Scientific hypothesis, verification and falsification. Verification and falsification of theory

Verification - (lat. Verificatio - proof, confirmation) a concept used in the logic and methodology of science to denote the process of establishing the truth of scientific statements as a result of their empirical verification. A distinction is made between direct verification - as a direct verification of statements that form observation data, and indirect verification - as the establishment of logical relationships between indirectly verifiable and directly verifiable statements. Scientific statements containing developed theoretical concepts, refer to indirectly verifiable statements. One should also distinguish between verification as the actual process of checking real statements and verifiability, i.e. possibility of verification, its conditions. It is the analysis of conditions and schemes of verifiability that acts as the subject of logical and methodological research.

The term verification has become widespread in connection with the concept of analyzing the language of science in logical positivism, which formulated the so-called principle of verification, or verifiability. According to this principle, any scientifically meaningful statement about the world must be reducible to a set of so-called protocol assumptions that fix the given “number of experience.” Thus, the epistemological basis of the principle of verification was the phenomenalist, narrowly empirical doctrine, according to which knowledge cannot go beyond the limits of sensory experience. The basis for such reducibility for the logical positivists of the Vienna Circle was the idea put forward by L. Wittgenstein in his “Logical-Philosophical Treatise” of the possibility of representing every meaningful statement about the world as a function of the truth of elementary statements, which was essentially an absolutization of the formalism of the propositional calculus of mathematical logic.

Explicit epistemological and methodological failure The principle of verifiability, which reduces knowledge about the world to “pure experience” and deprives statements of scientific meaning that are not directly verifiable by experience, forced its supporters to accept a weakened version of this principle, consisting in replacing the concept of strict and exhaustive verification with the concept of partial and indirect verification, or confirmation.

In modern logical-methodological literature, primitive “verificationism” is sharply critical. Verification is considered as a moment in the complex, contradictory process of development of scientific knowledge, as a result of a multifaceted relationship between competing theories and the data of their experimental tests.

Falsification is a scientific procedure that establishes the falsity of a hypothesis or theory as a result of experimental or theoretical testing. The concept of falsification should be distinguished from the principle of falsifiability, which was proposed by Popper as a criterion for demarcating science from “metaphysics” (as an alternative to the principle of verifiability put forward by logical empiricism).

Isolated empirical hypotheses can be directly falsified and rejected on the basis of relevant experimental data or because of incompatibility with fundamental scientific theories. However, systems of hypotheses combined into scientific theories can only in rare cases be completely falsified. The systemic-hierarchical nature of the organization of modern scientific knowledge complicates and makes it difficult to test developed and abstract theories. Testing such theoretical systems involves the introduction of additional models and hypotheses, as well as the development of theoretical models of experimental setups, etc. Problems that arise during the testing process, caused by the discrepancy between theoretical predictions and experimental results, can, in principle, be resolved by appropriate adjustments of some fragments of the theoretical system being tested. For a falsification theory, an alternative theory is most often necessary: ​​only it (and not the experimental results themselves) is able to falsify the theory being tested. Thus, only in the case where there is a theory that truly provides a further step in understanding the world is the rejection of the previous scientific theory methodologically justified.

As scientific propositions, hypotheses must satisfy the condition of fundamental verifiability, which means that they have the properties of falsifiability (refutation) and verifiability (confirmation). However, the presence of such properties is a necessary, but not sufficient condition for the scientific nature of a hypothesis. Therefore, these properties cannot be considered as a criterion for demarcation between scientific and “metaphysical” statements. The properties of falsifiability quite strictly capture the presumptive nature of a scientific hypothesis. Since the latter are statements of limited generality, they can both admit and directly or indirectly prohibit some state of affairs in the physical world. By limiting the universality of previous knowledge, as well as identifying the conditions under which it is possible to maintain the partial universality of a particular statement about laws, the property of falsifiability ensures the relatively discontinuous nature of the development of scientific knowledge.

We will use the concept of refutation in its usual sense, which is relatively established in epistemology.

Although the concept of refutation is neither substantively nor spatially precise, there is a fairly definite core of its content that clearly does not coincide with the content of the concept of logical falsification.

“Mere ‘falsification’ (in the Popperian sense) does not entail the rejection of the corresponding statement,” writes Lakatos. “Simple “falsifications” (that is, anomalies) should be recorded, but it is not necessary to react to them.”3

The concept of falsification presupposes, according to Popper, the existence of (negative) decisive experiments. Lakatos, ironically calling these experiments "great", notes that "the decisive experiment" is only an honorary title, which, of course, can be bestowed on a certain anomaly, but only long after one program has been superseded by another.

Falsification also does not take into account the fact that a theory that encounters difficulties can be transformed through auxiliary hypotheses and techniques similar to replacing real definitions with nominal ones. “No accepted basic statement in itself gives a scientist the right to reject a theory. Such a conflict may create a problem (more or less important), but under no circumstances can it lead to “victory.”

It can be said that the applicability of the falsification principle to different parts research program is different. It also depends on the stage of development of such a program: it is still the latest; successfully withstands the onslaught of anomalies, the scientist can ignore them altogether and be guided not by anomalies, but by the positive heuristics of his program.

Falsification failure. Popper's thoughts, the justification of scientific theories cannot be achieved through observation and experiment. Theories always remain unfounded assumptions. Science needs facts and observations not for substantiation, but only for testing and refuting theories, for falsifying them. The method of science is not observation and statement of facts for their subsequent inductive generalization, but a method of trial and error. “There is no more rational procedure,” writes Popper, “than the method of trial and error—suggestions and refutations: boldly putting forward theories; attempts the best way show the fallacy of these theories and their temporary recognition if criticism turns out to be unsuccessful." The trial and error method is universal: it is used not only in scientific, but in all knowledge; it is used by both amoeba and Einstein.

Popper's sharp contrast between verification and falsification, the inductive method and the trial and error method is not, however, justified. Criticism of a scientific theory that has not achieved its goal, a failed attempt at falsification, is a weakened version of indirect empirical verification.

Falsification as a procedure includes two stages:

Establishing the truth of a conditional connection “if A, then B,” where B is an empirically verifiable consequence;

Establishing the truth of “false B”, i.e. falsity of B. Failure to falsify means failure to establish the falsity of B. The result of this failure is the probabilistic judgment “It is possible that A is true, i.e. IN". Thus, the failure of falsification is an inductive reasoning that has the following scheme:

“if it is true that if A, then B, and false not-B, then A” (“if it is true that if A, then B, and B, then A”)

This scheme coincides with the indirect verification scheme. The failure of the falsification is, however, a weakened verification: in the case. ordinary indirect verification assumes that premise B is a true statement; in case of failed falsification, this premise represents only a plausible statement2. Thus, the decisive but unsuccessful criticism that Popper highly values ​​and which he opposes as an independent method of verification is in fact only a weakened version of verification.

Positive justification is the usual indirect empirical verification, which is a type of absolute justification. Its result: “Statement A, the consequence of which has been confirmed, is justified.” Critical justification is justification by criticism; its result: “Assertion A is more acceptable than its counterpart, assertion B, because A has withstood harsher criticism than B.” Critical justification is comparative justification: just because proposition A is more resistant to criticism and therefore more justified than proposition B does not mean that A is true or even plausible.

Popper thus weakens the inductivist program in two ways:

Instead of the concept of absolute justification, he introduces the concept of comparative justification;

Instead of the concept of verification (empirical justification), he introduces the weaker concept of falsification.

§ 4. Examples

The bias of the example. Empirical data can be used in argumentation as examples where fact or special case makes possible generalizations, illustrations when it reinforces an already established general position, and models when it encourages imitation.

The use of facts as examples and illustrations can be considered as one of the options for substantiating a position by confirming its consequences. But as such, they are a very weak means of confirmation: it is impossible to say anything concrete about the plausibility of a general proposition on the basis of one single fact speaking in its favor.

Facts used as examples and illustrations have a number of features that distinguish them from all those facts and special cases that are used to confirm general provisions and hypotheses. Examples and illustrations are more conclusive, or stronger, than other facts. The fact or particular case chosen as an example must clearly express a tendency towards generalization. The tendentiousness of the example fact significantly distinguishes it from all other facts. Strictly speaking, an example fact is never a pure description of some real state of affairs. He speaks not only about what is, but also partly and indirectly about what should be. It combines the function of description with the function of evaluation (prescription), although the first of them undoubtedly dominates in it. This circumstance explains the widespread use of examples and illustrations in argumentation processes, primarily in humanitarian and practical argumentation, as well as in everyday communication.

An example is a fact or special case used as a starting point for a subsequent generalization and to reinforce the generalization made.

The main purpose of the example. Examples may only be used to support descriptive statements and as a starting point for descriptive generalizations. But they are not able to: support assessments and statements that tend towards assessments, i.e. similar to oaths, promises, recommendations, declarations, etc.; serve as source material for evaluative and similar generalizations; support norms that are a special case of evaluative statements. What is sometimes presented as an example, intended to somehow reinforce an assessment, norm, etc., is in fact an example. The difference between example and sample is significant. An example is a descriptive statement that speaks about some fact, and a sample is an evaluative statement that refers to a particular case and establishes a particular standard, ideal, etc.

When presenting facts as examples of something, the speaker or writer usually makes it clear that we are talking about examples that should be followed by a generalization or moral. But this doesn't always happen.

The facts used as an example can be ambiguous: they can suggest different generalizations, and each category of readers can derive from them their own morality, close to its interests; It is not always possible to draw clear boundaries between example, illustration and sample.

The same set of facts cited can be interpreted by some as an example leading to a generalization, by others as an illustration of what is already known general position, third - as a model worthy of imitation.

Report on the philosophy of science and technology on the topic:

"Karl Popper's Principle of Verification and Falsification"

(Yakimenko A.A., group EAPU-07m --- this is with his consent)

1. Lead
2. The principle of verification in positivism
3. Limitation of the verification criterion
4. K. Popper's falsification criteria
5. Conclusion
6. List of sources

Introduction

Karl Raimund Popper (1902-1994) is considered one of the greatest philosophers of science of the twentieth century. He was also a social and political philosopher of great stature, declaring himself a "critical rationalist", a staunch opponent of all forms of skepticism, conventionalism and relativism in science and in human affairs in general, a staunch defender of the "Open Society", and an implacable critic of totalitarianism in all its forms. One of the many outstanding features of Popper's philosophy is the scope of his intellectual influence. Because epistemological, social, and strictly scientific elements can be found in Popper's work, the fundamental unity of his philosophical vision and method is largely dissipated. This work traces the threads that tie Popper's philosophy together, and also reveals the degree of relevance of Karl Popper's concept for modern scientific thought and practice.

The principle of verification in positivism

The goal of science is, according to neopositivism, to form a base of empirical data in the form of scientific facts, which must be represented in a language that does not allow ambiguity and lack of expressiveness. As such a language, logical empiricism proposed a logical-mathematical conceptual apparatus, distinguished by the accuracy and clarity of the description of the phenomena being studied. It was assumed that logical terms should express cognitive meanings observations and experiments in sentences recognized by empirical science as sentences in the “language of science.”
With the introduction of the “context of discovery,” logical positivism made an attempt to switch to the analysis of empirical statements from the point of view of their expressibility using logical concepts, thereby excluding issues related to the discovery of new knowledge from logic and methodology.
At the same time, empirical epistemology was given the status of the basis of scientific knowledge, i.e. logical positivists were confident that the empirical basis of scientific knowledge is formed exclusively on the basis of the language of observation. Hence the general methodological setting, which involves the reduction of theoretical judgments to observational statements.
In 1929, the Vienna Circle announced its formulation of the empiricist criterion of meaning, which became the first in a series of such formulations. The Vienna Circle stated: the meaning of a proposal is the method of its verification.
The principle of verification provided for the recognition as having scientific significance only that knowledge, the content of which can be justified by protocol proposals. Therefore, the facts of science in the doctrines of positivism are absolutized and have primacy over other elements of scientific knowledge, because, in their opinion, they determine the meaningful meaning and truth of theoretical proposals.
In other words, according to the concept of logical positivism, “there is pure experience, free from deforming influences from the cognitive activity of the subject and a language adequate to this experience; sentences expressed by this language are directly verified by experience and do not depend on theory, since the vocabulary used for their formation , does not depend on the theoretical vocabulary."

Limitation of the verification criterion

The verification criterion for theoretical statements soon revealed its limitations, causing numerous criticism. The narrowness of the verification method primarily affected philosophy, because it turned out that philosophical proposals are unverifiable, since they are devoid of empirical meaning. H. Putnam points out this side of the shortcoming of the doctrine of logical positivism.
Average person cannot "verify" the special theory of relativity. Indeed, nowadays the average person does not even learn special relativity or the (relatively elementary) mathematics necessary to understand it, although the basics of this theory are taught in some universities as part of an introductory physics course. The average person relies on the scientist to provide a competent (and socially accepted) assessment of theories of this type. The scientist, however, given the instability of scientific theories, apparently will not classify even such an established scientific theory as the special theory of relativity as “truth” tout court.
However, the scientific community's verdict is that special relativity is a "success" - in fact, like quantum electrodynamics, an unprecedentedly successful theory, making "successful predictions" and supported by a "wide range of experiments." And in fact, other people who make up society rely on these decisions. The difference between this case and those cases of institutionalized norms of verification that we touched on above consists (apart from the non-committal adjective “true”) in the special mission of the experts involved in these latter cases and the institutionalized veneration of these experts.
But this difference is nothing more than an example of the division of intellectual labor (not to mention the relations of intellectual authority) in society. The decision that special relativity and quantum electrodynamics are "the most successful of those physical theories"that we have" is a decision made by those authorities who are defined by society and whose authority is enshrined in practice and ritual and thus institutionalized.
The first to draw attention to the weakness of the positivist doctrine of logical analysis of scientific knowledge was K. Popper. He noted, in particular, that science mainly deals with idealized objects, which, from the point of view of the positivist understanding scientific knowledge, cannot be verified using protocol clauses, and therefore are declared meaningless. In addition, many laws of science expressed in the form of sentences are unverifiable. The minimum speed required to overcome gravity and enter near-Earth space is 8 km/sec, since their verification requires many private protocol proposals. Under the influence of criticism, logical positivism weakened its position by introducing a provision into its doctrine of partial empirical confirmability. It logically followed that only empirical terms and propositions expressed with the help of these terms have reliability; other concepts and propositions directly related to the laws of science were recognized as meaningful (confirmable) due to their ability to withstand partial verification.
Thus, the efforts of positivism to apply the logical apparatus to the analysis of knowledge expressed in the form of narrative sentences did not lead to scientifically significant results; they encountered problems that could not be resolved within the framework of the reductionist approach to cognition and knowledge that he adopted.
In particular, it is not clear why not all statements of science become basic, but only some? What is the criterion for their selection? What are their heuristic capabilities and epistemological perspectives? What is the mechanism of the architectonics of scientific knowledge?

K. Popper's falsification criterion

K. Popper proposed another criterion for the truth of a scientific statement - falsification.
Science, according to Popper, is a dynamic system that involves continuous change and growth of knowledge. This position determined a different role for the philosophy of science in scientific knowledge: from now on, the task of philosophy was reduced not to substantiating knowledge, as was the case in neopositivism, but to explaining its changes on the basis of the critical method. Thus, in the “logic of scientific discovery” Popper writes: “ central problem theory of knowledge has always been and remains the problem of the growth of knowledge,” and “... the best way to study the growth of knowledge is to study the growth of scientific knowledge.” As the main methodological tool for this purpose, Popper introduces the principle of falsification, the meaning of which boils down to the verification of theoretical statements by empirical experience. Why is falsifiability better than verifiability and what is the logic of Popper’s reasoning?
Having declared the task of methodology to be the study of the mechanisms of growth of scientific knowledge, Popper is based on the understood and perceived reality that makes up the sphere of scientific knowledge. In his deep conviction, science cannot deal with the truth, because scientific research activity comes down to putting forward hypotheses about the world, assumptions and guesses about it, constructing probabilistic theories and laws; that's how it is common path knowledge of the world and adaptation of our ideas about it. Therefore, it would be, to put it mildly, frivolous to accept some of these ideas as true, and to reject others, i.e. There is no universal mechanism that could identify from the variety of existing knowledge which of them are true and which are false.
Therefore, the task of philosophy is to find a way that would allow us to get closer to the truth. In Popper's logical-methodological concept there is such a mechanism in the form of the principle of falsification. K. Popper believes that only those provisions that are refuted by empirical data can be scientific. The falsifiability of theories by the facts of science, therefore, is recognized in the “logic of scientific discovery” as a criterion for the scientific nature of these theories.
At first glance, this position is perceived as nonsense: if it turned out that all those speculative constructions that we build about the world are refuted by our own empirical experience, then, based on their common sense, they should be recognized as false and thrown out as untenable. However, Popper's reasoning is based on a different logical sense.
You can prove anything. This is precisely where the art of the Sophists was manifested, for example. Popper believes that scientific statements stating the presence material objects, do not belong to the class of those confirmed by experience, but, on the contrary, refuted by experience, because the logic of the world order and our thinking tells us that scientific theories, refuted by facts, actually carry information about the objectively existing world.
The same methodological mechanism, which allows scientific knowledge to get closer to the truth, i.e. the principle of falsification of theories, by refuting them with facts, is accepted by Popper as a criterion for the demarcation of descriptive (empirical) sciences (from theoretical and from philosophy itself, thereby rejecting the neopositivist criteria of demarcation (induction and verifiability).
Ideological content theories of falsification and demarcation have a value significance that takes us to the worldview dimension. The concept of Popper's “logic of discovery” is based on the idea, which has taken the form of a belief, about the absence of any truth in science and any criterion for its identification; The meaning of scientific activity comes down not to the search for truth, but to the identification and discovery of errors and misconceptions. This, in essence, ideological idea the corresponding structure was determined:
a) ideas about the world, accepted in science as knowledge about it, are not truths, because there is no mechanism that could establish their truth, but there is a way to detect their fallacy;
b) in science, only that knowledge meets the scientific criteria that can withstand the falsification procedure;
c) in research activities “there is no more rational procedure than the method of trial and error - assumptions and refutations.”
This structure is a structure comprehended and accepted at the worldview level by Popper himself and implemented by him in science. However, therefore, the influence of ideological beliefs on the model of the development of science created by the thinker.
At first glance, the procedure for refuting theories and searching for new theories that differ in their resolving abilities seems positive, suggesting the development of scientific knowledge. However, in Popper's understanding of science, its development is not assumed for the reason that in the world itself there is no development as such, but only change. The processes that occur at the inorganic and biological levels of existence of nature are just changes based on trial and error. Accordingly, theories in science, as guesses about the world, do not imply their development. The replacement of one theory by another is a non-cumulative process in science. The theories that replace each other do not have a continuity between themselves; on the contrary, the new theory is new because it distances itself as far as possible from the old theory. Therefore, theories are not subject to evolution and development does not occur in them; they just replace each other, without maintaining any evolutionary “thread” between them. In this case, what does Popper see as the growth of scientific knowledge and progress in theories?
He sees the meaning and value of the new theory that replaced the old one in its problem-solving ability. If a given theory solves problems different from those that it was intended to solve, then, of course, such a theory is recognized as progressive. “...The most significant contribution to the growth of scientific knowledge,” writes Popper, “that a theory can make, consists of the new problems generated by it...”. From this position it is clear that the progress of science is conceived as a movement towards solving more complex and deeper problems, and the growth of knowledge in this context is understood as a gradual replacement of one problem by another or a sequence of theories replacing each other, causing a “problem shift”.
Popper is confident that the growth of knowledge is an essential act of the rational process scientific research. “It is the way of growth that makes science rational and empirical,” says the philosopher, “that is, the way in which scientists distinguish between existing theories and choose the best of them or (if there is no satisfactory theory) put forward reasons for rejecting all existing theories , formulating the conditions that a satisfactory theory must fulfill."
By a satisfactory theory, the thinker means a new theory capable of fulfilling several conditions: firstly, to explain facts of two kinds: on the one hand, those facts that previous theories successfully dealt with and, on the other, those facts that these theories could not explain; secondly, to find a satisfactory interpretation of the experimental data according to which existing theories were falsified; thirdly, to integrate problems and hypotheses that are unrelated to each other into one integrity; fourthly, the new theory must contain testable consequences; fifthly, the theory itself must also be able to withstand the rigorous testing procedure. Popper believes that such a theory is not only fruitful in solving problems, but even has a heuristic capability to a certain extent, which can serve as evidence of the success of cognitive activity.
Based on criticism of traditional synthetic and analytical thinking, Popper proposes a new criterion of knowledge, which he calls the “criterion of falsifiability.” A theory is only scientific and rational when it can be falsifiable.
There is a clear asymmetry between verification (confirmation) and falsification. Billions of evidence cannot perpetuate a theory. One refutation and the theory is undermined. Example: “Pieces of wood do not float in water” - “This piece of ebony does not float on water.” Karl Popper liked to repeat famous saying Oscar Wilde: “Experience is the name we give to our own mistakes.” Everything must be tested by falsification.
Thus, a provocative approach to reality was asserted, that is, the author of the theory open society In general, I would approve of the actions of the Russian peasants from the famous joke about Japanese woodworking machinery. "They brought it to a Siberian sawmill Japanese car. The men scratched their heads and shoved a huge pine tree into it. The machine fidgeted, fidgeted and spit out magnificent boards. “M-yes,” said the men. And they put in a thick spruce with all its branches and needles. The machine shifted again, fidgeted and gave out the boards. “Hmm, yes,” the men said with respect. And suddenly they see: some poor fellow is carrying the rail. The rail was enthusiastically thrust into the mechanism. The mechanism sighed, sneezed and broke. “Hmm, yes,” the workers said with satisfaction and took up their saw axes. Popper would have noted that there cannot be a machine that turns EVERYTHING into boards. There can only be a machine that turns SOMETHING into boards.
Popper's logical model presupposes a new concept of development. It is necessary to abandon the search for an ideal, a definitively correct solution, and look for an optimal, satisfactory solution.
“The new theory not only reveals what the predecessor succeeded in, but also his searches and failures... Falsification, criticism, justified protest, dissent lead to the enrichment of problems.” Without introducing hypotheses out of hand, we ask ourselves why the previous theory collapsed. The answer should appear a new version, the best theory. “However,” Popper emphasized, “there are no guarantees of progress.”

Conclusion

In the history of science, two principles have been proposed that allow us to draw a line between scientific theories and what is not science.
The first principle is the principle of verification: any concept or judgment has a scientific meaning if it can be reduced to an empirically verifiable form, or it itself cannot have such a form, then its consequences must have empirical confirmation; one principle of verification is applicable to a limited extent, in some areas modern science it cannot be used.
The American philosopher K. Popper proposed another principle - the principle of falsification; it is based on the fact that direct confirmation of a theory is often complicated by the inability to take into account all the particular cases of its action, and to refute a theory, just one case that does not coincide with it is enough, therefore, if a theory is formulated so that a situation in which it will be refuted can exist, then such a theory is scientific. An irrefutable theory, in principle, cannot be scientific.

List of sources

1. Martynovich S.F. A fact of science and its determination. Saratov, 1983.
2. Putnam H. How you can’t talk about meaning // Structure and development of science. M., 1978.
3. Popper K. Logic and the growth of scientific knowledge. M., 1983, p. 35.
4. Quote. by: Ovchinnikov N.F. “On the intellectual biography of Popper.” // Questions of Philosophy, 1995, No. 11.
Principles of verification and falsification
Posted by Scientist | 06/30/2010 | 6:18 | In categories: Philosophy of technology
Verification - (from the Latin verificatio - proof, confirmation) - a concept used in logic and methodology of scientific knowledge to denote the process of establishing the truth of scientific statements through their empirical verification.

Verification consists of correlating the statement with the real state of affairs using observation, measurement or experiment.

There are direct and indirect verification. In direct V., the statement itself, which speaks about the facts of reality or experimental data, is subjected to empirical verification.

However, not every statement can be directly correlated with facts, since most scientific statements refer to ideal, or abstract, objects. Such statements are verified indirectly. From this statement we derive a consequence that relates to objects that can be observed or measured. This consequence can be verified directly.

V. corollary is considered as an indirect verification of the statement from which this corollary was obtained. For example, suppose we need to verify the statement “The temperature in the room is 20°C.” It cannot be verified directly, because in reality there are no objects to which the terms “temperature” and “20°C” correspond. From this statement we can deduce a corollary that says that if a thermometer is brought into the room, the mercury column will stop at the “20” mark.

We bring a thermometer and, by direct observation, verify the statement “The mercury column is at the “20” mark.” This serves as an indirect V. of the original statement. Verifiability, i.e. empirical testability, of scientific statements and theories is considered one of the important signs of science. Statements and theories that cannot be verified in principle are generally not considered scientific.

FALSIFIATION (from Latin falsus - false and facio - I do) – methodological procedure, which allows one to establish the falsity of a hypothesis or theory in accordance with the rule of modus tollens of classical logic. The concept of “falsification” should be distinguished from the principle of falsifiability, which was proposed by Popper as a criterion for demarcating science from metaphysics, as an alternative to the principle of verifiability adopted in neopositivism. Isolated empirical hypotheses, as a rule, can be subjected to direct testing and rejected on the basis of relevant experimental data, as well as because of their incompatibility with fundamental scientific theories. At the same time, abstract hypotheses and their systems that form scientific theories are directly non-falsifiable. The fact is that empirical testing of theoretical knowledge systems always involves the introduction of additional models and hypotheses, as well as the development of theoretical models of experimental installations, etc. Discrepancies between theoretical predictions and experimental results that arise during the testing process can, in principle, be resolved by making appropriate adjustments to individual fragments of the theoretical system being tested.

Therefore, for a final Ph. theory, an alternative theory is necessary: ​​only it, and not the results of experiments themselves, is able to falsify the theory being tested. Thus, only in the case when there is a new theory that truly ensures progress in knowledge is the rejection of the previous scientific theory justified methodologically and logically.

The scientist tries to scientific concepts satisfied the principle of verifiability (the principle of verification) or at least the principle of refutation (the principle of falsification).

The principle of verification states: only verifiable statements are scientifically meaningful.

Scientists carefully check each other's discoveries, as well as their own discoveries. This is how they differ from people who are alien to science.

The “Carnap circle” helps to distinguish between what is verified and what is, in principle, impossible to verify (it is usually considered in a philosophy course in connection with the topic “Neopositivism”). The statement: “Natasha loves Petya” is not verified (not scientifically meaningful). The statement is verified (in a scientifically meaningful way): “Natasha says that she loves Petya” or “Natasha says that she is the frog princess.”

The principle of falsification does not recognize as scientific a statement that is confirmed by any other statements (sometimes even mutually exclusive), and cannot even be refuted in principle. There are people for whom any statement is yet another proof that they were right. If you tell him something, he will respond: “What did I say!” You tell him something exactly the opposite, and he again: “See, I was right!”

Having formulated the principle of falsification, Popper supplemented the principle of verification as follows:

A) A concept that is scientifically meaningful is one that satisfies experimental facts and for which there are imaginary facts that can, if discovered, refute it. This concept is true.

B) A concept that is scientifically meaningful is one that is refuted by facts and for which there are imaginary facts that can confirm it when discovered. Such a concept is false.

If the conditions for at least indirect verification are formulated, then the asserted thesis becomes more reliable knowledge.

If it is impossible (or very difficult) to find evidence, try to make sure that at least there are no refutations (a kind of “presumption of innocence”).

Let's say we cannot verify some statement. Then we will try to make sure that statements opposite to it are not confirmed. In a similar unique way, “by contradiction,” one frivolous person tested her feelings: “Darling! I’m dating other men to make sure I’m even more convinced that I truly love only you...”

A more strict analogy with what we are talking about exists in logic. This is the so-called apagogical proof (from the Greek apagogos - leading). The conclusion about the truth of a statement is made indirectly, namely, the statement that contradicts it is refuted.

By developing the principle of falsification, Popper sought to implement a more effective demarcation between scientific and non-scientific knowledge.

According to Academician Migdal, professionals, unlike amateurs, constantly strive to refute themselves...

The same idea was expressed by Louis Pasteur: a true researcher is one who tries to “destroy” his own discovery, persistently testing its strength.

So in science great importance is given to the reliability of facts, their representativeness, as well as the logical validity of hypotheses and theories created on their basis.

In the same time scientific ideas include elements of faith. But this special faith, which does not lead to a transcendental, otherworldly world. An example of this is “taken on faith” axioms, initial principles.

I.S. Shklovsky, in his scientific best-selling book “The Universe, Life, Mind,” introduced a fruitful principle called the “presumption of naturalness.” According to him, any discovered phenomenon is considered automatically natural unless the opposite is absolutely reliably proven.

Within science, the orientations to believe, trust and double-check are closely interrelated.

Most often, scientists only believe in what can be double-checked. Not everything can be double-checked yourself. Someone double-checks, and someone trusts the one who double-checked. Reputable professional experts are trusted the most.

Often “what is a priori* for the individual is a posteriori for the species”

Not long ago I had such a strange conversation with one of my friends. He argued that, in essence, what the logical positivists proposed and what Popper proposed are one and the same. Therefore, I have long wanted to make this entry to clarify the situation in the sense that I personally see it.

First, a few words about logical positivism. This may all sound somewhat simplified, but still.
Logical positivism is a movement that developed on the basis of the so-called. “Vienna Circle”, organized in 1922 by M. Schlick. Logical positivists posed an interesting task - finding a reliable basis for scientific knowledge. In addition, they were very interested in the problem of demarcation - the separation of scientific knowledge and extra-scientific knowledge; they, in particular, really wanted to expel philosophy (metaphysics) from science. According to logical positivists, in order for a certain proposition (in the logical sense) to have the status of a scientific one, it is necessary that it can be expressed through some elementary (protocol) propositions that are empirical (for simplicity, we will assume this way, although there is something else here -What). That is, in essence, any scientific knowledge must be strictly reduced to empirical experience in one form or another. On the other hand, theoretical knowledge is built on the basis of empirical knowledge through its inductive generalization. Logical positivists put forward verification principle, which must satisfy scientific theory. Its logical form is

where T is a theory, and is a consequence logically deduced from theory T, and at the same time an elementary sentence expressing an empirically reliable fact. In this case, they say that the theory is confirmed by empirical fact a. The more empirical facts, the higher the degree of confirmation of the theory. This scheme is thus based on induction - particular facts confirm the general theory.

Karl Popper’s concept opposes logical positivism on a number of points, in particular:

1. Against induction. Induction as a logical method includes an irrational moment (as David Hume spoke about): at what point can you interrupt the enumeration and move from the premises (a finite set of facts) to the conclusion (a general statement about all such facts)? From a logical point of view - never. There is no logical transition from premises to conclusion. And induction is the logical basis of empiricism. Thus, empiricism is not logically justified.
2. Against the principle of verification. It is quite difficult to establish the truth of a certain statement. For example, “All swans are white” will be true if each of the swans is white. That is, every swan needs to be checked. But you can show the falsity of such a statement by finding at least one counterexample. Thus, there is some asymmetry between confirmation and refutation.
3. Against the discrediting of philosophy (metaphysics) by positivists. Popper showed (see his “Logic of Scientific Research”) that if we use the principles of logical positivism, it becomes clear that not only philosophy falls out of the category of science - many statements of theoretical physics also turn out to be extra-scientific. Here I am reminded of the story with general theory relativity. People who understand the issue understand that there is not a single complete confirmation of this theory. There are a number (generally speaking, very small) of confirmations that are in one way or another based on calculating corrections to the Newtonian potential. But this does not make us doubt this theory. And here the point is that it is theory, not experience, that comes to the fore. Popper did not believe* (nor did Einstein, by the way) that a theory should be based on empirical facts, or in any way be provoked by them.

Based on his concept, Popper puts forward an alternative to the principle of verification - falsification principle, the logical diagram of which looks like:

where T is a theory, b is a consequence, not b is an empirical fact that contradicts the consequence. The conclusion affirms the falsity of T.
As a result:
1. The significance of empirical knowledge remains.
2. This mode is deductive and its conclusion is logically certain.
3. Induction is preserved - in a specific sense: the inductive direction of lies from false private knowledge in the premise to false general knowledge in the conclusion.

The principle of falsification is put forward as a criterion of scientific character (demarcation): a theory must have potential opportunity conflict with empirical facts. The more unsuccessful refutation attempts, the better for the theory. Therefore, falsifiability is a logical relation between a theory and a class of potential falsifiers (this includes not only pure empirical knowledge, but also mental statements). An attempt to rehabilitate a false theory leads, according to Popper, to dogmatism. And that's why. If b is derived from theory, but in practice it turns out not-b, then we must somehow introduce the statement of not-b into the theory. But this can lead to the theory containing a contradiction, and this, as is known, leads to the fact that anything can be deduced from the theory. To demonstrate this simple statement I will quote Popper’s words from his article “What is Dialectics”:

"Using our two rules, we can actually show this. Let's say there are two contradictory friends parcels to a friend, say:
(a) The sun is shining now.
(b) The sun is not shining now.
Any statement can be derived from these two premises, for example, “Caesar was a traitor.”
From premise (a) we can deduce, according to rule (1), the following conclusion:
(c) The sun is shining now V Caesar was a traitor. Taking now (b) and (c) as premises, we can ultimately deduce, according to rule (2):
(d) Caesar was a traitor.
It is clear that using the same method we could derive any other statement, for example, “Caesar was not a traitor.” So from “2 + 2 = 5” and “2 + 2 not = 5” we can derive not only the statement we would like, but also its negation, which may not have been part of our plans."

Regarding verification, Popper says the following:

“I can illustrate this with two significantly different examples of human behavior: the behavior of a person pushing a child into water with the intention of drowning him, and the behavior of a person sacrificing his life in an attempt to save that child. Each of these cases is easily explained in both Freudian and Adlerian terms. According to Freud, the first person suffers from a repression (say, Oedipus) complex, while the second has achieved sublimation. According to Adler, the first person suffers from a feeling of inferiority (which causes him to prove to himself that he is capable of daring to commit a crime), the same thing happens to the second (who has a need to prove to himself that he is capable of saving a child). So, I could not think of any form of human behavior that could not be explained on the basis of each of these theories. And it was precisely this fact - that they coped with everything and always found confirmation - in the eyes of their adherents was the most strong argument in favor of these theories. However, I began to suspect whether this was not an expression of the strength, but, on the contrary, of the weakness of these theories?
<….>
Astrology is not subject to testing. Astrologers are so mistaken about what they consider to be supporting evidence that they pay no attention to examples that are unfavorable to them. Moreover, by making their interpretations and prophecies vague enough, they are able to explain away everything that might be a refutation of their theory if it and the prophecies that follow from it were more accurate. To avoid falsification, they destroy the testability of their theories. This is the usual trick of all soothsayers: to predict events so vaguely that the predictions always come true, that is, so that they are irrefutable.
The two mentioned earlier psychoanalytic theories belong to a different class. They are simply untestable and irrefutable theories. ... This does not mean that Freud and Adler did not say anything correct at all ... But it does mean that those “clinical observations” that psychoanalysts naively believe confirm their theory do not do so in to a greater extent than the daily confirmations found by astrologers in their practice. As for Freud's description of the I (Ego), the Super-I (Super-Ego) and the Id (Id), it is essentially no more scientific than Homer's stories about Olympus. The theories under consideration describe some facts, but do so in the form of a myth. They contain very interesting psychological assumptions, but they express them in an untestable form.”
—Popper K.R. Conjectures and Refutations. The Growth of Scientific Knowledge. London and Henley. Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1972.

Popper managed to identify the main shortcomings of the program of logical positivism; he actually closed the problem of the existence of a reliable source of knowledge. The old question about what is decisive in cognitive activity: feelings or reason - turned out to be incorrectly formulated, because There are no “pure” empirical facts. They always depend on a certain theory. Popper made us think about the nature of theoretical knowledge and the role of induction in its emergence. The main purpose of a scientist is to put forward risky hypotheses, the falsification of which forces one to put forward new problems and even more risky hypotheses.
The disadvantages traditionally include the fact that consistent implementation of the principle of falsification in real scientific practice has never taken place. A real scientist, faced with contradictions, will not, even after a certain period of time, abandon his theory, but will find out the reasons for the conflict between theory and facts, look for an opportunity to change some parameters of the theory, that is, he will save it, which is fundamentally prohibited in Popper’s methodology.

*) Generally speaking, as far as I remember, Karl Popper himself did not receive a humanities education at all; rather, he was close to mathematics and theoretical physics, as, indeed, were many members of the Vienna circle.

The criterion for the scientific status of a theory is its verifiability and fundamental falsifiability.

There are several criteria for distinguishing between scientific and pseudoscientific ideas. In the 1920s Neopositivist philosophers proposed a verification concept of scientific knowledge. As a criterion for distinguishing scientific knowledge from non-scientific knowledge, neopositivists considered verification, i.e. experimental confirmation. Scientific statements are meaningful because they can be verified against experience; unverifiable statements are meaningless. Scientific propositions are better substantiated the more facts confirming these propositions. Using the verification procedure, neopositivists intended to cleanse science of all meaningless statements and build a model of science that is ideal from the point of view of logic. It is obvious that in the neopositivist model, science was reduced to empirical knowledge, statements about facts confirmed by experience.

The verification concept of scientific knowledge was criticized immediately after its appearance. The essence of the critical provisions boiled down to the assertion that science cannot develop only on the basis of experience, since it presupposes obtaining results that are irreducible to experience and cannot be directly deduced from it. In science, there are statements about the facts of the past, formulations of general laws that cannot be verified using verification criteria. In addition, the principle of verifiability itself is non-verifiable, i.e. it should be classified as meaningless and subject to exclusion from the system of scientific statements.

K. Popper, in his concept of critical rationalism, proposed a different criterion for distinguishing scientific knowledge from non-scientific knowledge - falsification. The theoretical position of critical rationalism developed in polemics with neopositivism. Thus, K. Popper argued that the scientific attitude is, first of all, a critical attitude. Testing a hypothesis for scientific validity should not consist of searching for confirming facts, but of attempting to refute it. Falsifiability is thus equated with empirical falsifiability. From the general provisions of the theory, consequences are derived that can be correlated with experience. These implications are then tested. Refuting one of the consequences of a theory falsifies the entire system. “Unverifiability, and falsifiability of a system should be considered a demarcation criterion... From scientific system I demand that it have such a logical form that makes it possible to isolate it in a negative sense: for an empirical scientific system there must be the possibility of being refuted by experience,” argued K. Popper. In his opinion, science should be understood as a system of hypotheses, conjectures and anticipations that are used as long as they withstand empirical testing.

Thus, K. Popper proposes to analyze science on theoretical level, as an integral system, and not to engage in confirmation of individual statements. Any theory, in his opinion, if it claims to be scientific, must in principle be refuted by experience. If a theory is constructed in such a way that it is in principle irrefutable, then it cannot be considered scientific.

Science studies only that which exists in itself and independently of the subject. She is not interested in why it is, what could be, what should be, and how good or bad it is. In principle, science can answer these questions, but it ignores them. She does not seek to find absolute truth by answering all possible questions. You can approach self-restraint in different ways, but the scientific community believes that this style allows you to achieve the most significant results.

Science is based on evidence, so only what can be confirmed or disproved makes sense. Confirmation and refutation are two types of evidence. Confirmation proves truth, and refutation proves falsity. Science strives for universal obligatory nature and universal recognition of the degree of accuracy and objectivity of its statements. Conclusions and statements must be equally convincing for everyone.

Philosophical ideas, unlike scientific knowledge, are closely related to subjective preferences. The materialist considers eternal and infinite matter to be the first principle, and the idealist considers the ideal, spiritual (God, the World Mind, the Absolute Idea, etc.) to be the first principle. These opposing ideas can neither be confirmed nor refuted, so you can only believe one or the other. In general, this is a question of the relationship of consciousness to being.

Today, the scientific community recognizes two criteria on the basis of which it distinguishes scientific knowledge from pseudoscientific

The principle of verification is (from the Latin verus - true and facere - to do), by virtue of which only that knowledge is scientific that can be confirmed (one way or another, directly or indirectly, earlier or later). This principle was proposed by Bertrand Russell.

The principle of falsification is (from the Latin false - lie and facere - to do), by virtue of which only that knowledge is scientific that can (one way or another, directly or indirectly, sooner or later) be refuted. This principle was proposed by Karl Popper.

If the first criterion does not raise questions, then the indisputability of the second is in doubt. Its practical application in relation to science will result in a final disaster, and who can guarantee that one day this will not be done? The criterion must be recognized as unnatural and suicidal. If the principle of verification is aimed at strengthening the system of scientific knowledge, then the principle of falsification is aimed at its destruction. In nature, a system based on such principles would be doomed to destruction.

The principle of falsification violates logic, therefore it must be replaced by a more adequate one. Only that knowledge is scientific that can be changed, that is, either refuted or supplemented. The need for addition follows from the unity of certainty and uncertainty. Scientific knowledge should not be absolute. Let science not strive for absolute truth(i.e., to complete certainty), but what to do if the knowledge needed to be clarified? In the proposed interpretation, the criteria for scientificity become opposites, and this alone makes them natural and invulnerable. They will withstand the most biased criticism.