Problems with falsificationism
1. Some legitimate parts of science seem not to be falsifiable.
2. Falsification is not itself falsifiable.
3. The notion of degree of falsifiability is problematic.
4. Popper cannot account for our expectations about the future .
5. Scientists sometimes ignore falsification.
1- Some legitimate parts of science seem not to be falsifiable
1.1 Probabilistic statements
Often science does not predict a definite result, but only the probability that something will
happen.
In such a case, no individual instance is falsifiable, for basically anything could happen and it
would still be consistent with the theory.
E.g., a coin can land on the tail side without refuting the fact that it has ½ chance
of landing head side up.
This problem does not arise for probabilities defined over large population.
E.g., with enough tosses (say, 1 million) the statement that a given coin has ½ chance
of landing head side up will be considered refuted if it lands tail side up 90% of the time.
1.2 Existential statements
Science not only produces universal statements (“All Xs are Ys”), but also existential statements
(“There is an X”), that is, science says of some things that they exist.
E.g., black holes, DNA, etc.
Just because we have not found something yet, does not mean it does not exist.
E.g., extra-terrestrials living beings.
Thus, existential statements are not falsifiable.
You could have inductive grounds to think that something does not exist, but falsificationism is
supposed to allow science to do without induction.
To completely reject induction means that we can never have any reason to believe in the
unobservable entities postulated by science
E.g., gravitational fields, quarks.
Yet, these can help scientists devise otherwise highly falsifiable theories.
1.3 Unfalsifiable scientific principles
It can be defended that some unfalsifiable principle are nevertheless proper parts of science.
E.g., the principle of conservation of energy, the second law of thermodynamic (the
entropy of any closed system always increases), and the principle of ‘no action at a distance’ are
all principles that are firmly held by scientists.
Any apparent falsification will be taken as showing that something else is wrong.
Some methodological principles also appear to be central to science yet unfalsifiable.
E.g., the idea that simple and unifying theories are more likely to be true than messy
and complex ones, all other things being equal.
This methodological principle is what motivates many physicists today to try to unified
general relativity and quantum mechanics, even though there are no new additional phenomenon
to explain no covered by either one of these theories.
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