Quine-duhem thesis and Popper essays

Quine-duhem thesis and Popper essays Does the Quine-Duhem thesis create insurmountable problems for Poppers falsificationist methodology of science? Karl Popper can be credited with positing an alternative, original methodology of science that escapes, it would appear, many of the Humean problems to induction. What follows is a careful examination of the falsificationist philosophy where it shall be shown that falsificationism is not as coherent a philosophy as one might think, and that the objection in the form of the Quine-Duhem thesis renders Poppers position deeply precarious with few escape routes. The relation of observation experiences to language shall take a key place in this essay for it is here more than anywhere else that the debate shall be decided. The argument between realism and anti-realism shall not be gone into too deeply but, for the purpose of this essay, an anti-realist idea of science shall be presupposed in the sense that it will be taken that scientific knowledge is derived from factual statements and not from things in themselves. It shall be concluded that if scientific knowledge cannot transcend and e scape the language or concepts that are employed in expressing it then the Quine-Duhem thesis really does invalidate falsificationism. But after closely looking at the implications of the Quine-Duhem and holism, it shall be shown that Quine and Duhem face severe objections and that upon one interpretation falsificationism can be seen as the means in which holism is justified i.e. how it faces the tribunal of experience en masse. One striking similarity between Popper and Quine is that they were both fallibilists, i.e. they both argued against the absolute truth of scientific theories, theories were for Popper guesses or bold conjectures awaiting refutation. Popper took seriously Humes skepticism of induction and agreed that induction could not justify scientific knowledge; by adopting his...