SPER 1st class 9.

9
17th- 19th century POSITIVISM
1920s-1930s Vienna circle
Logical Positivism

Positivism’s premises: empirical approach (how do we judge scientific theory through fact),
rational, no bias, cumulative.
 Positivism is a scientific process that begins with observation, then theory, then
verification / it progresses, cumulates. This means science can be done in a non-
biased manner.

20th century

- Logical positivism/Vienna Circle

(Schlick, Neurath, Carnap)

 Post positivism. EPISTEMOLOGY: what does it mean to be rational/neutral? Can we

trust our senses?
(Popper/Kuhn...)
 Social Constructionism
 Marxism/ Critical theory

Harding: Objectivity and Diversity (CH.5)

Modern western science- why are we being taught that it can gives us the answers /Is
certain/ neutral / truth
Decolonize science: why some theories are more important than others?
American context (McCarthyism/Cold War): science separate from politics, trying to avoid
relativism at all costs.
Natural sciences: plurality, not one single truth. Can we say the same for social sciences?
Some say disunity (many different truths) is good, it provides challenge/ competition. But if
there are many truths/many ways, what does that say for democracy?
Manhattan project ; do scientist have ethical responsibilities to what happens with the things
they create? (Einstein/Russell say yes)
Positivism gets attacked both from inside and outside. Gender theories tend to be
considered attacks on positivism.
What rule does West have to tell everyone else how they should do things?
Post-truth concern (111) (disrespect for facts is widespread)
Antipositivists: by holding to the idea of absolute truth (in order to combat fascism), they
actually fed into various fascist theories. Disunity and difference contrasted with a humanity
shared by all persons.
Idea that science should never be closed- end of the discussion about what is truth. (121)
We have to find middle ground between radical relativism and universal realism. (122)

Karl Popper (Vienna – Jewish but convers to Lutheranism)

Originally joins the Marxist party. Member of many socialist groups.
Concerned about violence that can come about between different political views.
Becomes a phycologist/ With the rise of Nazism, his opportunities become less and less.
Looks for work in other countries.
 Book ‘Open society and its enemies’
He hung out/ influenced by Vienna circle but not part of them. Criticizing logical positivism.
Theory of falsifiability: when something is science? When there is a possibility of the theory
being refuted. When something is not scientific, it doesn’t mean it is meaningless.

First one to move away from positivism. Emphasis on critical, rational approach. Not
dogmatism.
Different notions of rationality in his science and his politics.
Take the method of natural sciences and implement it to social sciences.
Rationality: irrational leap in reason (a leap of faith)

After break

There is not an individual choice-> everything has an impact on others

Historicism tends to reduce people to numbers and laws.
Popper didn’t like the prophetic traits of Marxism/Freudinism/ Nazism
Focus on the agency and responsibility on all aspects. In order to do that social sciences
must separate themselves from natural sciences. The first can make bold choices, the latter
not because it affects people’s lives.
Popper connects historicists (Plato, Hegel, and Marx) to totalitarianism.
He calls the closed society, his life in Vienna with the rise of Nazis. No space for political
thought, but use of propaganda/myth, expectancy of obedience.
Transition from close to open society. Asks questions, understands that people are fallible,
Socratian-like approach.

Science flourishes in an open society (democratic/pluralistic), in contrast to Nazism when

science were suppressed.

Popper’s science vs his politics

 - Problem of demarcation
science vs pseudoscience => CAPABLE OF BEING REFUTED (Criterion)
Why is demarcation so important? Which scientific project should we fund/not, which is
science and which are not scientific?

- Theory of falsification

There should be internal consistency. We should set up experiments that are capable to be
proven wrong. But the diff with nat science is that we cannot make bold/risky choices.

- Acc to logical positivists/verificationism

- Popper vs Hume
- Context Distinction
He separates where ideas come from and what we do to test these ideas. The
discovery moment where you can have an irrational idea (that’s fine), and the
moment when you bring that idea in the realm of science. Then you need to be
rational / scientific/.

Corroboration:
If a theory has the potential to be refuted, whether it already has or not, we cannot verify it,
we can only get close to it/ corroborate/. So, a theory can ever said to be truth. We can only
say it might be close to the truth. But there is no guarantee. We can never step, it’s an
endless process of getting close to the truth but never knowing for sure.
We can increase our confidence in a theory but not the certainty of its truth.

- Scientific method
when it comes to discovery there is not method, but there must be in the next stage.
The method is one when we have trial and error (deductive). What we do is process
of elimination. (in contrast to pseudoscience that it is adding/including cases, to make
its theory irrefutable, by changing the theory.) -> Popper’s idea, is eliminating parts of
the theory that do not fit with the cases, so in the end, the theory is closer to the truth.
[snowball getting bigger in pseudosc / smaller in popper-> in the centre there’s the
‘truth’)

Objectivity still plays a role in Popper’s theory (post-positivism)

As long as we have this critical space for challenge, that makes it better science.
Critical attitude is opposed to the dogmatic attitude.
Importance of ethics (agency/responsibility) in both his science and his politics.

Can science for Popper be neutral?

Objective, kind of yes, if we allow enough space for criticism, but neutrality not really, as
humans are fallible.
POPPER – TEXT 1 NOTES
Argument: when is a theory scientific?
If it can be applied to any situation, that doesn't imply its verification, it is rather its weakness.
For it simply means we explain a situation in light of a certain theory. (a lense)
The difference with say Einstein's theory of gravitation is the risk involved in its prediction. If
an experiment proves the theory wrong, then it is refuted. The other theories (Marx, Freud
etc) cannot be refuted, since they are compatible with any kind of behavior/situation (they
seem to be able to explain every situation, even completely opposite ones - so it's
impossible to either verify or refute it)

Conclusions:
1. it's easy to find confirmations for almost every theory if we are looking for them
2. confirmations only count if they are the result of risky predictions
3. a good scientific theory forbids certain things to happen. The more it forbids the better
4. a theory that is impossible to be refuted is not scientific
5. a genuine test of a theory attempts to falsify/refute the theory, but some theories are more
testable than others.
6. confirming evidence only counts if it's the result of a genuine test (a serious but
unsuccessful attempt to falsify a theory is confirmation that it holds)
7. if a theory is found to be false, but it is still upheld by its admirers by 're-interpreting the
theory-, it loses its scientific status (or lowers it)

=> so the criterion for scientific status of a theory is its falsifiability/refutibility/testability.

II
Example of Astrology: it's incredibly vague and able to explain everything so
irrefutable/untestable.
Marxism: its predictions falsified. Still its supporters re-interpreted the theory and the
evidence to make them agree. So it is saved from refutation but destroyed its scientific
status.
=> even if a theory is found to be non-scientific, it is not unimportant/meaningless but it
cannot be backed by empirical evidence in the scientific sense.

Poppers problem: not whether a theory is meaningful/true but drawing the line between
statements of the empirical sciences and the rest. This is called the problem of demarcation.
The solution to demarcation is the criterion of falsifiability. A statement to be ranked scientific
must be capable of conflicting, possible observations.

III
Wittgestein tried to show that all genuine/meaningful propositions were the 'atomic facts',
statements that could be established or rejected by observation.

Popper: then we must assume that every genuine proposition must be deductible from
observation statements, and that everything else (all apparent propositions) are
meaningless, pseudo-propositions.
Wittgestein's criterion of demarcation is deductibility from observation statements. Popper
finds this too narrow as it excludes from science everything that is characteristic of it (and
fails to exclude astrology). No scientific theory can ever be deducted from observation
statements.
Basically everyone thought his falsifiability was a solution to the problem of meaning, but it
was to demarcation.

IV
Problem of induction
Hume: induction cannot be logically justified. We cannot logically argue that those instances
of which we have no experience, resemble those of which we have had. So we cannot draw
inferences for any object beyond our experience.
Hume: we believe in laws due to custom or habit.
Popper: what is repetition? movements that first need attention are done in the end without
attention, unsonsciously.
But repetition doesn't originate from habit. eg. walking/talking is done before repetition can
take place. rep plays a part but it's not the origin.
Hume's theory of repetition based upon similarity. -> sequences of events similar
Popper's criticism: repetitions are only from a certain point of view, there must always be a
point of view, a system of expectations before there can be any repetition, which pov cannot
just be the result of repetition.

Therefore, Popper says that our attempts to interpret the world were before the observation
of similarities. the same goes for science. The scientific theories are not observations but
inventions-conjectures, but forward to trial to be eliminated if clashed with observations.

V
We cannot simply 'observe'. Observation is always selective, needs a chosen object, an
interest, a pov, a problem.
Hungry animal -> edible vs inedible things
Scientist the same way classify objects, similar or disimilar related to needs and interests
-conjectures.
An observation might preceed a hypothesis, but they too need a frame of reference. They
are significant because they could be explained within a theoretical framework.