Popper's principle of falsification and logical positivism. Positivism Dispute" in German Sociology: K

Popper actively opposed the verification criterion, participating in the meetings of the Vienna Circle. He put forward another criterion for demarcation, or demarcation, of genuine science from pseudoscience, which is based on the possibility of falsification, or refutation, of scientific hypotheses and theories.

Despite criticism of verification, Popper shared the thesis of the positivists that the philosophy of science should deal only with the issues of substantiating scientific knowledge.

The fundamental opposition to logical positivism was, first of all, the methodological constructions of Popper, who proposed a radically new look at the role of experience in relation to scientific theories. According to Popper, the main purpose of observations and experiments is by no means in confirming scientific hypotheses and theories, and even more so in proving their truth (both experiences are not able to fulfill simply by their logical possibilities in relation to theories). The purpose of experience is to falsify false models and theories. Among theories not falsified by actual experience, preference should be given to those theories that had a high probability of being refuted and, nevertheless, successfully passed the test. Moreover, only those theories can generally be considered scientific, which in principle can be falsified by experience and sooner or later will be refuted.

Karl Popper (1902-1994) considers knowledge not only as a ready-made system that has become, but also as a system that is changing and developing.

He presented this aspect of the analysis of science in the form of the concept of the growth of scientific knowledge. Rejecting ageneticism, anti-historicism of logical positivists in this matter, he believes that the method of constructing artificial model languages is unable to solve the problems associated with the growth of our knowledge. But within its limits, this method is legitimate and necessary. Popper is clearly aware that highlighting the change of scientific knowledge, its growth and progress, may to some extent contradict the prevailing ideal of science as a systematized deductive system. This ideal has dominated epistemology ever since Euclid.

The growth of knowledge is not a repetitive or cumulative process, it is a process of eliminating errors, a Darwinian selection. The growth of knowledge is not a mere accumulation of observations, but the repeated subversion of scientific theories and their replacement by better and more satisfactory ones. The main mechanism of knowledge growth is the mechanism of assumptions and rebuttals.

The growth of scientific knowledge consists in putting forward bold hypotheses and the best (from possible) theories and implementing their refutation, as a result of which scientific problems are solved. The growth of scientific knowledge is carried out by trial and error elimination and is nothing more than a way of choosing a theory in a certain problem situation - this is what makes science rational and ensures its progress. The growth of scientific knowledge is a special case of world evolutionary processes. Popper points out some difficulties, difficulties and even real dangers for this process: lack of imagination, unjustified faith in formalization and accuracy, authoritarianism.

The necessary means of scientific knowledge growth include such things as language, problem formulation, the emergence of new problem situations, competing theories, mutual criticism in the process of discussion.

3 basic requirements for the growth of knowledge:

1) A new theory must start from a simple, new, fruitful and unifying idea.

2) It must be independently verifiable, i.e. should lead to the presentation of phenomena that have not yet been observed. That is, the new theory should be more fruitful as a research tool.

3) A good theory must withstand some new and rigorous testing.

The theory of scientific knowledge and its growth is epistemology, which in the process of its formation becomes a theory of problem solving, construction, critical discussion, evaluation and critical testing of competing hypotheses and theories.

Popper's theses:

The specific ability of a person to cognize, reproduce scientific knowledge is the result of natural selection.

Evolution is about building better and better theories. This is the Darwinian process.

Elimination of old theories that turn out to be erroneous.

Against the Badey principle of knowledge - the traditional theory of knowledge. Denies the existence of directly sense data, associations and induction through repetition and generalization.

A necessary prerequisite for critical thinking is that the human language has a descriptive or descriptive function that allows you to convey information about the state of affairs or about situations that may or may not take place.

POPPER(Popper) Karl Raimund (July 28, 1902, Vienna - September 17, 1994, London; buried in Vienna) - philosopher and logician. His father was a law professor, his mother was a musician. In 1918 he entered the University of Vienna, where he studied mathematics, physics, music history, after graduation he worked at a school. In 1928 he received a diploma as a teacher of mathematics and physics at the gymnasium. Until 1937 he worked in Vienna, in 1937–1945 he taught in New Zealand, in 1945 he received British citizenship, from 1946 until he retired to the con. 1960s Professor at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Popper's creative activity lasted more than 65 years, but he formulated the main ideas of his philosophical and logical concept in con. 1920 - 1st floor. 1930s, when he lived in Vienna and maintained creative contacts with some leaders of logical positivism (in particular, with R. Carnap). Popper's main area of scientific interest, like that of the neopositivists, is the philosophy of science. However, his philosophical concept - critical rationalism , the theory of the growth of scientific knowledge - he built as an antithesis to the empiricism of the neopositivists. In 1934, Popper's first book, The Logic of Scientific Discovery (Logik der Forschung), was published. This work contained provisions that were rated as "confusion" by the members of the Vienna Circle. In fact, however, Popper's conclusions ran counter to the phenomenalist, reductionist, and conventionalist tenets of logical empiricism. The zone of discrepancy was contained in Popper's interpretation of the empirical criterion for the demarcation of scientific-theoretical knowledge and metaphysics. In contrast to the desire of logical empiricists to formulate criteria for the cognitive significance of scientific statements on the basis of the principle of verification, Popper put forward the principle of falsification, or fundamental refutation. In general form, this principle means the following: scientific theories include only those for which it is possible to determine their potential falsifiers, i.e. statements that contradict them, the truth of which can be established by means of certain generally accepted procedures of an experimental order. In solving this problem, he rejected inductivism, abandoned the narrow empiricism of logical positivists and the search for an absolutely reliable basis of knowledge. According to Popper, empirical and theoretical levels of knowledge are related; any scientific knowledge is conjectural in nature, subject to errors (principle of fallibilism). The growth of scientific knowledge consists in putting forward bold hypotheses and implementing their refutation, resulting in the growth of scientific knowledge.

Popper is one of the creators of the deductive-nomological scheme of explanation (some statement is considered explained if it can be deduced deductively from the set of relevant laws and boundary conditions). Based on the ideas of Tarski's logical semantics, he proposed a method for determining the true and false content of scientific theories (hypotheses). In epistemology, Popper advocated "realism," or the metaphysical assumption that our knowledge is knowledge of reality, and not of ideas in the mind, sensations, or language. Although the essence of the world can hardly be expressed using the universal laws of science, however, through hypotheses and refutation, science is moving towards comprehending ever deeper structures of reality.

In the works of the 1960s and 70s. Popper turned to biological-evolutionary and emergentist arguments to explain knowledge, the human self and cosmological issues (Conjectures and Refutations. The Growth of Scientific Knowledge. L., 1969; The Self and Its Brain. An Argument for Interactionism. V.–N. Y.– L., 1977, with J.C. Eccles, Objective Knowledge, An Evolutionary Approach, Oxf., 1979). Knowledge in the subjective sense and knowledge in the objective sense is rooted in the foundation of innate knowledge formed in the process of evolution, and each emergence (be it an organism or a scientific theory) appears as a “hypothesis”, the vitality of which depends on the ability to adapt to the environment. Based on determinism, it is impossible to explain the emergence of novelty. Popper did not deny the existence of a system of invariant laws, but he did not consider it complete enough to rule out the emergence of new law-like properties.

In the works of the 1970–80s. Popper addresses the problem of consciousness, which he solves from the standpoint of emergentism, opposing it to physicalist reductionism. In solving the problem of the spiritual and the physical, he defends dualism and interactionism (Knowledge and Body-Mind Problem. In Defense of Interaction. L.–N. Y., 1996). His concept of "three worlds" asserts the existence of the physical and mental worlds, as well as ideal objects (the world of objective knowledge). Genetically interconnected (the physical generates the mental, and the latter - the ideal), these "worlds" are not reducible to each other. World-3, or the world of the ideal, has autonomy and the ability to self-develop: theories, once created, give rise to consequences that their creators could not foresee.

Popper's belief in the reality of consciousness and free will was an important ideological component of the "open universe" metaphysics he created; in turn, this metaphysics served as the theoretical basis for the ideas of "open society" and "open philosophy", which he defended throughout his career. In the 1990s Popper drew attention to the cosmological significance of the concept of predispositions put forward by him back in the 50s (World of Propensities. Bristol, 1990): predispositions are “unobservable dispositional properties of the physical world”, similar to the Newtonian force of attraction or fields of forces. The hypothesis of predispositions is used by the late Popper both to explain the phenomenon of self-active consciousness and to confirm its indeterminism: according to it, reality is not a causal machine, but the process of implementing "weighty dispositions". Unlike the past, which is always fixed, "weighty dispositions" are in a state of anticipation of the future and, in their striving towards it, influence the present.

In social philosophy, Popper criticized historicism, which, in his opinion, is internally infected with prophetism and utopianism (The Poverty of Historisism. L., 1957; The Open Society and Its Enemies, v. 1–2. L., 1966). In this regard, he sharply opposed the socio-historical concept of Marx, although he recognized its moral and intellectual appeal. The methodology of “step-by-step” social engineering developed by Popper (as opposed to social projecting) was widely used in the theory and practice of social reformist organizations in European countries in the 2nd half. 20th century

Popper's ideas were developed in the philosophical theories of I. Lakatos, J. Watkins, W. Bartley, J. Agassi, D. Miller, as well as in various versions of German critical rationalism (X. Albert, X. Spinner, etc.). Their influence also marked those philosophical and historical-scientific concepts that sought to refute Popper's falsificationism (for example, T. Kuhn, P. Feyerabend). Popper is often reproached for the internal inconsistency of the formal criterion he proposed for assessing the plausibility of scientific theories, they find flaws in his anti-inductivism and the thesis about the impossibility of an inductive interpretation of the calculus of probabilities. At the same time, his name remains at the center of discussions on the most pressing problems of philosophy.

Compositions:

1. Unended Quest: An Intellectual Autobiography. L., 1976;

2. Quantum Theory and the Schism in Physics. Totowa (N. J.), 1982;

3. The Open Universe. Totowa (N. J.), 1982;

4. Realism and the Aim of Science. L., 1983;

5. Popper Selections, ed. by D. Miller. Princeton, 1985;

6. Logic and growth of scientific knowledge. M., 1983 (bibliography);

7. The Open Society and Its Enemies, vols. 1–2. M., 1992;

8. Logic of social sciences. - "VF", 1992, No. 8;

9. Poverty of historicism. M., 1993.

Literature:

Khabarova T.M. The concept of K. Popper as a turning point in the development of positivism. - In the book: Modern idealistic epistemology. M., 1968;
Cornforth M. Open philosophy and open society. M., 1972;
Serov Yu.N. The concept of "presumptive" knowledge of K. Popper. - In the book: Positivism and Science. M., 1975;
"Critical Rationalism". Philosophy and Politics. M., 1981;
Gryaznov B.S. Logic, rationality, creativity. M., 1982;
Sadovsky V.N. About Karl Popper and the fate of his teachings in Russia. - "VF", 1995, No. 10;
Yulina N.S. K. Popper: the world of predispositions and the activity of the self. - "Philosophical Research", 1997, No. 4;
Towards an open society. Ideas of Karl Popper and modern Russia. M., 1998;
The Critical Approach to Science and Philosophy. N.Y., 1964;
The Philosophy of K.Popper, v. 1–2. La Salle, 1974;
Ackermann R.J. The Philosophy of K.Popper. Amberst, 1976;
In Pursuit of Truth: Essayes on the Philosophy of K.Popper on the Occasion of His 80th Birthdae. Atlantic Highlands (N.J.), 1982;
Watkins J. Karl Raimund Popper, 1902-1994. – Proceedings of the British Academy, v. 94, p. 645–684;

Biography

early years

Karl Raimund Popper was born on July 28, 1902 in Vienna to the lawyer Simon Sigmund Karl Popper and Jenny Schiff. His father worked as a law professor at the University of Vienna, was interested in problems of philosophy, sociology and political science, had an extensive library and often discussed social and political issues with his son. Thanks to this, Karl, already at a young age, got acquainted with numerous works on classical philosophy, as well as with works on social philosophy by such thinkers as K. Marx, F. Engels, K. Kautsky, E. Bernstein and others.

In 1918 he entered the University of Vienna, where he studied mathematics and theoretical physics, while continuing to take an interest in philosophy on his own. Even in his youth, his mother instilled in Popper a love of music; in 1920-1922, Popper seriously thought about becoming a musician. He joined the Society of Private Concerts of A. Schoenberg and studied at the Vienna Conservatory for a year, but considered himself insufficiently capable and stopped studying music, but he did not completely lose interest in it; chose the history of music as an optional subject during his PhD examination.

From 1921 to 1924, K. Popper mastered the profession of a cabinetmaker. In the same period, he worked as a volunteer in A. Adler's children's clinics, where he met him personally. Observing Adler's methods, Popper doubted the effectiveness of psychoanalysis and the claims of such theories to be scientific. After studying the works of Z. Freud and A. Einstein, Popper became interested in how the doctrines of K. Marx, Z. Freud and A. Adler differ from such recognized scientific theories as, for example, A. Einstein's theory of relativity. In future works, this question will become the basis of the falsifiability principle or Popper's criterion.

In 1925, after graduating from university, Popper married Josephine Anna Henninger and received a diploma as a teacher of mathematics and physics at the gymnasium. After that he taught mathematics and science at a high school. In 1928, Popper completed his Ph.D. thesis in philosophy, on the topic of the methodology of cognitive psychology.

Popper and Hoshl

Moving to New Zealand

When Popper arrived in New Zealand, he was already quite famous in Europe, but few people heard about him in his new place of residence. As a result, Popper's attitude towards the university was ambivalent: on the one hand, he was safe from anti-Semitic persecution and Nazism. On the other hand, his authority in the new place was minimal, and he had to be subordinate to much less authoritative professors.

Headstone at the grave of Karl Popper

However, Popper gained recognition in Christchurch as well and became one of the university's most influential and talked about lecturers.

Later years and move to the UK

In 1945, Popper became a British citizen and moved to London in January 1946, where from 1946 until the mid-1970s he was Professor of Logic and Dean of the Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method at the London School of Economics and Political Science. In 1964 he was knighted.

Karl Popper died on September 17, 1994 in the London Borough of Croydon. His wife Josephine Popper died in 1985.

Key Ideas

Falsifiability and Epistemology

Karl Popper made a great contribution to the development of the principles of scientific knowledge. To solve the philosophical problem of demarcation (separation of scientific knowledge from non-scientific), he proposed the criterion of falsifiability, which is also known as Popper's criterion. In his works, Popper considered many philosophical problems, such as the problem of induction, formulated by D. Hume, and so on. transcendental question of I. Kant. Popper, recognizing the objectivity and absoluteness of truth, rejected the inductive nature of scientific hypotheses, and believed that scientific hypotheses appear as a result of a priori judgments, which, however, can be subject to errors (the principle of fallibilism). In this, Popper disagrees with Kant, who believed that a posteriori knowledge about the world is based on true a priori intuitions. Popper argued that it is irrational to demand that scientific knowledge be justified.

It was K. Popper who introduced the concept of falsifiability (lat. falsus- false) - a necessary condition for recognizing a theory or hypothesis as scientific. Representatives of logical positivism put forward as a criterion for the demarcation of science and non-science verification principle. Popper showed the necessity, but the insufficiency of this principle, and proposed the method of falsifiability as an additional criterion for demarcation: only that theory is scientific, which can be fundamentally refuted by experience. “The dogma of meaning or meaning and the pseudo-problems it generates can be eliminated if the criterion of demarcation is taken to be the criterion of falsifiability, that is, at least of asymmetric or one-sided solvability. According to this criterion, statements or systems of statements contain information about the empirical world only if they have the ability to collide with experience, or more precisely, if they can be systematically tested, that is, subjected to (according to some "methodological decision" ) checks, the result of which may be their refutation. Popper turned the possibility of constantly being wrong in favor of science and said: “Scientific research should be devoted not to confirming a scientific theory, but to disprove it. Only those theories can be classified as scientific for which potential falsifiers can be found, that is, assumptions that contradict the theory, the truth of which is again found in experience. Popper's methodological rule: "a scientist, having found such a falsifier, must immediately abandon his theory and develop the next theory." The positive role of error lies in the change of scientific theories.

Popper believed that the growth of scientific knowledge is not due to the justification of existing theories, but due to the criticism of hypotheses that are proposed to solve new problems. Karl Popper studied the relationship between competing and successive scientific theories:

In the process of knowledge development, the depth and complexity of the problems being solved grows, but this complexity depends on the very level of science at a certain time stage of its development.
The transition from one theory to another does not express any accumulation of knowledge (a new theory consists of new problems generated by it).
The goal of science is to achieve highly informative content.

K. Popper 1990

Popper's concept of competing theories is comparable to the concept of natural selection, when the fittest representative of the genus is selected in the course of selection ("an armed struggle for the survival of the most worthy theory").

In his later writings, Popper advanced the three worlds hypothesis:

the world of physical objects and states
the world of mental and mental states of consciousness
the world of the objective content of thinking (this includes the content of scientific hypotheses, literary works and other objects independent of subjective perception).

Open society and the state

In 1945, the work "The Open Society and Its Enemies" was published, in which Karl Popper criticized Platonism, Marxism, totalitarianism ("closed society"), historicism and advocated democracy. In this work, Popper also put forward the idea of an open society - a society based on democracy and the critical thinking of individuals. In such a society, individuals are free from various taboos and make decisions based on the consensus reached as a result of an agreement. The political elite in such a society does not have unlimited power and can be removed without bloodshed. Popper argued that since the process of accumulation of human knowledge is unpredictable, the theory of ideal government does not fundamentally exist, therefore, the political system must be flexible enough so that the government can smoothly change its policy. Because of this, the society must be open to multiple points of view and cultures, that is, have signs of pluralism and multiculturalism.

Popper continued his criticism of Marxism in his work The Poverty of Historicism (G.).

Indeterminism

Criticism

A number of scientists who do not agree with Popper's ideas have tried to prove the fact that a separate theory cannot be the main methodological unit when discussing the issues of confirming, testing and refuting theories.

Notes

Bibliography

Works by Karl Popper

Editions in Russian

popper, K. Democracy // Century XX and the world. - 1994. - No. 1-2.
popper, K. Logic and the growth of scientific knowledge. - M.: Progress, 1983.
popper, K. The open society and its enemies. T. 1-2. - M., 1992.
popper, K. The poverty of historicism. - M., 1993.
popper, K. Unfinished search. Intellectual autobiography. - M.: Editorial URSS, 2000. - 256 p.
popper, K. Objective knowledge. Evolutionary approach / Per. from English. D. G. Lakhuti - M .: Editorial URSS, 2002. - 384 p. ISBN 5-8360-0327-0
popper, K. Darwinism as a metaphysical research program // Questions of Philosophy. - 1995. - No. 12. - S. 39-49.
popper, K. What is dialectic? / Per. from English. G. A. Novichkova // Questions of Philosophy. - 1995. - No. 1. - S. 118-138.
popper, K. Logic of social sciences // Questions of Philosophy. - 1992. - No. 10. - S. 65-75.
popper, K. The Poverty of Historicism // Questions of Philosophy. - 1992. - No. 8. - S. 49-79; No. 9. - S. 22-48; No. 10. - S. 29-58.
popper, K. Assumptions and rebuttals: The growth of scientific knowledge / Per. from English. A. L. Nikiforova, G. A. Novichkova. - M .: AST Publishing House LLC, ZAO NPP Ermak, 2004. - 638 p.
popper, K. Knowledge and psychophysical problem: In defense of interaction / Per. from English. I. V. Zhuravleva - M.: LKI Publishing House, 2008. - 256 p. ISBN 978-5-382-00541-6

Literature about K. Popper

Begiashvili, A. F. Karl Popper - "Critic" of Marx // Questions of Philosophy. - 1958. - No. 3. - S. 51-57.
Khabarova, T. M. The concept of K. Popper as a turning point in the development of positivism // Modern idealistic epistemology. - M., 1968.
Gendin, A. M. Social forecasting in the interpretation of Karl Popper // Questions of Philosophy. - 1969. - No. 4. - S. 111-122.
Cornforth, M. Open philosophy and open society. - M., 1972.
Evsevichev, V. I., Naletov, I. Z. The concept of the "third world" in the epistemology of Karl Popper // Questions of Philosophy. - 1974. - No. 10. - S. 130-136.
Meisel, B. M. The problem of cognition in the philosophical works of K. R. Popper of the 60s // Questions of Philosophy. - 1975. - No. 6. - S. 140-147.
Serov, Yu. N. The concept of K. Popper's "presumptive" knowledge // Pozitivism and Science. - M., 1975.
Kachoha, V. K. Popper: an alternative to the society of the future // Questions of Philosophy. - 2002. - No. 6. - S. 48-59.
Metlov, V. I. Critical analysis of the evolutionary approach to the theory of knowledge of K. Popper // Questions of Philosophy. - 1979. - No. 2. - S. 75-85.
Yulina, N. S."Emergent realism" by K. Popper against reductionist materialism // Questions of Philosophy. - 1979. - No. 8. - S. 96-108.
"Critical Rationalism". Philosophy and Politics. - M., 1981.
Gryaznov, B. S. Logic, rationality, creativity. - M., 1982.
Jamonat, L. On Popper's Philosophy: Critical Notes // Questions of Philosophy. - 1983. - No. 8. - S. 147-155.
Ovchinnikov, N. F. Karl Popper - our contemporary, philosopher of the XX century // Questions of Philosophy. - 1992. - No. 8. - S. 40-48.
Lektorsky, V. A. Rationality, criticism and the principles of liberalism (the relationship between social philosophy and Popper's epistemology) // Questions of Philosophy. - 1995. - No. 10. - S. 27-36.
Natureno, M. K. Popper's criticism of scientific socialism, or R. Carnap and his collaborators // Questions of Philosophy. - 1995. - No. 12. - S. 70-87.
Ovchinnikov, N. F. On Popper's intellectual biography // Questions of Philosophy. - 1995. - No. 12. - S. 35-38.
Rozov, N. S. The Possibility of Theoretical History: A Response to the Challenge of Karl Popper // Questions of Philosophy. - 1995. - No. 12. - S. 55-69.
Sadovsky, V. N. Karl Popper, Hegelian dialectics and formal logic // Questions of Philosophy. - 1995. - No. 1. - S. 139-147.
Sadovsky, V. N. About Karl Popper and the fate of his teachings in Russia // Questions of Philosophy. - 1995. - No. 10. - S. 14-26.
Smirnov, V. A. K. Popper is right: dialectical logic is impossible // Questions of Philosophy. - 1995. - No. 1. - S. 148-151.
Sorina, G. V. Philosophical position of Karl Popper in the context of the problems of psychologism and antipsychologism in culture // Questions of Philosophy. - 1995. - No. 10. - S. 57-66.
Tchaikovsky, Yu. V. On the evolutionary views of Karl Popper // Questions of Philosophy. - 1995. - No. 12. - S. 50-54.
Yulina, N. S. Philosophy of Karl Popper: the world of predispositions and the activity of the self // Problems of Philosophy. - 1995. - No. 10. - S. 45-56.
Yulina, N. S. K. Popper: the world of predispositions and the activity of the self // Philosophical research. - 1997. - No. 4.
Towards an open society. Ideas of Karl Popper and modern Russia / Ed. editor A. N. Chumakov. - M.: All world, 1998. - 256 p. ISBN 0-8199-0987-4
Bazhenov, L. B. Reflections while reading Popper // Questions of Philosophy. - 2002. - No. 4. - S. 159-169.
Sadovsky, V. N. Karl Popper and Russia. - M.: Editorial URSS, 2002. - (Scientific school. System approach.) ISBN 5-8360-0324-6
Evolutionary epistemology and the logic of the social sciences. Karl Popper and his critics / Comp. Lahuti D. G., Sadovsky V. N., Finn V. K. - M.: Editorial URSS, 2006. ISBN 5-8360-0536-2 ISBN 5-8360-0136-7
Malachi Haim Hacohen Karl Popper - The Formative Years, 1902–1945. Politics and Philosophy in Interwar Vienna. - Cambridge University Press, 2002. - S. 626. - ISBN 9780521890557
Edmonds D., Idinow J. Wittgenstein poker. The history of a ten-minute dispute between two great philosophers / Per. from English. E. Kanishcheva. - M .: New Literary Review, 2004. - 352 s - (Library of the magazine "Inviolable Reserve"). ISBN 5-86793-332-6
Zhuravlev, I. V. Emergent Evolution Theory and Karl Popper's Evolutionary Epistemology // Popper, K. Knowledge and the Psychophysical Problem: In Defense of Interaction. - M.: LKI Publishing House, 2008. - S. 217-237.

In the second half of the 20th century, neo-positivism is losing its former attractiveness, and a wave of criticism of it is growing in the circles of the scientific intelligentsia of the West. This is connected both with the limited possibilities of the logical formalization of science, which was absolutized by neopositivism, and with its detachment from vital problems of an ideological, humanitarian and social nature. The crisis of neopositivism resulted in the emergence of alternative points of view on the philosophy and methodology of science, as well as an understanding of the place of philosophy in culture and its purpose. At the center of discussions in the philosophy of science is post-positivism, which criticized the positivist interpretation of the tasks of the methodological analysis of science (Kuhn, Lakatos, Feyerabenl, and others). supporters of this trend rejected the absolutization of logical formalization, emphasized the role of the study of the history of science for its methodology, and also asserted the cognitive significance of philosophy in the development of science. These ideas largely owe their appearance to the influence of the methodology of critical rationalism of K. Popper, who criticized the radical scientism of neopositivism, ignoring various forms of extrascientific knowledge and their significance for science.

K. Popper, a representative of post-positivism, i.e. philosophical doctrine that arose after positivism and in many respects did not share its attitudes. Popper created a holistic philosophical doctrine, including the philosophy of the universe (ontology), the concept of "open society" and the original methodology of scientific knowledge - critical rationalism. In the present context, we are primarily interested in the methodology of K. Popper. Popper opposed his concept to logical positivism and phenomenology in the interpretation of the reliability of knowledge and the definition of criteria for such reliability. Popper contrasted the principle of verification of the results of scientific knowledge with the criterion of falsification, or fundamental refutability, of scientific stories. Throughout his career, Popper defended the idea of an open society, an open philosophy, an open universe. In the 1970s and 1980s, Popper developed the concept of evolutionary epistemology, according to which knowledge, both in the objective and in the subjective sense, is formed in the process of evolution. Each emergence (stage) of evolution manifests itself as a "hypothesis", the viability of which depends on the ability to adapt to the environment. Research in the field of the problem of consciousness

led Popper to the idea of three worlds: the physical world, the spiritual world and the world of knowledge, which are not reducible to each other, although they are genetically related.

In the 1990s, Popper drew attention to the cosmological significance of the concept of "predispositions" put forward by him in the 1950s - unobservable dispositional properties of the physical world, analogous to Newton's force of attraction or fields of forces. The hypothesis of predispositions was used by Popper to explain the self-activity of consciousness and to confirm his indeterminism. Popper argued that the universe is not a causal machine, but a process of realizing "weighty dispositions". Weighty dispositions are in a state of anticipation of the future and, in their striving for it, influence the present (analogous to attractors in synergetics). Let us turn to a more detailed consideration of some of the ideas of K. Popper in the field of philosophy of science.

On the criteria for the scientific character or scientific status of a theory."What are the differences between science and pseudoscience?" Popper asks. The generally accepted explanation for this difference is the reliance of science on the empirical method, i.e., induction, which is not found in pseudoscience. The unsatisfactoriness of such an answer is astrology, which has a huge mass of empirical material based on observations. This raises the problem of the difference between truly empirical and pseudo-empirical methods.

But it was not astrology that led Popper to the problem of the demarcation of science and pseudoscience, but those theories that were very popular in Austria after the collapse of Austria-Hungary: Einstein's theory of relativity, Freud's psychoanalysis, Marx's theory of history, Alfred Adler's "individual psychology". Popper noted that during this period, only a few could say that they believed in the truth of Einstein's theory of gravity. However, it was this theory that was confirmed as a result of Eddington's observations. As for other theories, although they are expressed in a scientific form, they actually have more in common with primitive myths than with science and more closely resemble astrology than astronomy. Popper explained the influence of these concepts by the fact that all their admirers were under the impression of their obvious explanatory power. It seemed, Popper wrote, that these theories could explain almost everything that happened in the field they described, the world is full of verifications of the theory. What is the difference? Einstein's theory predicted that heavy masses (such as the Sun) should attract light in the same way that they attract material bodies. Calculations made on this account showed that the light of a distant star, visible near the Sun, would reach the Earth in such a direction that the star would appear to be shifted away from the Sun (compared to its actual position). This effect was observed during a solar eclipse, was photographed, and the predicted effect could be verified in the photographs. Thus, if there is no effect, the theory is wrong, the theory is incompatible with the possible results of the observation. All other theories were found to be compatible with any human behavior. Hence the conclusions: first, it is easy to obtain confirmations, or verifications, for almost every theory if we are looking for confirmations. Therefore, confirmations should be taken into account only if they are the result of risky predictions, and the theory, not refuted by any conceivable event, is unscientific.

Popper is convinced that every real test of a theory is an attempt to falsify it, i.e., to refute it, and if the theory cannot be falsified, it is scientific. Some genuinely testable theories, after being found to be false, are nevertheless supported by their supporters by ad hoc auxiliary assumptions (Latin “to this”, “for this case”, i.e. assumptions or hypotheses specially created for a particular case ). Popper gives examples that support his conclusions: for example, in astrology, its supporters simply do not pay attention to examples that are unfavorable to them. They formulate their predictions in such a way that they can be interpreted in any way, but in favor of astrology! “The Marxist theory of history, despite the serious efforts of some of its founders and followers, eventually adopted this practice of divination. In some of its early formulations (for example, in Marx's analysis of the nature of the "coming social revolution") it made verifiable predictions and was indeed falsified. However, instead of accepting this refutation, the followers of Marx reinterpreted both the theory and the evidence in order to bring them into line. In this way, they saved the theory from refutation, but this was achieved at the cost of using means that made it generally irrefutable. (Popper K. Assumptions and denials. M., 2004. S. 70). The falsifiability of concepts, scientific (and non-scientific) assumptions is interpreted by K. Popper both as a criterion of scientific character and as a means of demarcating science and non-science. However, Popper emphasizes, this does not mean that we should fence ourselves off with a Chinese wall from myths, philosophy or pseudoscience: they may contain ideas that are very fruitful for scientific knowledge. For example, the economic theory of Marxism or psychoanalysis 3. Freud contain valuable ideas. Falsificationism versus inductivism. According to Popper, a scientist, putting forward his hypothesis (theory), predicts the consequences that logically follow from this concept. Thus, he exposes himself to criticism, risking being refuted by empirical verification. It is characteristic that Popper simultaneously opposes inductivism, since his logic of scientific discovery is based not on facts, but on theoretical assumptions, the consequences of which are empirically verified. Popper poses the question, how do we actually make the jump from statements of observation to theory? Even D. Hume argued that a general statement cannot be deduced from facts. Based on this concept, Popper argues that we are making a jump to a theory not from statements of an empirical nature, but from a problematic situation that arose as a result of the falsification of a previous theory with facts. From this follows Popper's negative attitude towards the method of induction. Popper argues that the attempt to justify the procedure of induction by appeal to experience leads to a regression to infinity. Popper refers to Hume, who emphasized that the assumption that cases that we have not yet encountered in experience will be similar to those that we have already encountered is untenable. No matter how many statements of observation that confirm a theory or a law of science, we cannot be sure that our knowledge is absolutely true. Demonstrative inductive reasoning presupposes a complete induction, and the pursuit of a complete induction takes us into the infinity of the universe (or, as Popper puts it, to a regression to infinity). Instead of an inductivist approach, Popper proposes a methodology of trial and error - assumptions and rebuttals. “We do not passively wait for repetitions that inspire or impose regularities on us, but we ourselves actively try to impose regularities on the world. We try to find similarities in things and interpret them on the basis of laws that we have invented. Without waiting for all the premises to be at our disposal, we immediately formulate conclusions. Later they will be discarded if observation shows them to be false” (Ibid., p. 83).

How is trial and error justified? It is a method of eliminating false theories by means of observational statements, and its justification is the purely logical relation of deducibility, which allows us to assert the falsity of a universal statement if we have admitted the truth of some singular statements. Popper, in his absolutization of the idea of falsificationism, was able to show the significance of this methodology as a means of freeing science from errors. But at the same time, he was unable to provide convincing evidence of how the development scientific knowledge. Truth in his concept plays only a regulatory role, but in real knowledge it is unattainable: moving from falsification to falsification, discarding false concepts, science only approaches the comprehension of truth. Later, Popper, under the influence of the ideas of A. Tarski, a Polish logician, recognized the possibility of comprehending the truth.

Deductive-pomological scheme of explanation. Popper is one of the founders of the deductive-nomological scheme of explanation, according to which a certain statement is considered explained if it can be deduced deductively from the totality of the relevant laws.

and boundary conditions. A necessary condition for an adequate deductive proof is the truth (verifiability) of the premises. Popper contrasts the usual definition of explanation as the reduction of the unknown to the known, and argues that explanation is the reduction of the known to the unknown. The movement of some hypotheses to other hypotheses of a higher level, the reduction of known to them to assumptions - this is the way of the development of science, says Popper. Analysis of degrees of explanatory power and the relationship between genuine explanation and pseudo-explanation, and between explanation and prediction, are examples of problems of great interest.

The idea of the theoretical loading of the fact. In his reasoning, Popper shows the inseparable connection between the theoretical and empirical levels of scientific knowledge. Denying the decisive role of induction in the formation of a theory, Popper answers the question why a theory cannot begin with observations. This is because observation is always selective character. It is necessary to choose an object, “a certain task, to have some interest, a point of view, a problem. And the description of the observation involves the use of a descriptive language with words that fix the corresponding properties. In addition, objects can be classified and be similar or different. only through their connection with needs and interests. Thus, the fact of science, obtained experimentally and fixed in the language of science, is formed under the influence of many factors. The result of the experiment, as well as the process of its establishment, reveals its dependence on the initial theoretical premises, as well as on the needs, interests, attitudes of the scientist, etc. e. The main problem that Popper tried to solve by putting forward the criterion of falsifiability was the problem of drawing a line between the propositions or systems of propositions of the empirical sciences and all other propositions - religious, metaphysical or simply pseudo-scientific.

Objectivity of scientific knowledge. The basis of Popper's epistemology is realism, that is, the assumption that our knowledge is knowledge about reality, and not about ideas, sensations, or language. Popper considered the development of knowledge as putting forward hypotheses and refutations to comprehend ever deeper structures of reality. In this regard, Popper criticizes the methodological setting, which he defines as essentialism. According to the length of the installation, the task of the scientist is the final substantiation of the truth of scientific theories, the comprehension of the essential nature of things, that is, those realities that lie behind the phenomena. Essentialism makes itself felt both when it requires a “final explanation”, the achievement of absolute truth, and when it denies the possibility of comprehending it: the scientist considers our ordinary world to be only an appearance behind which the real world is hidden. Popper believes, "... what is

understanding can be rejected as soon as we realize the fact that the world of each of our theories, in turn, can be explained by other further worlds described by subsequent theories - theories of a higher level of abstraction, universality and testability. Concept about essential or ultimate reality collapses along with the doctrine of the final explanation” (Ibid., pp. 194-195). “Thus, all these worlds, including our ordinary world, we must consider equally real worlds, or, perhaps, it may be better to say, equally real aspects or levels of the real world. “Looking through a microscope and moving to ever greater magnification, we can see different, completely different aspects or levels of the same thing - all equally real” (Ibid., p. 195). Therefore, we will not, for example, regard as real only the so-called "primary qualities" of the body (such as its geometric outlines) and contrast them, as the Essentialists did, with unreal and allegedly only apparent "secondary qualities" (such as color). “Indeed, both the length and the geometric outlines of the body have long been objects of explanation based on higher level theories that describe subsequent and deeper levels of reality - forces and fields of forces that are associated with primary qualities in the same way that the latter, according to essentialists, are associated with secondary qualities Secondary qualities, such as color, are just as real , as well as primary qualities, although our color sensations should, of course, be distinguished from the color properties of physical things in the same way that our perception of geometric shapes should be distinguished from the geometric properties of physical bodies ”(Ibid., pp. 195-196). Objecting to the logical positivists, Popper emphasizes that descriptive language (the language of description) is used by us in order to say about the world. This gives us new arguments in favor of realism. When we test our assumption and falsify it, then we see that there is a reality - something that our assumption collides with. Thus, our falsifications indicate the points at which we come into contact with reality. If we do not know how to test a theory, then we are likely to doubt whether there is something of the kind (or level) described by this theory. However, if a theory is testable and the events it predicts do not happen, it nevertheless asserts something about reality. Some of our theories can be compared with reality, and when this happens, we know that reality exists, that there is something that reminds us that our ideas can be wrong. Science is capable of making real discoveries, and even about the fact that in the discovery of new worlds our intellect triumphs over our sensory experience. On the criteria for the truth of our knowledge. Popper refuses to search for an absolutely reliable criterion of truth and an absolutely reliable basis of knowledge: he argued that any scientific knowledge is conjectural and subject to error (the principle of falsification). My view, says Popper, "preserves the Galilean conviction that the scientist strives to true description of the world or its individual aspects and to true explanation of observed facts. He combines this conviction with the non-Galilean understanding that although truth is the goal of the scientist, he can never know with certainty whether his achievements are true, and he is sometimes able to substantiate with sufficient certainty only the falsity of his theories ”(Ibid., p. 294 ). Popper shared the belief, implicit in the classical theory of truth, or correspondence theory, that we can call a state of affairs "real" if - and only if - the statement describing it is true. However, he considers it a serious mistake to conclude from this that the unreliability of the theory, i.e., the hypothetical, conjectural nature, in any way reduces its naive claim to describe something real. "Scientific theories are real guesses highly informative guesses about the world that, although not verifiable (i.e., cannot be shown to be true), can be subjected to rigorous critical checks. They are serious attempts to discover the truth." In a number of his statements, Popper tried to soften the rigid principle of falsification, which denies the possibility of obtaining true knowledge. In particular, based on the logical ideas of Tarski, who substantiated the correspondence (classical) theory of truth (Tarski's work "The Concept of Truth in Formalized Languages"), Popper proposed a way to define true and false judgments as corresponding or not corresponding to facts. At the same time, Popper emphasized that the theory is true regardless of whether one believes or does not believe in this theory. “It is the idea of truth that allows us to speak rationally about errors and rational criticism and makes possible rational discussion, that is, critical discussion aimed at finding errors, striving most seriously to eliminate most of them in order to approach the truth. Thus, the very idea of error and fallibility includes the idea of objective truth as a standard that we may not reach” (Ibid., p. 383). In terms of content, the solution to the problem should not be trivial, it should have explanatory power “or the improbability of the relevant information” (Ibid., p. 385). Directly related to the concept of objective truth is the problem of plausibility, which Popper considered more applicable and more important than the concept of truth itself. The growth of scientific knowledge does not consist in multiplying the degree of probability of put forward theories (which are poor in content), but in putting forward unexpected, “incredible” assumptions that radically change the usual ideas and cause the acceleration of scientific progress.

Postpositivism

Postpositivism – this is a common name for several schools of philosophy of science, united by a critical attitude towards neo-positivist epistemological teachings; this is the positivism of the fourth stage.

The main representatives of postpositivism: K. Popper, P. Feyerabend.

I may be wrong and you may be right; make an effort, and we may come closer to the truth.

ricism. Popper lived and worked in Vienna. In 1937, due to the Nazi threat, he left for New Zealand. From 1946 Popper lived and worked in England. Major works: The Logic of Scientific Research (1935), The Open Society and Its Enemies (1945), The Poverty of Historicism (1957), Assumptions and Refutations (1963), Objective Knowledge: An Evolutionary Approach (1972) .

Ontology. Following twentieth-century scientists, Popper argues: “Our world is governed not only in accordance with Newton's strict laws, but at the same time and in accordance with regularities of the case, randomness, randomness, i.e., patterns of statistical probability. And this turns our world into an interconnected system of clouds and clocks.

I. Epistemology and Philosophy of Science

critical rationalism. The modern scientific picture of the world brings Popperak to the conclusion that our knowledge of the world is hypothetical: "We do not know - we can only assume." People can get closer to the truth and can move away from it. Consequently, neither in science nor in the social sphere should there be undeniable, "authoritative" opinions; people should always have the opportunity for rational criticism, and people should be tolerant of rational criticism. Thus, critical rationalism- this is a disposition to listen to critical remarks, this is the realization of the right to make a mistake, this is a gradual approach to the truth by joint, transpersonal and supragroup efforts.

The principle of falsification. Criticizing the position of the neopositivist M. Schlick “a true statement must allow full verification”, Popper argued that any science, even empirical science, is based on statements, the verification of which is impossible. For example, modern physics relies on the postulates of the relativistic physics of Einstein, such as. The principle of verification directs scientists to look for confirmations of their hypotheses and theories, and such confirmations, as a rule, can be found in an infinite number. Confirmations contribute more to the stagnation than to the growth of scientific knowledge. Popper put forward as a criterion for distinguishing between scientific and non-scientific statements falsification principle: only that theory is scientific, which can be fundamentally refuted by experience. According to Popper, "irrefutability is not a virtue of a theory (as is often thought), but its vice". The principle of falsification makes any, even the most authoritative, teachings open to criticism. The falsification method is a way to achieve the unity of knowledge through elimination errors. The falsification procedure is more economical than the verification procedure: it is enough to find one black swan to refute the proposition "all swans are white."

Essentialism and nominalism as scientific methodologies. By analogy with medieval realism and nominalism, K. Popper singled out two scientific methodologies: essentialism and nominalism. The essentialist methodology, introduced into scientific and philosophical circulation by Aristotle, is based on the desire to reveal the essence of things and phenomena: “what is matter?”, “what is force?”, “what is justice?”. Nominalist methodology sets the task of science not to elucidate the essence of things (especially since there are many indefinite and indefinable things in the world), but to explain and describe them: “how does a given piece of matter behave?” or "how does it move in the presence of other bodies?". Nominalists believe that “We are free to introduce new concepts where it is beneficial, neglecting their original meaning. Words are just useful tools of description. Admittedly, methodological nominalism has triumphed in modern natural science; those. today it is widely recognized that fundamental concepts are indefinable, and the main task of science is "the description of things and events represented in our experience, as well as their explanation with the help of universal laws." Popper notes that these two scientific methodologies predetermine the corresponding social theories. Methodological essentialism is a method leading to the concept of one truth, unfreedom. Methodological nominalism is the basis of free discourse.

About metaphysics. Popper spoke out against the crude empiricism and strict inductivism inherent in empirical positivism.

“I don't think we're making inductive generalizations at all, i.e. we start with observations and then try to derive our theories from them. I am convinced that the opinion that we do this is a prejudice, a kind of optical illusion, and that at no stage in the development of science do we start (from scratch) without some semblance of a theory, whether it be a hypothesis or a prejudice. , or a problem—often a technological problem—that somehow guides our observations and helps us select from among the innumerable objects of observation those that may be of interest to us ... From the point of view of science, it does not matter whether we received our theories in as a result of jumping to illegitimate conclusions, either they simply stumbled upon them (thanks to "intuition"), or used some inductive method. The question "How do you came to your theory? concerns completely private problems, in contrast to the question “How do you checked your theory?”, the only one significant for science.

Popper strongly rejected the neo-positivist view that metaphysical theories are meaningless: metaphysical theories can be valid even if they are not falsifiable.

II. social views

anti-historicism. Popper introduced the concept of " historicism”, under which he united all concepts that recognize the existence of objective laws of social development, reducing the role of an individual to the role of a pawn, not a very important tool in social development. “Historicism sees the main task of the social sciences in historical prediction. This problem is solved when "rhythms", "schemes", "laws" or "trends" are seen as the basis of historical evolution. I am convinced that it is the historicist conceptions that are responsible for the unsatisfactory state of the theoretical social sciences. Popper showed the illegitimacy of attempts to make global historical predictions: “It is impossible to predict the course of human history”, historical laws do not exist, predictions of the future are impossible.

Historicism is the theoretical basis for the irresponsibility of its adherents. “If you are convinced that certain events will happen so that you do not take action against them, then you can, with a clear conscience, refuse to fight these events.” Historicist, prophetic social theories lead to "the denial of the applicability of reason to the problems of social life and, ultimately, to the doctrine of power, the doctrine of domination and submission."

Closed and open society

Popper distinguished between two types of societies: closed and open.

closed society Popper called a "magical, tribal or collectivist society" characterized by a "magical or irrational attitude to the customs of social life and, accordingly, the rigidity of these customs", based on supernatural will. This society is based on various kinds of taboos, strict social prohibitions that regulate all aspects of life and dominate people. The collectivist, tribal organization of society does not allow the development of personal responsibility of the individual.

Open (civil) society Popper called the form of a democratic society in which freedom is highly valued, and citizens are socially active and do not shift responsibility for their lives to the state and other authorities.

Signs of an open (civil) society, according to Popper

1. Democratic form of government.

2. The rule of law.

3. Institutional control over rulers. “In order to raise the question of institutional control over rulers, it is enough simply to admit that governments are not always good and wise ... It seems to me that rulers rarely rose above the average level, both morally and intellectually, and often did not even reach his. And I think that in politics it would be reasonable to be guided by the principle: "prepare for the worst, trying to achieve the best." In my opinion, it would be folly to base all our political actions on the faint hope that we can find excellent or even competent rulers.

4. Rejection of collectivism and the cultivation of intellectual freedom, i.e. freedom to make independent decisions and implement them. Intellectual freedom is necessary for responsible thinking and behavior of a person, it is a condition for people to behave as "responsible individuals, and not as part of a crowd." “The crowd is always irresponsible. But many people like to be in a crowd: they are too scared to do anything else, and therefore they themselves begin to howl when wolves howl. And then the life of a person goes to dust, ruined by cowardice and fear.

5. Cultivation of free discussion of decisions, rational criticism. The culture of the rational, i.e. transpersonal and supragroup, discussion of political decisions will ensure the choice of the most effective political course.

6. Encouragement and protection by society of formations of free communities.

7. The existence of certain state-legal institutions that guarantee compliance with all of the above points.

An open society, Popper notes, is not fully feasible in any state, but it is an ideal model to strive for.

Addressing the Russians, Popper wrote about the need to establish the rule of law and special training for this judges.

“Without the establishment of the rule of law, the development of a free market and the achievement of economic equality with the West are inconceivable. This idea seems to me fundamental and highly relevant, and since I did not notice that it was properly emphasized, I will emphasize it here. ... The Japanese, trying to establish their own version of an open society, sent abroad their best and most promising young lawyers, who were required not only to have a good knowledge of languages, but also to have experience as judges and lawyers. They had to spend some time in the courts in order to assimilate the Western tradition of legal proceedings.

Popper believes that critical rationality should become a deterrent against the spread of the irrational spirit of totalitarianism.

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