Karl Popper\'s Proposed Solution to the Demarcation

Karl Popper's Proposed Solution To The Demarcation Problem:

Popper vs. Kuhn

According to the philosopher Karl Popper, "the central problem in the philosophy of science is that of demarcation, i.e., of distinguishing between science and what he terms 'non-science'" (Thornton 2009). Colloquially, of course, all of us think we know what science is -- it is the scientific method, or the proving of a hypothesis. But even here there is confusion, given that what constitutes a scientific 'theory' is not what is meant by 'theory' when a layperson speaks. And much of what we intuitively believe to be science may not be science at all, given that it may be based more upon observed correlations and observed, personal experiences than the proving and disproving of hypotheses. According to Popper, what we call science is largely a web of hypotheses, rather than 'truth.'

Popper called the problem of distinguishing between science and non-science to be a problem of demarcation. Popper was unusual amongst philosophers of his era to take seriously Hume's critique of scientific induction which is: "Our knowledge of such contingent truths could only be grounded in our experience. But the principle of the uniformity of nature isn't something that we can just 'see' to be true. As a result, it appears that we could only have inductive evidence to support it. So it seems that the only way we could justify anything like the inductive principle is through induction" (Beisecker 2005). Although our presumptions may be accurate much of the time, they are hardly true all of the time.

Popper's critique of Hume is that pure, objective inductive observation is, in fact, not the foundation of all scientific theories. "All observation is selective and theory-laden -- there are no pure or theory-free observations" (Thornton 2009). Observation takes place only with a purpose, whether the purpose is a consciously-designed experiment or everyday observation. There is no unique, scientific methodology that stands apart from conventional observation. All human activity "consists largely of problem-solving," whether the problem is a theoretical one or a practical one (Thornton 2009). Science is based on problems, not observations, and observations are meaningless, scientifically, unless the observation is designed to solve problems.

This problem-solving approach, however, can be riddled with errors, based upon the desire of human beings to want to prove a particular theory true or false. It is very easy to find evidence to prove a particular hypothesis, regardless of how erroneous it might be, and also because it is virtually impossible to be exposed to all examples of a phenomenon. Instead of the inductive method, Popper proposes falsifiability as the standard for any scientific theory. "For Popper, a theory is scientific only if it is refutable by a conceivable event. Every genuine test of a scientific theory, then, is logically an attempt to refute or to falsify it, and one genuine counter-instance falsifies the whole theory" (Thornton 2009).

Popper's theory of falsification and his denial of the inductive method is also a superior way to deal with the question of scientific phenomena that cannot be observed in their entirety. "It is logically impossible to conclusively verify a universal proposition by reference to experience (as Hume saw clearly), but a single counter-instance conclusively falsifies the corresponding universal law. In a word, an exception, far from 'proving' a rule, conclusively refutes it" (Thornton 2009). A theory is just that -- a theory -- which receives additional corroboration based upon experience. More and more empirical evidence mounts in support of the theory, the theory is finally falsified by a contradictory example or a better theory supplants the original theory. "In practice a single conflicting or counter-instance is never sufficient methodologically to falsify a theory," but when the counter-instances outweigh the original support, gradually the theory begins to be questioned (Thornton 2009).

The development of a theory begins with the creation of an internally logical problem statement that is not self-contradictory, and is distinguished between its empirical and logical propositions. The theory must also be an advance upon current theories. Then, the theory is corroborated with evidence. But all theories are ultimately not 'proven' to be true, rather they are only 'proven' to be false. "If the new predictions are borne out, then the new theory is corroborated (and the old one falsified), and is adopted as a working hypothesis" (Thornton 2009).

Popper's definition of science continues to be controversial, particularly amongst experts in areas considered by Popper to be 'non-science.' As far as Popper was concerned, only disciplines such as the natural sciences of physics and chemistry are true sciences, given that their propositions are falsifiable. In contrast, the propositions of much of psychology, including Freudian psychoanalysis are not science but at best "a pre-science (i.e., it undoubtedly contains useful and informative truths, but until such time as psychoanalytical theories can be formulated in such a manner as to be falsifiable, they will not attain the status of scientific theories" (Thornton 2009). Astrology and phrenology "are pseudo-sciences," given that none of their propositions are falsifiable at all and are merely speculative in nature (Thornton 2009).

The notion of science as continually generating new theories that are superior to old ones is also reflected in Thomas Kuhn's seminal work The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Kuhn, much like Popper, emphasized problem-solving in his work. "The functions of a paradigm are to supply puzzles for scientists to solve and to provide the tools for their solution. A crisis in science arises when confidence is lost in the ability of the paradigm to solve particularly worrying puzzles called 'anomalies'" (Bird 2011). For long periods of time, the scientific community remains relatively stable, in terms of its embrace of a particular theory. Then, it gradually comes to embrace a new theory, once that theory has been shown to be superior in its problem-solving capacity and ability to explain anomalies in the old theory. Kuhn's work echoes Popper's philosophy because of his notion of the inherent mutability of scientific theory. With Popper's conception of science, there is no singular 'best' theory that can stand for all time, because all theories can potentially be falsified or a superior theory can arise to surmount existing theories, as Einstein's Theory of Relativity surmounted the commonly-accepted theories of physics.