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"One of the main tasks for human reason is to make the universe we live in understandable to ourselves. This is the task of science. There are two different components of about equal importance in this enterprise. The first is poetic inventiveness ..."
– Karl Popper
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Monthly Archives: February 2010
Critical Preferences
What problem is the idea of a “critical preference” intended to solve? (And how does it solve it?) I think the problem is this: We form theories to solve our problems, and we criticize them. Sometimes we decisively refute a … Continue reading
Posted in epistemology
6 Comments
Popper’s Indeterminism
I read Popper’s The Open Universe for the first time yesterday. What do you think of Popper’s arguments against determinism, especially the metaphysical variety? Although I appreciate Popper’s critique of “scientific” determinism, I confess to assuming that some kind of metaphysical determinism is … Continue reading
Posted in CR scholars, science
17 Comments
Force and Charity
Rafe champion writes: Welfare is a sticking point for many people of good will who support freedom but believe that they cannot be libertarians because of all the poor people who need assistance. Actually support for deserving poor people could … Continue reading
Posted in open society
5 Comments
SA in criminology
An excellent paper by Paul Knepper applies Popperian Situational Analysis to criminology. The paper appeared in the Review of Austrian Economics. He provides an introduction to Popper’s ideas about social sciences and the methodology of situational analysis (SA) plus the rationality principle … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
1 Comment
Anthony O’Hear on Popper
Prof O’Hear now at the University of Buckingham wrote the Popper entry in the Oxford Companion to Philosophy edited by Ted Honderich. O’Hear has been writing about Popper for along time, his first major book Karl Popper was published in 1980. It was … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
2 Comments
Hans-Hermann Hoppe getting Popper wrong
Hans-Hermann Hoppe is a leading figure in the group of Austrian economists who are based at the Mises Institute in the US. At one stage of his life he was influenced by Popper but he moved on and his major influences became … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
35 Comments
Explanation versus justification
Many people conflate explanation and justification. An explanation is a theory about why something happened or why we should do one thing rather than another. A justification is a story about why we are right, or probably right, to adopt … Continue reading
Posted in epistemology
12 Comments
What Is Liberalism About?
Rafe Champion writes: [Mirowski] offers a list of eleven tenets of neoliberalism. Some of them are very strange. 1. “The starting point of neoliberalism is the admission, contrary to classical liberal doctrine, that their version of the good society will … Continue reading
Philip Mirowski on Popper and the Mont Pelerin Society
The dustjacket of Mirowski’s collection of essays The Effortless Economy of Science indicates that he questions a host of theories, including the pictures of science put forth by Popper, Polanyi and Kuhn. So he is a polymath and a giant killer. … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
5 Comments
Sir Peter Medawar on scientific method
Deductivism in mathematical literature and inductivism in scientific papers are simply the postures we choose to be seen in when the curtain goes up and the public sees us. The theatrical illusion is shattered if we ask what goes on … Continue reading
Posted in science
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