are not reliable, or that the discrepancies which are asserted to exist between the experimental results and the theory are only apparent and that they will disappear with the advance of our understanding .

the logic of scientific discovery

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We must be clear in our own minds that we need other people

to discover and correct our mistakes - as they need us -

especially those people who have grown up with different ideas

in a different environment.
This too leads to toleration.

toleration and intellectual responsibility

 

 

Abbiamo bisogno della libertà

per impedire che lo Stato abusi del suo potere

ed abbiamo bisogno dello Stato per impedire l'abuso della libertà

 

in che cosa consiste fondamentalmente un modo di comportarsi  “ civilizzato ” ?

Consiste nel ridurre la violenza

È questa la funzione principale della civilizzazione

ed è questo lo scopo dei nostri tentativi

di migliorare il livello di civiltà delle nostre società

il prezzo della libertA  E  l’eterna vigilanza

 

 

  welcome popper  -  pagina   1   -   2

 

links

www.tkpw.net/intro_popper/intro_popper

http://biografieonline.it/biografia.Karl+Popper

https://sociologicamente.it/storia-del-tacchino-induttivista

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/popper

http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Popper

www.friesian.com/popper

www.academia.edu/A_Conversation_with_Sir_Karl_Popper

www.studenti.it/riassunto-pensiero-filosofico-karl-popper

https://youtu.be/rg8yLS7USFI  - philosophy against false prophets - 1974

 

 

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