What is WoB? Web of Belief? Much of what analytical philosophy tries to do is a waste of time--justified true belief, etc. I prefer what the Popperians have to say to this, but aside from the rejection of justificationism, it seems they are playing the same game. Knowledge cannot be justified, but at the same time, being stuck in an inverted Humeanism is a dead end. Only formally can one say that all knowledge is conjectural and can only be falsified, not confirmed. (Corroboration means something different to them than confirmation, but I easily get confused.)
I think certain strands of philosophy of science partially overlap what I'm getting at--Neurath's boat, Harold I. Brown--but I think there's more to be said about the paradox underlying the attempt to state formal principles when in actuality little can be said of any value outside content-specific situations. Criticism I yhink can only be determinate even though can list general principles. Once they are stated, we can do no more, except to examine situations case-by-case, which are always content-driven. Using the Socratic method--which predates more elaborated philosophies--has similarities. One can attempt to keep on asking questions and examining each assumption, but the ability to formulate questions itself has dependencies-on the ability to formulate concepts, the state of knowledge achieved at some point in history, a web of background knowledge and concepts . . . Following the process to its conclusion is limited historically. I became conscious of these problems after suffering through my exposure to Popperians, and, curiously, as a result of a re-reading of the Tao Te Ching (Dao De Jing) two and a half years ago, which I subjected to the same critique. At 10:12 AM 10/1/2007, Justin Schwartz wrote: >Ralph says: > > > I suspect Anglo-American philosophy of science has >exhausted itself >and is mostly a dead-end. > >Yes, and not just philosophy of science either. It is >as Rorty predicted shortly before he jumped ship. > > friend of mine, after a lapse of many many years, > > is now working on > > completing his Masters in philosophy of science. He > > finds the issues > > in the field tedious and trivial and sees little > > advance in the past > > two decades. > >Yes. It looked very different when I was in college >and grad school and various people werehereoically >building new alternatives to positivism. > > I strongly suspect that it is pretty > > trivial, and has > > little relation to real science for reasons more > > profound than the > > actual interests or behavior of scientists. > >Well, there is a big question about how much most of >itever did have much connection to real science. > >. . . . science, like all other issues > > regarding > > knowledge, is content-driven, while philosophy is a > > purely > > formalistic enterprise. > >I don't think that there is any such thing, except >maybe (and I don't know enough to say about this) pure >mathemaetics. >--- Ralph Dumain <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > I thought that Popper trashed psychoanalysis and > > Marxism as > > non-scientific because non-falsifiable as ad hoc > > auxiliary hypotheses > > could always be brought in to account for any > > discrepancies between > > the theory and empirical evidence. But perhaps this > > is different > > from holism and the web of belief? > >Popper was a bit more generous with Marx, if not with >Marxism. > >I think that he wavered between reasserting his old >unreconstructed falsifiability and realizing that one >can legitimately make ad hoc auxiliary hypotheses to >handle recalcitrant falsifications in any any science. > > There's no real general rule for when that's a cheat >that makes what you are doing scientifically >uninteresting and when it's not. Quine and Goodman >have a notion that certain elements of the WoB are >more entrenche and non revisable, so attempts to save >them from refutattaion by adding epicycles are not to >be counted as ad hoc generally. There's something to >that in view of the actual practice of science. _______________________________________________ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
