Journal of Philosophical Investigations

Document Type : Research Paper

Author

Associate Professor at Department of Philosophy & Comparative Religion Vidya Bhavana (Institute of Humanities & Social Sciences) Visva Bharati University- India

Abstract

Modern (theoretical) physics seems to be in deep crisis today as many of its core aspects are not empirically well-confirmed. Heated exchanges among physicists on the scientific status of physical theories with little or, at best, a tenuous connection to possible experimental tests is highly visible in the popular scientific literature. Some physicists (e.g., Carroll 2014, 2019; Ijjas et al., 2017) argue that science must discard empirical testability as one of its defining properties and the highly explanatory theories of present-day physics should be exempted from experimental testing, while others (e.g., Ellis & Silk 2014) spot in these arguments (for softening the testability or falsifiability requirement for modern physics) a dangerous tendency to undermine science. The philosopher of science who naturally draws most attention in these current debates is Karl Popper (1902-1994). His views, however, are often misrepresented in these debates. The prime objective of this paper is to explain how a more enlightened perspective on the ongoing debates can be obtained by a careful scrutiny of the Popperian criterion of falsifiability. As a first step in achieving this objective we will analyze the two major (conceptual) failures on which the current controversies rest. Our next step will be examining the controversial string theory to see whether the criteria of falsifiability is a ‘blunt instrument’ for determining its scientific status.

Keywords

Bartley, W. W. III. (1999). Rationality versus the Theory of Rationality. In Critical Approaches to Science and Philosophy, ed. M. Bunge, Transaction Publishers.
Blom, T. & Wessel, M. (2017). Deze wetenschappers strijden tegen alternatieve feiten, De Volkskrant.
Carroll, S. (2014). Edge essay: What scientific ideas are ready for retirement? Falsifiability. www.edge.org/response-detail/25322
Carroll, S. (2019). Beyond Falsifiability: Normal Science in a Multiverse. In Why Trust a Theory? Epistemology of Fundamental Physics, ed. R. Dardashti et al. Cambridge University Press.
Davies, P. C. W & Brown, J. (1988/2000). Superstrings: A Theory of Everything? Cambridge University Press (Canto).
Dawid, R. (2013). String Theory and the Scientific Method. Cambridge University Press.
Dawid, R. (2019). The Significance of Non-Empirical Confirmation in Fundamental Physics. In Why Trust a Theory? Epistemology of Fundamental Physics, ed. R. Dardashti et al. Cambridge University Press.
Ellis, G. F. R (2019). Theory Confirmation and Multiverses. In Why Trust a Theory? Epistemology of Fundamental Physics, ed. R. Dardashti et al. Cambridge University Press.
Ellis, G. F. R., & J. Silk. (2014). Scientific method: Defend the integrity of physics. Nature, Vol. 516: 321–3.
Greene, B. (2000). The Elegant Universe. Vintage Books.
Guth, A., et. al. (2017). A cosmic controversy, Scientific American, 316.
Hossenfelder, S. (2017). Science needs Reason to be Trusted, Nature Physics, Vol. 13, 316-317.
Ijjas, A., et. al. (2017). Pop goes the Universe, Scientific American, 32-39.
Kane, G. L. (2019). String/M-Theories about Our World Are Testable in the Traditional Physics Way. In Why Trust a Theory? Epistemology of Fundamental Physics, ed. R. Dardashti et al. Cambridge University Press.
Koyre´, A. (1973). The Astronomical Revolution, Hermann.
Lakatos, I. (1978). The Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes. Edited by J. Worrall & G. Currie. Cambridge University Press.
Miller, D. (1985). Popper Selections (eds). Princeton University Press.
Miller, D. (1994). Critical Rationalism: A Restatement and Defence, Open Court.
Miller, D. (2006). Out of Error. Ashgate Publishing Limited.
Popper, K. R. (1935/2005). The Logic of Scientific Discovery, Routledge.
Popper, K. R. (1963/2013). Conjectures and Refutations: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge, Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Popper, K. R. (1983). Realism and the Aim of Science. Routledge.
Schwarz, J. H. (2000). Introduction to Superstring Theory. arXiv: hep-ex/0008017v1 9 August 2000.
Weinberg, S. (2015). To Explain the World. Harper Perennial.
CAPTCHA Image