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Inhalt: I. AUSEINANDERSETZUNG MIT GRUNDPOSITIONEN DER KRITISCHEN GESELLSCHAFTSTHEORIE DER FRANKFURTER SCHULE. Hans ALBERT: Dialektische Denkwege. JÜrgen Habermas und der Kritische Rationalismus. William D. FUSFIELD: Some Pseudoscientific Features of Transcendental-Pragmatic Grounding Projects. Evelyn GRÖBL-STEINBACH: Reflektierte versus naive AufklÄrung? Kritische Theorie und Kritischer Rationalismus - Versuch einer Bestandsaufnahme. Kurt SALAMUN: Befriedetes Dasein und offene Gesellschaft. Gesellschaftliche Zielvorstellungen in Kritischer Theorie und Kritischem Rationalismus. II. DAS LEIB-SEELE-PROBLEM UND DIE KONZEPTION DER OFFENEN GESELLSCHAFT. Volker GADENNE: Ist der Leib-Seele-Dualismus widerlegt? Arpad SÖLTER: Der europÄische Sonderweg zur offenen Gesellschaft. Miroslav PROKOPIJEVIC: Justice in the "Open Society". Wojciech DOMALEWSKI: Zwei Toleranzbegriffe. III. VON DER TOTALITÄREN DER OFFENEN GESELLSCHAFT IN DER EHEMALIGEN SOZIALISTISCHEN LÄNDERN. Dieter WITTRICH: Alltagserfahrung als Politikum. Dariusz ALEKSANDROWICZ: Die sich Öffnende Gesellschaft und ihre Feinde. Andreas PICKEL: Schocktherapie als rationale Reformstrategie? Eine Kritik der theoretischen Grundlagen radikaler Marktkonzepte und ein PlÄdoyer fÜr Reformgradualismus. IV. METHODISCHE PROBLEME DER GESELLSCHAFTSWISSENSCHAFTEN. Herbert KEUTH: Sozialwissenschaften, Werturteile und Verantwortung. Michael SCHMID: Die Logik institutioneller Analyse aus der Sicht des Kritischen Rationalismus. Peter V. ZIMA: Framework ist kein Mythos. Zu Karl R. Poppers Thesen Über wissenschaftliche Kommunikation. ... Read more

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This collection is a timely assessment of the reactions to and abiding influence of Popper's work, and controversy it caused across many academic and political fields. ... Read more

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Sir Karl Popper (1902-1994) is one of the most controversial and widely read philosophers of the 20th century. His influence has been enormous in the fields of epistemology, logic, metaphysics, methodology of science, the philosophy of physics and biology, political philosophy, and the social sciences, and his intellectual achievement has stimulated many scholars in a wide range of disciplines. These three volumes of previously unpublished essays, which originate in the congress Karl Popper 2002 held in Vienna to mark the centenary of Popper's birth, provide an up-to-date examination of many aspects of Popper's life and thought. Volume 2 deals especially with Popper's metaphysics and epistemology, including his proposal (critical rationalism) that it is through sharp criticism rather than through the provision of justification that our knowledge progresses. Several papers tackle the problem of the empirical basis, and offer decidedly different answers to some unresolved questions. The volume contains also a number of papers evaluating Popper's celebrated, but much contested, solution to Hume's problem of induction. ... Read more

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The rules of the game of science
This book should put an end to the view that Popper's philosophy of science can usefully be summed up by the label "falsificationism", a view that has been perpetuated even by commentators as well informed and sympathetic as Alan Chalmers in What is this thing called Science? Popper expounded a critical method, with five forms of criticism.

1. The check on the problem. Does the theory solve the problem?
2. The check of logic. Is the theory internally consistent?
3. The check of consistency with other well-tested theories.
4. The check of evidence, falsifiability (if this is appropriate).
5. The check on the metaphysics.

The focus in this book by Jarvie is check 4, the use of evidence, although this is just the point of departure and the destination is much more interesting.

Jarvie argues strenuously that Popper's first major work in early 1930s can be interpreted to anticipate the social turn in the philosophy of science. This may be called the strong version of his thesis, by analogy with the strong program in the sociology of science. A weaker version of Jarvie?fs thesis, which is equally fruitful but possibly less controversial, is that Popper should be regarded as a conventionalist in scientific methodology (not to be confused with conventionalism as a theory of truth). Jarvie has argued convincingly that the decisive achievement of Logik der Forschung was to show the indispensable function of methodological conventions as rules of the game in science. This mirrors Popper?fs approach to political philosophy; as the function of the philosophy of science is to formulate and criticize the rules of the game of science, so the function of moral and political philosophy is to do the same for the rules of the game of social and political life. These rules may be unwritten conventions, mores and folkways, traditions, laws of the land and institutions of all kinds.

The Introduction to the book, Science as an Institution, sets out the major issues in the complex relationship between science and society that Jarvie hopes to illuminate. The word science of course has many different uses and discussion can easily be confused by conflating two or more of the meanings. Science may refer to a body of public knowledge; a set of beliefs about the world; the whole range of activities performed by scientists; some subset of those activities that are supposed to be special to science; the social and political institutions that influence the activities of scientists. Jacques Barzun wrote a particularly valuable book with the title Science: The Glorious Entertainment. Jarvie is clearly aware of the nuances of the topic and he surveys various approaches to it, including the positivist and falsificationist demarcation principles and Merton's sociological account of the distinguishing features of scientific knowledge.

Chapter 1 unpacks the hidden elements of the social turn in Popper's early philosophy of science. The key concept here is the need for rules of the game in science and these constitute what Jarvie calls the proto-constitution of science. This is the foundation of his project and he spells out this constitution in some detail, drawing from The Logic of Scientific Discovery (originally Logik der Forschung, 1935). In the following chapters he works through the evolution of Popper's thoughts over the decade from 1935 to 1945 to show how his views on science and society developed to the point they reached in The Poverty of Historicism and The Open Society and its Enemies.

The second chapter of Jarvie's book is called Popper's 1935 Proto-Constitution for the Republic of Science. This contains a list with Popper's supreme or meta-rule (SR) and 14 subsidiary rules (R1 to R14), which constitute the rudimentary scaffolding for Popper's republic of science.

SR: The other rules of scientific procedure must be designed in such a way that they do not protect any statement in science against falsification.

R1: The game of science is, in principle, without end. He who decides one day that scientific statements do not call for any further test, and that they can be regarded as finally verified, retires from the game.

R2: Once a hypothesis has been proposed and tested, and has proved its mettle, it may not be allowed to drop out without 'good reason'.

The "supreme rule" and the first two subsidiary rules were proposed by Popper, then Jarvie has identified additional rules that can be found scattered in the text of Popper's book.

R3: We are not to abandon the search for universal laws and for a coherent theoretical system, nor ever give up our attempts to explain causally any kind of event we can describe.

R5: Only those auxiliary hypotheses are acceptable whose introduction does not diminish the degree of falsifiability or testability of the system in question but, on the contrary, increases it.

R9: After having produced some criticism of a rival theory, we should always make a serious attempt to apply this criticism to our own theory.

And so on.

Jarvie's commentary on the constitution begins with the reminder that it is very incomplete. He notes also that it is very abstract, as thought the whole of science is a kind of debating society, leaving out of account a great deal of gritty reality, such as the question of leadership in the decision-making that is inevitably required, including decisions about adding to the constitution or revising it.

One of the implications of the social turn described by Jarvie is that the nature of objectivity is radically shifted. It ceases to be a problem for individual scientists, requiring that they be unbiased, rational and free from preconceptions. It becomes a situational or institutional problem, calling for such things as theoretical pluralism, clear formulation of the problems that the theories are supposed to solve, the design of critical experiments, the existence of journals, seminars and conferences to facilitate critical discussion. Some of these requirements need to be provided by individual scientists, especially new ideas and imaginative criticism; others call for institutions, including political institutions, to protect the autonomy of the journals and the research institutes. ... Read more

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This digital document is an article from The Review of Metaphysics, published by Philosophy Education Society, Inc. on June 1, 2010. The length of the article is 539 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Keuth, Herbert. The Philosophy of Karl Popper.(Book review)
Author: Riccardo Pozzo
Publication: The Review of Metaphysics (Magazine/Journal)
Date: June 1, 2010
Publisher: Philosophy Education Society, Inc.
Volume: 63Issue: 4Page: 928(2)

Article Type: Book review

Distributed by Gale, a part of Cengage Learning ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Philosophy - A way to enlightment
Popper has been one of the most influential German thinkers and philosophers of the 20th century. This book summarizes a multitude of his invaluable ideas. In 30 essays the reader is introduced to Popper's broad thinking - from his theory on knowledge creation and scientific progress to his criticism of historicism.
I found Popper's ideas and thoughts very intriguing, and can highly recommend it. It opens up a new scope onto many contemporary issues. Nonetheless, a word of warning: the book is not an easy and fast read, if you want to get the most of it. ... Read more

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Popper's theory of science has been widely misunderstood and poorly represented in the literature on philosophy of science, over the last three decades. This book discusses the main issues in Popper's theory of science and, after giving a careful characterization of each issue, examines the main objections that have been raised against them and offers ways of circumventing them.   It demonstrates that Popper's theory can guide us again to a better understanding of the aim and the structure of science. ... Read more